Born: 15 June 1899, United States
Died: 1 November 2005
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA
Mohegan medicine woman, anthropologist, author, elder and tribal council member Gladys Tantaquidgeon co-founded the Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum, the oldest to be owned and operated by Native Americans, in 1931. She also published several books about traditional healing practices, and her archive of tribal records and correspondence were vital to the case for federal recognition of the Mohegan, which the tribe received in 1994.
As a child, Tantaquidgeon learned from respected female elders known as nanus, including Fidelia Fielding (1827–1908) and Emma Fielding Baker (1828–1916). Baker, Tantaquidgeon’s maternal aunt, was posthumously elected the tribal medicine woman, and inducted into the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame for her work in cultural education and preservation. From a young age, Tantaquidgeon studied with her, with a focus on traditional herbal medicine.
As a young woman, she was invited to study anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania with Frank Speck, who had worked with Fidelia Fielding. She assisted him with fieldwork, expanding her knowledge of other Native American cultures and their traditional medicine practices. She went on to work with the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs from 1934 to 1947, including helping indigenous artisans preserve the knowledge of traditional skills and create pathways to sell their work. She developed ways to revive cultural practices, including those that had been legally prohibited in the 1800s like the Ghost Dance and the Sun Dance. She also published several books about Native American healing practices.
With her father and brother, Tantaquidgeon had established the Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum in 1931, and after leaving government work in 1947, she worked at the museum for the next five decades until 1998, when she was in her late 90s. A likeness of her resides in the museum. In the 1970s and 1980s, she served on the Mohegan Tribal Council, promoting the preservation and revival of the language and customs. In 1992 she was elected the Tribal Medicine Woman of the Mohegan.
Her honors include honorary doctorates from the University of Connecticut (1987) and Yale University (1994), being inducted into the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame and the National Organization for Women’s Harriet Tubman Award (1996) for “consistent endeavor in the area of social justice.”