The name of John Trudell was often thought of as synonymous with Native American rights and activism, whether through his work with the American Indian Movement (AIM), his acting roles, or his music. An early organizer of political action, he worked both in the forefront and behind the scenes in trying to secure a guarantee of basic freedoms for indigenous Americans.
The son of Thurman Clifford Trudell, a Dakota (Santee) Sioux, and Ricarda Almanza, of Native American-Mexican descent, Trudell was a native of Niobrara, Nebraska. Little is known of his early years until he began actively organizing Natives for political action in California in the 1960s. A resident of Los Angeles in 1969, he and first wife, Lou, along with their children, Maurie and Tara, went to the San Francisco Bay area to join the group occupying Alcatraz Prison. They landed on the island on November 30, just over a week after the organization, Indians of All Tribes, Inc. (IAT) had "seized" it in accord with the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. That treaty included the provision that unused federal land could be taken by Native people; IAT took the island in order to set up an educational facility.
Wovoka Trudell, Lou and John's son was born on Alcatraz, as was John's future as a spokesperson. He hosted a daily radio program called Radio Free Alcatraz, in which he called for the founding of the Native Studies center, archives and a religious retreat, and interviewed some notable Natives, including activist Grace Thorpe (daughter of athlete Jim Thorpe). The Trudells stayed on Alcatraz until the end of the occupation in June of 1971.
By the time they returned to the mainland, Trudell was a member of the American Indian Movement, and went on to become its national spokesperson. He took part in the 1972 Trail of Broken Treaties, a mass movement of Natives across the country, which converged on the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) headquarters in Washington, D.C. The event was intended to focus public awareness on Native rights and abuses of them, but the eventual occupation of the BIA and subsequent property damage cast a negative light on their effort in the eyes of the general public.
Trudell's effectiveness as a speaker throughout the turbulent event gained him the scrutiny of the FBI. When he was elected co-chair of AIM the next year, that scrutiny intensified. When AIM and their supporters took over the small settlement of Wounded Knee, South Dakota on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1973, John Trudell was there. When two FBI agents and one Native American were killed in a shoot-out at the Jumping Bull Compound at Pine Ridge in 1975, catapulting AIM members "Dino" Butler, Rob Robideaux, and Leonard Peltier into national headlines, Trudell parried with the press about the possible illegalities involved in the government's presence on the reservation.
An articulate master of irony, Trudell continued to make enemies with his public statements concerning Peltier, AIM, Native rights, and federal policy. A 1975 incident in Owhyee, Nevada, in which Trudell fired a pistol into the ceiling of a trading post to protest alleged overpricing of goods by the non-Native American owner, did not discredit him as many of those enemies had hoped; however, Trudell ultimately served short sentences on several occasions. In one facility, he reports that he was told by another inmate that unless he stopped his activist efforts, his family might be harmed. At the time, such threat seemed to be part of political organizing and Trudell let the matter drop.
Years of absences from home for various causes contributed to the incompatibility that brought the marriage of Lou and John Trudell to a "friendly" end. John remarried, this time to a Duck Valley Shoshone-Paiute activist, Tina Manning. They lived on her people's Nevada reservation, working for AIM and other Native American rights groups. They had three children, Ricarda Star, Sunshine Karma, and Eli Changing Sun. On February 11, 1979, Trudell was away from home speaking in Washington, D.C., on abuse of Native rights by the federal government. To bring more attention to the Peltier case, Trudell burned an upside-down American flag and was arrested. Within twelve hours, the Manning-Trudell house on the Duck Valley Reservation was set afire. Burned to death were Leah Manning, Tina's mother, Ricarda, Sunshine, Eli, and a pregnant Tina Manning-Trudell. A later investigation listed the cause of the fire as accidental; however, Trudell has repeatedly asserted that he suspected government complicity in the fire.
In the 1980s, Trudell began to shift his focus from AIM. He continued to speak on Native American rights, lobby for Leonard Peltier, and recount his personal loss as an object lesson. He was also testing the waters to branch out into other fields. He played a cameo role in Hand-Made Film's production of Powwow Highway. In 1992, he appeared in the film Thunderheart, playing a character based on Peltier. That same year, he released his first album, AKA Graffiti Man on Rykodisc, an independent label. Johnny Damas and Me, his second effort, was released in 1994, and he has played numerous concerts on behalf of Native rights groups.
In the twenty-first century, Trudell continued to focus on his film, music, and writing careers. He starred in 1998's Smoke Signals, a film based on the works of Native American writer Sherman Alexie. Trudell also had roles in 2004's Sawtooth and 2012's Dark Blood. In 2005 his life was the subject of the documentary film Trudell, which featured interviews with actors Robert Redford, Sam Shepard, Val Kilmer, and Kris Kristofferson.
In 1999 Trudell published a collection of poems called Stickman. He followed that up with another poetry collection, Lines From a Mined Mind, in 2008. Trudell also continued to record albums, including Blue Indians (1999), Descendant Now Ancestor (2001), Bone Days (2001), Live A Fip (2003), Crazier Than Hell (2010), and Wazi's Dream (2015). On December 8, 2015, Trudell died of cancer at his home in Santa Clara, California. He was 69.