The Fargo-Grand Forks Forum has an interesting piece on Marlon Brando's activism on behalf of Native Americans, particularly in South Dakota, headlined "Brando remembered for off-screen activism." Excerpt:
Marlon Brando's movie career and his celebrity support of American Indians famously intersected when he refused to personally accept an Oscar for his role in "The Godfather.''Instead, Brando sent a young woman to accept the award and serve as his voice, a voice that noted the "recent happenings at Wounded Knee" β a reference to armed activists' occupation of a village on South Dakota's Pine Ridge Reservation in 1973....
In 1975, he went to Rapid City, S.D., to post a $30,000 cash bond for AIM leader Russell Means, who was charged in a shooting death of a Pine Ridge man. He also appeared at an AIM rally at the state capitol in Pierre, S.D.
Brando even has an often-forgotten cameo role in one of the darkest chapters in AIM history β the conviction of Leonard Peltier for the 1975 murders of two FBI agents at Pine Ridge.
Before fleeing to Canada, Peltier was stopped by police in Oregon; he was driving a recreational vehicle registered to Brando. When police searched the vehicle, they found a pistol belonging to one of the slain agents β later found to contain a fingerprint matched to Peltier.
Peltier, an Ojibwe from the Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota, was convicted of the murders by a federal jury in Fargo. Brando was one of a long list of celebrities who called for Peltier's release.
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