NYT Blog: Reading more about activist Anna Mae Pictou Aquash

Johanna Brand, a Canadian journalist and the author of “The Life and Death of Anna Mae Aquash,” spent a year in the late 1970s talking to Aquash’s friends and family. Brand’s brief biography vividly describes Aquash’s early years in a community of Mikmaq Indians in Nova Scotia, where she lived in a small hut without electricity or running water. By her early 20s, Aquash had moved to Boston and was married and raising two young daughters. It was here that she began to work as a community organizer, helping other Mikmaq Indians find work, housing and counseling services. Later, she taught at an Indian cultural center in Maine. Brand’s book was first published in 1978, years before anyone was found criminally responsible for Aquash’s murder.

In 1999, Antoinette Nora Claypoole, a teacher and Native American activist, published “Who Would Unbraid Her Hair: The Legend of Annie Mae.” Claypoole’s unconventional biography explores Anna Mae’s deep commitment to Native American rights and uses a mix of poetry and prose to describe Aquash’s life and the circumstances surrounding her death.