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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 15, 2002)
Smoke Signals 3 NOVEMBER 15, 2002 Code Talker Roy Hawthorne Tells HowThe Code Developed Code Talker continued from front page guage was not to be spoken. There were cer tain punishments for speaking the language. The teacher would take you down to the wash room and wash out your mouth with lye soap. If you persisted, you'd be confined to a dark base ment, chained to a water heater." An irony, he noted, "for those who would soon be called on to speak (the language) to assist in the military to overcome an enemy that was over coming American forces..." The code talker project was secret enough that Steve Bobb, designer and driving force of the Veterans' Memorial project, who served as a ma rine during Vietnam, "didn't realize that code talkers were Marines. I didn't know (anything about them) until the movie came out," he said. The code talkers were made famous recently by the Nicolas Cage movie, Windtalkers. Based on the Navajo language, the codes were never broken during the war, and are now considered a vital part of the American victory. Code talking came about, Hawthorne said, when the son of a missionary family minister ing to the Navajos got the idea that the Navajo language could turn around the war effort. At the time, the Japanese were quickly and effi ciently breaking every American code. The Japanese forces were so good and so cocky that they would "break into AM radio bands and say, 'Thank you, we'll be waiting for you,'" Hawthorne said. Persisting in the face of rejection, this mission ary boy finally convinced the military to put to gether a pilot project of 30 Navajos. They were "The Japanese did not want to ad mit that they had met their match, but this was the only military code that was never broken." Roy Hawthorne Code Talker recruited, Hawthorne among them, but for what, they did not know. "When I heard that they were going to give us special jobs," Hawthorne said, "I thought they were going to make us Generals!" They went to boot camp instead, and then to communications training. Development of the code came in two parts. The first, Hawthorne said, was vocabulary. Since the Navajo language had no military ter minology, the project developed Navajo words for military hardware in the air, on the surface, and in the sea. He cited examples for airplanes. "We searched for a bird with similar characteristics," he said. 4 ; J !' : n PCVr " "'J- W6 i it. 1 1 A And yet, the project almost came to a halt be fore it got off the ground "because the officers couldn't understand it." "I'm not a Veteran," said Tribal Council mem ber Valorie Sheker-Robertson, "but he has en lightened me to the Indian contribution." Hawthorne also told stories of soldiers break- For a reconnaissance plane, they looked for a quiet bird that just took in information. They settled on the owl. For tanks, he said, they se lected the Navajo word for turtle. An aircraft carrier became a bird carrier. A submarine be came an iron fish. All in the Navajo language, mind you. The second part of the project was to give Na vajo names to every letter of the American al phabet. For "a," for example, there were three Navajo code words: "and," which in the Navajo language is "woolichee;" "apple," which is "bilasana;" and "axe," which is "fsenix." It is easy to see why these words, which begin with any thing but "a" would be hard to decipher. Two hundred and eleven initial Navajo words repre senting letters would ultimately be expanded to 600 words by war's end, said Hawthorne. "The Japanese did not want to admit that they had met their match," Hawthorne said, "but this was the only military code that was never bro ken." "How can you express the feeling of honor?" said Tribal Council Chairwoman Cheryle Kennedy. "It's just once in a lifetime that you can witness someone of your own nation who made such a great contribution to the world. If the war had been lost, what would it have been like?" At Iwo Jima, Hawthorne said, some 800 mes sages were delivered without error. ing down under the pressure of war. "War is a crime," he said. "It really is." "This is relevant to what we're facing today," said Catholic Bishop Emeritis and Veteran B. Dak Rissan. "Individuals are going in there and don't know what they're facing." At the same time, Hawthorne said, "it opened up many doors for us, for the Navajo. We came into contact with different cultures and learned how to get along together. It also taught us about setting goals. And education became a goal for many of us." "After the war," Hawthorne said, "Navajo Code Talkers earned degrees in theology and educa tion. We became educators and ministers and businessmen." He also described why he has a special place in his heart for nurses. He recalled being fer ried out of a Korean trouble spot (he was in the infantry here, not a code talker) on a MASH unit helicopter. "I opened my eyes in a dimly lit building but I came to realize it was my lights that were going out. A string of doctors came by, made little noises like 'hmmm,' and 'hmmm.' But it was a nurse who came by and held my hand and said, 'Chief, you're going to make it!'" Tribal Council member Val Grout summed up the feelings of many about the evening, when she said, "I thought it was fanastic." Eagle Beak drums at the Veterans' Memorial Fundraiser. The Fundraiser's Other Headliners The evening also included other speakers, dancers and some great drum and voice work by the Eagle Beak Singers. Klarice Westley led the invocation. The Tillicum Dancers, including Indians of many ages, performed the Grass Dance, tradition ally done to flatten down the grasses. There also was a men's Traditional Dance, a But terfly Dance, a Upai Dance, an Owl Dance, an Eel Dance and a Laughing Dance. In the Northwest, said Westley, "an abun dance of food gave us a lot of time for play ing games, for fun and for social dances." Darrell Dean Butler, a Siletz Indian and Veteran of the American Indian Movement (AIM), said that something happens in war to "bring the physical and spiritual together. It is this fulfillment that makes them the Vets that come home. I came to the crossroads when I became a Vet where I no longer hate. AIM was a spiritual awakening. "My father always said, 'I didn't go over there to fight for this government. I went to fight for my people, my homeland.'" "As Indian people, we have been put on reservations and signed many treaties, but we have never surrendered," said Nick Sixkiller, a Cherokee, an Education Special ist in Eugene for the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, and master of ceremonies for the evening. H
