1. Mary TallMountain was a poet and storyteller of mixed Scotch-Irish and Koyukon ancestry.
17 Facts About Mary TallMountain
1. 2.
Mary TallMountain started her working career as a legal secretary and began writing around age 50 when she was a contributor to the Native American Renaissance.
3.
Mary TallMountain eventually owned her own stenography business, which she lost while battling cancer.
4.
Mary TallMountain lived in San Francisco until her death in 1994.
5.
Mary TallMountain was born on June 19,1918, in Nulato, Alaska, to a mother of Russian and Native American heritage, and a father of Irish-Scottish descent, who was an American soldier.
6.
Mary TallMountain was born to the Athabascan tribe, which is believed to be one of the original tribes that came over to Alaska via land bridge from Asia.
7.
Mary TallMountain was not allowed to speak her native tongue, and was bullied by the white school children she attended school with.
8.
Mary TallMountain was then diagnosed with cancer in 1968, while she overcame this, she lost her business.
9.
Mary TallMountain began to keep a journal, as her adoptive mother had her do when she was a child.
10.
Mary TallMountain writes "Coyotes' Desert Lament," where the narrator becomes a coyote, exploring Native thought how all creatures and people are connected.
11.
Mary TallMountain was diagnosed with cancer a second time in 1978, then when she went into remission she located her biological father.
12.
Mary TallMountain was battling cancer, living in Phoenix, Arizona, and spent the last few years of his life with her.
13.
Mary TallMountain was located by an Alaskan poet and given a grant to travel and teach to local schools, communities, and prisons.
14.
Mary TallMountain suffered a stroke in 1992, which left her with aphasia, the inability to express or understand language.
15.
Mary TallMountain then stopped doing any readings or teaching, but continued to write until her death on September 2,1994.
16.
Mary TallMountain's work titled "Listen To The Night" was published in 1995 by Freedom Voices.
17.
The Rasmussen Library at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks houses an archival collection of Mary TallMountain's published and unpublished works.