A Professor Claimed to Be Native American. Did She Know She Wasn’t?

As Hoover and her sisters grew older, they began to find a sense of purpose and identity in a story that Anita told them about their family. Their great-grandmother, she said, had been a Mohawk Indian, and she had drowned herself in order to escape her drunk and abusive French Canadian husband. The girls were also told that they were Mi’kmaq on their father’s side. Anita began taking the girls to powwows across western New York and New England, where Native Americans would play music, share crafts, and dance. These gatherings are held throughout the country. They are intertribal and offer opportunities for Native Americans who have become disconnected from their people to be welcomed back in.