Chickasaw, Unconquered and Unconquerable has been named a finalist for a 2007 Oklahoma Center for the Book award in the Design and Illustration category.
“It is very gratifying to see the first publication of the Chickasaw Press named as a finalist for this prestigious award,” said Bill Anoatubby, governor of the Chickasaw Nation. “Everyone involved in this project was dedicated to providing meaningful insight into the story of the Chickasaw people and they definitely succeeded.”
The book was produced in cooperation with Graphic Arts Center Publishing Company. Designed by Betty Watson, the book features photography by Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame member and three-time Oklahoma Photographer of the year David Fitzgerald.
Graphics, art, essays, recollections and memoirs of the Chickasaw people from Removal to present day are used to tell the story of the Chickasaw people.
Contributing writers include Chickasaw authors Linda Hogan, Dr. Amanda Cobb and Jeannie Barbour.
Hogan is a prolific author whose career spans more than two decades. She has won several awards, including the Guggenheim Award, the Before Columbus Foundation American Book award, the Five Civilized Tribes Playwriting Award, and the Wordcraft Circle’s Writer of the Year (Prose-Fiction) award.
Dr. Cobb is the author of “Listening to our Grandmothers’ Stories: The Bloomfield Academy for Chickasaw Females,” which won the 2001 American Book Award and the North American Indian Prose Award. Dr. Cobb, who earned her Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma, is an assistant professor in the Department of Native American Studies at the University of New Mexico.
Barbour teaches Chickasaw history classes and lectures on Chickasaw political structure and culture. She is an award-winning artist who has done extensive research on Chickasaw culture and documented little known facts about that culture in her art work. Several images of her art work appear in the book.
The Chickasaw Press is part of a comprehensive effort to offer more Chickasaw history and culture to the reading public.
That effort, outlined by Gov. Anoatubby in his Oct. 2005 state of the nation address, includes the publishing company, a series of publication awards and a center for the study of Chickasaw culture and history.
“We hope to provide encouragement and support to authors and scholars interested in Chickasaw heritage,” said Gov. Anoatubby. “By providing an outlet for their work, awards for outstanding achievements and a resource to assist in research efforts, we believe we can do a great deal to inspire authors and expand the scope of knowledge of our tribe’s history, heritage and culture.”
Awards will be announced Saturday, March 10 at the Petroleum Club in Oklahoma City.
