Comanche Tribal Members Receive AARP Native American Elder Honors

On Wednesday, November 5, Comanche Nation tribal members were honored at AARP Native American Elder Honors event at the First Americans Museum in Oklahoma City.

Verna Cable-Burgess and Gene Sovo received medals for their work in preserving native culture.

Burgess said it was very humbling to receive the award.

“It's very surprising. I'm awed by the recipients and how measly this little person can be with that group…It's the first time I really feel honored,” she said.

Burgess said working with the Elders Council is one of her most significant accomplishments.

“Oh my gosh, it's quite an experience. It's very educational for me,” she said. “I didn't think I would do very well in that group, but I've come to really respect my elders, and they've got a lot to teach us, and I've got a lot to learn yet.”

Burgess is also raising a family.

“I want them to all know of our Numunu ways. You know, when we were growing up, we weren't taught to be Comanche. We were taught to accept and live with the white man. We went to his school, we wore his clothes, we went to his church, and that was fine with me because I had a big family. We were all together and that was fine,” she said. “But somewhere through there, my mother got involved. My mother and my sister got involved with the Comanche Nation language group, Comanche Language Culture and Preservation Committee. And my mother was a master in the language, and my sister, Billie Kreger, was her apprentice. When they got involved, it was a family thing, and we all got involved with that.So, being and doing that inspires and encourages me to further my knowledge in our Numunu ways.”

Burgess said people need to live life to the fullest.

“Life is short. It's very short. I'm 76 years old. I never thought in my lifetime even 70 would come to me,” she said. “Growing up, it was hard, but because we had such a large family, we helped each other, and we never really suffered poverty, although we were termed that. But because our daddy worked and took care of us, and provided for us, and Mother was at home, we had one mama, one daddy for nine children, about nine cousins, about nine grandkids. And at any dinner table, it was full. And we always started with prayer, and we always laughed, and we always sang.”

Burgess said tribal members and youth also need to get involved.

“I was saddened by us having a grant from AARP to build a community garden. I was very enthused in the beginning because I thought, ‘Oh boy, everybody's going to come out, we're going to get this garden going, and we're just going to produce all these wonderful fruits and vegetables, and we're going to share them with each other.’ That didn't happen,” she said. “We did a little bit of it, and we asked for volunteers, and we got no volunteers. And that's sad. So, people get involved. Volunteer. It's so important.”

Sovo said it was also humbling to receive the award out of all the Comanches, elders and Native Americans in the area.

As for his most significant accomplishment…

“When I had the privilege to be a Kiowa Native American character in the movie Lonesome Dove, in the miniseries, and we filmed that in ‘89, and they found me because of my ability to horsemanship. We grew up on horses, so we were very agile, and we could ride bareback, saddle, whatever, you know. So, they kind of selected me in that part of it,” he said. “But as well as knowing a lot of our past culture, our history of our peoples, the way they did things way back when, you know. Used to, we had those old folks would come back and say, ‘How did they do this?’ ‘How did they do that?’ you know. And now we're finding ourselves more so having to rely on what the old folks told us because they're all gone now, and we're becoming, slowly but surely, we're becoming the elders of the tribe.”

Sovo is currently working to raise awareness within the Native American church.

“On possible ways that we'll always be able to have our natural resources for our peyote, herb, for our younger generation in the future,” he said. “And we're also, like Veterans Day on November 11, we're going to do a Tu-whee dance, the Black Knife Dance, and we try to maintain that knowledge and that culture of that dance exactly the way the late Joe A. Attocknie taught us. And so, we try to maintain that as part of our culture, you know, preserving our culture.”

Sovo is trying to encourage the younger generation to become more involved in the church as well.

“It's a very strenuous religion. You go in at dark 30, come out on sunrise, you know, whereas most of your churches go in about 10:30, 11 to church on Sunday and come out at noon and then go on about the rat killing, you know. But we've been raised to believe that you got to give a little something to get a little something,” he said. “And it's, like I said, it's a hard religion, but it's a very, very good religion as far as getting things…They have always said, ‘Our white man churches, they talk about the Lord.’ You go into the teepee, throughout the night, you talk to our Creator instead of talking about Him. So that they always, our elders always influenced that. That's one of the things that was a difference between our Native American church and that is the closeness that we have with our Creator.”

Sovo said the younger generation needs to reconnect with their elders and become closer.

“Your grandparents, your great-grandparents…call them maybe once a week, every other day or something like that. Get in contact with them. Let them know you, as a younger generation, you haven't forgot our elders. When they want to sit down and tell stories, sit down and listen to them,” he said. “…They have so much culture that's going to go to waste if the younger generation doesn't slow down and sit down and listen to what our old folks have to say. That's how I learned. And that's the only way it's going to be taken into the future is if our younger generation slows down long enough to listen and kind of absorb what our old folks have to offer.”

The award ceremony featured guest speakers, and friends and families offered their support for recipients.