Minnie’s War Bonnet
Animated Short
Director, Producer, Writer
Minnie’s War Bonnet: A Modern Native Warrior Woman
Yvonne Russo’s animated short pays tribute to Minnie Hollow Wood, one of the many women warriors who fought courageously alongside male warriors in major battles such as the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876. Minnie was the first Lakhota woman warrior to be honored with a sacred War Bonnet, a symbolic give-away, representing one of the highest honors of war, peace and valor.
It was 1979 when my mother decided to leave the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. My mom had just traded her 1964 Ford Mustang to my Uncle Bob for two Amtrak train tickets to Los Angeles. I remember that Ford so well, it had a rust hole on the passenger side floor. As my mom drove along the highway, I would be riding shotgun, watching the paved road underneath my feet.
When my mother left her life on the Rosebud Reservation for a new one in Los Angeles, it was post Wounded Knee, and times were tough. Our community was holding on to what they had – land, government houses, and USDA commodity foods. Since my mom couldn’t find a job on the Reservation, we left. I remember she only had 35 cents in her pocket and two suitcases. She was determined to start a new life for us – a vivid memory as a kid – trying to understand it all, and what it meant to be Lakhota in America.