Carter Camp (August 18, 1941,Pawnee, Oklahoma – December 27, 2013,White Eagle, Oklahoma) (Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma) was anAmerican Indian Movement activist. Camp played a leading role in the 1972Trail of Broken Treaties that traveled to Washington, DC, where protesters took over the Department of Interior building. Camp was also one of the organizers of the 1973Wounded Knee occupation on thePine Ridge Indian Reservation inSouth Dakota, to highlight the Lakota desire for sovereignty.
In his later years Camp opposed the construction of theKeystone Pipeline, an oil pipeline proposed from the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin in Alberta to refineries in Illinois and Texas.[1]
Carter Augustus Camp was born to Woodrow Camp and Jewell McDonald in Pawnee, Oklahoma, on August 18, 1941, the third of six children of thePonca family. His brothers Craig Camp, Dwain Camp, and Cordell Camp and sisterCasey Camp-Horinek survived him. His sister Darlena Overland preceded him in death. His father Woodrow Camp was a union activist.[2][3]
Camp was sent away toIndian boarding school, under Federal policy intended to "Christianize" Native American children in those years. He graduated in 1959 from theHaskell Institute, now known asHaskell Indian Nations University, inLawrence, Kansas.[2][3]
According to his sister Casey Camp-Horinkek, in 1960–1963 Carter served as a corporal in theU.S. Army, stationed inBerlin.[2][3] He lived in Los Angeles after his discharge, working as an electrician in a factory and serving asshop steward for the union.
He married Linda Carson. They had several children together: Kenny, Jeremy, Victorio, Mazhonaposhe, Ahmbaska, and Augustus.[3]
Becoming politically active, Camp joined theAmerican Indian Movement when it was founded in 1968.[2] He organized the first AIM chapters in Kansas and Oklahoma.[3]
With AIM, he helped lead the 1972Trail of Broken Treaties protest, which led a caravan from theWest Coast across the country toWashington, D.C..[2] During the caravan,Hank Adams wrote theTwenty Points document, which had demands for the federal government.[3][4] After the caravan reached the capital, activists occupied theBureau of Indian Affairs national headquarters building.[2] They presented theTwenty Points document to top BIA officials.
In 1973, Camp helped organize theoccupation of Wounded Knee on thePine Ridge Indian Reservation. He led the first group of AIM members as they seized the trading post in the village, cut phone lines, forcedBureau of Indian Affairs staff to leave town, and took eleven hostages. Camp was one of the primary organizers, along withDennis Banks andRussell Means, and he acted as the action's spokesperson.[5] Camp signed off on the agreement ending the occupancy, although not all his fellow activists did.[2] For his actions, Camp was charged and convicted of "abducting, confining, and beating four postal inspectors." He served three years in prison.[2] Camp's sister, Casey Camp-Horinkek, disputes the charges of the alleged assault.[1]
Camp was elected chair of AIM in August 1973, but was expelled shortly afterward after a controversial conflict with fellow AIM leaderClyde Bellecourt; Camp took much of AIM's Oklahoma support with him.[2][6][7]
After his time in AIM, Camp continued his activism. For over twenty years Camp was an organizer and participant in the annualsun dance held in theRosebud Indian Reservation,[1] along withLeonard Crow Dog. The latter was also one of theWounded Knee occupiers. Camp also organized and protested against aLewis and Clark Expedition re-enactment and a motorcycle bar near his Oklahoma reservation.[2]
Camp was involved in a variety of environmental actions. He organized support against construction of theKeystone Pipeline, designed to run from the Canadian Sedimentary Basin in Alberta to refineries in Illinois and Texas.[1] He also opposed siting hazardous waste dumps on Native American lands.
Camp died in Oklahoma after a yearlong battle against cancer.[2]
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