Walking Beyond Our Ancestors’ Footsteps: An Urban Native American Experience

by Levi Rickert

Life-long Grand Rapids area resident Levi Rickert, a tribal citizen of the Potawatomi, will provide an overview of a new exhibition that will open on November 3, 2015 at Grand Valley State University’s Mary Idema Pew Library, named “Walking Beyond Our Ancestors’ Footsteps: An Urban Native American Experience.”

Rickert has been part of the planning team that developed “Walking Beyond Our Ancestors’ Footsteps: An Urban Native American Experience.” The exhibition originated within the Kutsche Office of Local History, located in Brooks College of Interdisciplinary Studies at Grand Valley State University.

The new exhibition is the beginning of a series that will highlight Native Americans living in the Grand Rapids area during the last half-century.

Levi Rickert is the publisher and editor of the Native News Online

The exhibition is a small portion of the work done already in conjunction with the “Gi-gikinomaage-min (We are all teachers): Defend Our History, Unlock Your Spirit” project that was kicked off last fall by the Kutsche Office of Local History. This project is conducting oral history interviews with Grand Rapids American Indians.

The exhibition consists of historic documents and objects made by local Native Americans. The “Walking Beyond Our Ancestors’ Footsteps: An Urban Native American Experience” exhibition is a collaborative effort of the GVSU’s Kutsche Office of Local History, Grand Rapids Public Library and the Public Museum of Grand Rapids.

About Levi Rickert

Levi Rickert is the publisher and editor of the Native News Online, an online website that is a daily American Indian news publication. He co-founded Native News Network in February 2011, which became Native News Online two years ago. In just over four years, Native News Online has become one of the country’s most read daily American Indian news publications in the country.

Native News Online has over 300,000 Facebook “likes” and almost 30,000 Twitter followers. Mr. Rickert has covered stories in Washington, DC, San Francisco, Chicago, Albuquerque, Minneapolis, Phoenix and some 30 American Indian reservations in Indian country. His work has taken him to the White House Tribal Nations Summit, Capitol Hill, Alcatraz Island and coverage of the Longest Walk III- Reversing Diabetes.

Mr. Rickert is a tribal citizen of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation and is the former executive director of the North American Indian Center of Grand Rapids. His community involvement in Grand Rapids has reached beyond the American Indian community. He has served as president of the Grand Rapids Historical Commission; vice chair of the City of Grand Rapids Community Relations Commission; board member of the Dyer-Ives Foundation; board member of Camp Blodgett; member of the Secchia Millennium Commission, among several others. Currently, he sits on the Native American advisory board at Grand Valley State University and the GVSU’s Kutsche Office of Local History advisory council.

In November 2012, Mr. Rickert received the Innovation Health Hero award by the Alliance for Health. The Alliance Health Heroes are those who go above and beyond to promote health and help people in need, while creating positive, healthy change among their communities.

Mr. Rickert is the author of three published essays in three different books. His most recent, “Indian Pride” is in "Voice on the Water: Great Lakes Native America Now," (December 2011, Northern Michigan University Press). The previous two essays are: “Grand Rapids Indians at the Millennium” for “Heart and Soul: The Story of Grand Rapids Neighborhoods” (November 2003, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company) and “Even Though I Was Not ‘Raised Indian’” for “Thin Ice: Coming of Age in Grand Rapids” (May, 2007, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company).

Mr. Rickert’s work and commitment to American Indians is featured in the 2013 “Our Fires Still Burn: The Native American Experience,” a documentary film that has been shown throughout the nation on PBS stations.

“Walking Beyond Our Ancestors’ Footsteps: An Urban Native American Experience”, Thursday, October 8, 2015, 7:00 p.m., by Levi Rickert (Potawatomi), Publisher/Editor,Native News Online.