Plains Indian Sign Language (PISL), also known as Plains Sign Talk and Hand Talk, has been used for centuries, and Peltier and Vieux family member Charles Scott hopes to bring it back to the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.
Citizen Potawatomi Nation honored first responders with its inaugural First Responders Appreciation Day. Security Training Officer Tommy Bowen said each of the responders who attended went home with about two prizes each — either from drawings or playing games such as football toss and basketball.
Since she was three years old, Tribal member Marlee Affentranger and her parents have known without a doubt that not dancing is simply not an option for the young artist. Affentranger’s passion led her to found the first-ever pom squad at Bethel (Oklahoma) High School.
Dr. Rosemary Schrepfer, 101, is among the oldest living CPN elders. “Doc,” as she is lovingly known in her family, blazed a trail for women hoping to enter medicine. When she graduated from the University of Kansas’s medical school, she became the first woman to complete the obstetrician-gynecologist program.
Lafromboise father and son duo Steve and Koby Lawson made the trek to the top of California’s Mount Whitney (the highest point in the contiguous United States) in 2021. Two years later, they teamed up again to tackle Longs Peak in Rocky Mountain National Park, known as Colorado’s deadliest 14’er (a mountain with an elevation of at least 14,000 feet).
Author and artist Minisa Crumbo Halsey recently published Going to CPN Family Reunion, a book created for young readers. Crumbo Halsey collaborated with the CPN Language Department to publish the book.
When Gordon Cooper Technology Center (GCTC) in Shawnee, Oklahoma, received feedback from Citizen Potawatomi Nation and other local entities that there was a need for linemen training, the school set up a new program to fill the gap. Now, CPN Electrical Director Justin Whitecotton hopes it will lead to opportunities to hire employees for the Tribe.
Every year at the CPN Family Reunion Festival, the Nation honors a group of families that moved to Oklahoma and eventually formed the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. The 2024 Honored Families are Darling, Hardin, Higbee, Levier, Lewis, Nadeau, Negahnquet, Pambogo and Smith.
CPN Tribal members Kristen Arambula Hernandez and Lauren Kelly collaborated to create an experience of art, culture and spirituality at a Norman, Oklahoma, Art Walk in September 2023.
Sealed bids will be received by the Planning and Economic Development office of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, located at 1601 S. Gordon Cooper Blvd., Shawnee, OK 74801, until 5 PM Central Local Time, on the 5th day of, February 2024 for the construction of the Transloading Facility.