cover image Molly Spotted Elk: A Penobscot in Paris

Molly Spotted Elk: A Penobscot in Paris

Bunny McBride. University of Oklahoma Press, $34.95 (360pp) ISBN 978-0-8061-2756-9

Born on the Penobscot reservation in northern Maine, Molly Spotted Elk (1903-1976) was the oldest of eight children. Because her family was poor, she worked as a domestic helper from the age of 11 until her talent for dancing and singing earned her a place in an Indian performing troupe. Drawing on Molly's diaries (numerous excerpts are printed here) and interviews with family members, McBride, a freelance writer who specializes in cultural survival, provides an engrossing account of Molly's adventurous life. Although she was a successful vaudeville dancer and appeared in the silent film The Silent Enemy (1930), the discrimination she suffered because she was Native American led her to pursue a dancing career in Paris, where she met Jean, a French journalist with whom she had a daughter and whom she eventually married. McBride documents Molly's escape from France during WWII and the suffering she endured after Jean's death. A moving life of a Native American. Photos. (Sept.)