About this Event
Too Fond Of Books is honored to welcome Cherokee Elder and Storyteller Charlie Soap and author Greg Shaw to the store. They will be discussing Shaw's Book "Last One Walking", and signing copies after the discussion.
About Last One Walking:
You probably know the story of the late Wilma Mankiller, the first woman to serve as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. You might not recognize the name of her husband, Charlie Soap, yet his role as a Native community organizer is no less significant. Combining memoir, history, and current affairs, Last One Walking charts for the first time the life and work of this influential Cherokee.
In telling this story, author and former journalist Greg Shaw gives voice to his sources. As a longtime colleague and friend of the family, he draws on his many travels and interviews with Soap and on previously unpublished writings, including a Soap family history penned by Mankiller, included here as the book’s prologue. Shaw offers a rich profile of Soap’s singular career—particularly as a champion of water rights.
In managing public infrastructure projects, housing assistance, and water development in the Cherokee Nation, Soap has exemplified ga-du-gi, the Cherokee word for community members working together for the collective good. Shaw portrays a dynamic partnership between Soap and Mankiller. Together they reignited community development for the Cherokee people by listening to everyone, including the poorest of the poor, and hearing their pleas for reliable water, a basic human need and a sacred element in Cherokee culture.
Charlie Soap’s name in Cherokee, Ohni ai (ᎣᏂ ᎠᎢ), translates as “the last one walking.” In the Cherokee wolf clan, this is the member who trails the rest of the pack to watch for danger and opportunity. The last one walking forms a bond of trust with the pack’s leader.
The Native American fight for land has been well chronicled, but the fight for water has not. Last One Walking helps to fill that void with a narrative that is also deeply moving, revealing on every page the spirit of ga-du-gi.
About Charlie Soap:
Born March 25, 1945, in Stilwell, Oklahoma, Charlie Soap is a full-blood, bilingual Cherokee. He served in the United States Navy from l965-l969 and received an honorable discharge. He later earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Education from Northeastern State University.
Mr. Soap has dedicated virtually his entire career to working to strengthen the many Cherokee communities in northeastern Oklahoma. Serving under three chiefs, he served as the community service group leader for the Cherokee Nation, overseeing a $100 million budget dedicated to public transit services, roads, bridges and infrastructure projects, environmental health services, self-help housing assistance, youth programs and natural disaster relief.
Due to his accomplishments and innovative approaches to community development in rural communities, Mr. Soap has received numerous awards including the Common Cause public service achievement award and two national certificates of merit from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Mr. Soap has lectured on community development at Cornell University, Arizona State University Law School, the University of Maryland, Tufts University, Indiana State University, the Mayo Clinic, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and numerous other settings.
Following his career with the tribe, Mr. Soap also worked with business education and political leaders to establish the Boys and Girls Club of Tahlequah and served as its founding director. Under Mr. Soap’s leadership, the club operated a comprehensive summer enrichment program and, working with Tahlequah Public Schools, developed the first after-school program in the school system. The collaboration between the Boys and Girls Club and the Tahlequah Public Schools has served as a national model. Mr. Soap served for seven years as the Oklahoma area director of the Christian Children's Fund.
Mr. Soap is the Producer/Director of the film, Cherokee Word for Water, which tells the story of the Bell waterline project, which he and his wife, Wilma Mankiller, led before their marriage of more than 30 years. He is a skilled photographer who is working on a book of photographs of indigenous people in the Amazon. Mr. Soap is a fancy war dancer, an avid golfer, fisherman and cyclist.
Now a tribal elder, Mr. Soap remains an active and authoritative voice on community development. In 2021, the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma enacted The Wilma P. Mankiller and Charlie Soap Water Act to ensure that everyone on the Cherokee Nation Reservation will be free of any barriers to accessing clean, safe water,” Chief Chuck Hoskin announced.
About Greg Shaw:
Oklahoma native Greg Shaw has reported for the Cherokee Advocate and served as an executive for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Too Fond of Books, 162 North Muskogee Avenue, Tahlequah, United States
USD 0.00
