 
| | | Arthur Junaluska 1912 - 1978 This page commemorates not only Arthur, but his loving wife Betty (my first cousin once removed).
Arthur and Betty Smith Junaluska were a special couple - by no means typical of our family or indeed
of any family: but Betty's marriage and their story is not out of place in the genetic heritage of the
Wrights and the Berrys, whose forceful women followed their own paths. | The Cherokee | |  Arthur was a member of the Cherokee nation, born in North Carolina, site of the tribal home of the Eastern band of the Cherokees. His father was an electrical engineer. He was sent to a Government boarding school like many other native American children of his generation. He managed to complete four years of college and graduated with a BSc. He worked as a Medical Technician and Bacteriologist, occasionally working on projects for the New York Department of Health. But his career as a medical technician was a fallback career - his vocation was the theatre. He trained with the Shakespeare Repertoire Group of America, and played the classics in small repertory companies and university theatres. He rode in rodeos, and eventually started getting parts in films and television. He played many bit parts as North American Indians, South American Indians, even Indian Indians. In the fifties he began to develop a focus on his native American heritage, writing plays, producing ballets, and promoting Indian culture. Although they travelled throughout the USA Arthur did much work on the New York theatre scene, and gradually his work in the field of native American culture began to be noticed. In 1970 he was invited to attend the first Convocation of American Indian Scholars, at Princeton University, in recognition of the contribution he had made to his cultural heritage | | | The Nurse From Sandford... | |  Betty Wright (1920-2005), WAAF nurse from Sandford, could not have guessed the impact that the glamorous US Medical Corps Sergeant would have on her life when he asked her for a dance in the Tower Ballroom, Blackpool. They dated, and soon fell in love. But at the end of the war he had to return to the States. They stayed in touch however, and their love for each other was strong enough to survive separation. Prompted by her letters, Arthur flew back to England. In Exeter, in July 1948, Betty married this Cherokee, 8 years her senior, and divorced - a fact that was either unknown or unacknowledged by Betty's family. But the couple were not happy in grey post-war England, so on 1st December 1949 they sailed for New York. Betty had vivid memories of arriving in New York after she got married and of those early days settling into a huge and bustling city. She was struck by how much food they ate (after rationing in England) and all the bright lights and tall buildings and new inventions like the coffee machine that you put a nickel in to get your drink. She shared thirty years of her life with Arthur, and travelled around America, enduring the ups and downs of the career of a jobbing actor and artist, but her love for him never seemed to diminish. | | | Arthur's origins are somewhat shrouded in mystery, and indeed in myth of his own creation. His given name of Smith hardly makes for straightforward research. He claims to have been born in Oklahoma, but his first definite appearance in the record is his enlistment record in December 1942, when Arthur F. Smith, American Indian, citizen , birth year 1912, Nativity State: North Carolina, enlists in Tulsa, Oklahoma for the duration. His name on his marriage certificate in 1948 is the same - Arthur Freeman Smith. But by 1948 he has started to use the name Junaluska, and claimed that his great-great grandfather was the Cherokee Chief Junaluska, who saved General Andrew Jackson at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1812. Jackson treacherously rewarded his allies by expelling the Cherokees from their homelands in North Carolina to the alien Indian Territory that was to become Oklahoma. The 1600 mile forced winter march to the place of exile became known as the Trail of Tears and Junaluska was one of the leaders on the journey. By 1972 Arthur was claiming descent from Yonaguska, or Drowning Bear, supposedly the half-brother of Junaluska, who managed to elude capture by the military and remained in North Carolina, protecting what was to be the Eastern band of the Cherokee. From the 50s Arthur became Arthur Smith Junaluska. Research undertaken to date has not been able to verify his ancestry. But it would be reasonable for an imaginative person working in a business where a romantic identity can only be an advantage, to make the most of family legends. Arthur claimed that his name meant Running Wolf. Betty and the family always called him Ramon. |  | | | | Arthur's Work | He began to write plays on native American themes, including The Medicine Woman, Hell-cat of the Plains, Grand Council of Indian Circle, The Spirit of Wallowa and Spectre in the Forest. He would direct not only his own plays but was invited to direct the work of others, in New York and at events exploring Native American Culture on university campuses around the country. He is credited with having begun the contemporary Indian theatre movement with his productions in New York in the 1950s.
He had always been a choreographer - indeed he had taught indian dance steps to choreographer Helen Tamaris for the long-running 50s Broadway production of Annie Get Your Gun. | | As well as his work in film and television and on the stage, Arthur's repertoire included lecture tours, when he would recite the speeches of Great American Chiefs, and perform traditional dances in full regalia. He made recordings of some speeches - one being the account by Red Hawk of the defeat of Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn, and a second a double album of Great American Indian Speeches. He also narrated some folk tales and recorded these. Sadly his recordings are no longer available commercially, though copies can be found in many university libraries in the USA. You can download an .mp3 of his reading of a speech of Seneca Chief Redjacket if you click on the picture right. | 
Chief Redjacket | | During the 60s he began to work on the piece that was in many ways the culmination of his artistic development. He devised, choreographed, designed, directed and produced the Folk Ballet The Dance of the Twelve Moons. Based on the Native American Year of 12 Moons, or months, it comprises 12 traditional dances, with a narration that interweaves aspects of Arthur's life with the seasons. The ballet was performed in New York City, in North Carolina and also in the North West, with an all Indian cast. | 
The Dance of the Twelve Moons Prologue
"Out of this hallowed, limitless space of time, playing hide and seek from behind the moving clouds, the chanting echoes of the past emerge forth once again, and the wind is its voice. Listen! The first beat of the sacred-hollow drum resounds through every fibre, even now in the whispering of the wind, you can hear the faint moccasined foot-steps of spirited dancers." Moon of the Long Nights
backdrop designed by Arthur | 
Betty with her parents during a return visit to England in 1958
| | | Whilst Arthur was a quietly-spoken gentle man, Betty was by contrast flamboyant and vivacious, and tremendously loyal to Arthur. In New York she worked as an agency nurse, and for a while looked after the dying composer Stravinsky. She was very proud of having met Jackie Kennedy. She steadfastly travelled the roads of America with Arthur and endured tribal politics and jealousy when she lived with him for a while on a reservation. But Arthur supported her equally. By 1971 she was missing her Devonshire home and family, and Arthur agreed that they should return to England. They returned in '72. They tried to promote his work in Europe, without much success. He gave some lectures, and recitals, but his career never blossomed in the UK. In 1978 Arthur succumbed to ill-health and died in Exeter. For the rest of her life Betty worked tirelessly in an effort to get his work staged in Europe, or revived in the US. She died in 2005. | | | 
Arthur as Indian Medicine Man Mr Blacktree in the 1971 Oscar-winning film The Hospital. | The black comedy The Hospital starred George C. Scott, with Diana Rigg, seen here with Arthur. Writer Paddy Chayevsky won an Oscar for Best Screenplay. Arthur also appeared in a very minor role as Mexican peasant alongside Sir Laurence Olivier, in a TV Production of The Power and the Glory in 1961. He told me when I was a child that he occasionally appeared as an extra in the Phil Silvers (Sergeant Bilko) Show, but there are no credits to support this. | | 
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