More articles coming soon...

The Hills Are Healing Johnny One Feather

JOHNNY ONE FEATHER spends his days writing war poetry, making porcupine quill earrings, or carving eagle heads on knife handles - peaceful work for a Hamburger Hill survivor and television bad guy. Though he's been seen onscreen by millions of people, the old Indian lives in near anonymity on the outskirts of Rapid City.

Some know him as the guy in suspenders who sells arts, crafts and rummage items off folding tables along Highway 16. To youngsters at a local children's home, he's the guy who brings gifts and tells stories of his movie stunts. One of their favorites is the time Johnny was chased by a bear in a "Gunsmoke" episode.

One Feather has been eluding bears of one sort or another ever since he was born the son of a Norwegian lumberjack and his Chippewa wife in northern Minnesota in 1940. A high school dropout, he was "lumbering and farming" until he decided to join the U.S. Army in 1959.

He was trained for "cold weather duty" in Alaska, but the Vietnam War heated up so he was reassigned to helicopter training at Fort Riley, Kansas. He learned to rappel from a copter into rough terrain with a rifle and ammo. By 1964, he was in the jungle, fighting a war most Americans had hardly noticed. He survived his first 12-month tour unscathed, and was sent back to the States for more jungle warfare training. Then he was reassigned to ‘Nam, and he found himself in the midst of a real mess.

He and a buddy lived for weeks at a time in foxholes made of sandbags; one manned a machine gun while the other slept or scrounged for food. Some days, they were able to run through the jungle and rendezvous with an army truck filled with C-rations. Other days, they ate what the jungle provided. "We ate python, it isn't as good as rattlensnake, it swells up in your mouth," One Feather said. "Mostly we hunted monkey, but that can freak you out because when they're skinned out they look a lot like a human, with their fingers and toes. We also learned to suck on sugar cane like the Vietnamese."

He suffered gunshot wounds, healed up, and then fell into a punji pit, a camouflaged hole with pointed bamboo sticks tipped with feces or other contaminants so they both stab and infect the victim.

He remembers thinking, as he fell in the six-foot hole, to twist his body sidewise so he'd be less exposed. "I was real lucky. I mostly fell between the spike," he said. "Only one got me real good." Still, he needed help to get free and escape the pit.

One Feather is reticent to discuss his war injuries. "That's a long story," he says, when you persist with questions. Persist and you'll learn some of what he experienced, because he's too polite to ignore you altogether.

"Do you smoke?" we asked.

"No, the doctors said I'd be dead if I didn't quit. I've only got one lung."

"Why just one lung?"

"I lost the other one?

"In the war?"

"Yes, that was it."

"From the punji pit?"

"No."

"From the gun shots?"

"Yes."

His body healed from both injuries, but he can't forget what he saw and experienced. He's just as reluctant to talk about Vietnam's long-term impact on his life, but rather than say as much he just deflects questions with, "That's another long story." In lieu of conversation, he writes poetry that he willingly shares if you ask. "It's a way to get stuff off my chest," he says. "My mother (Hazel One Feather) wrote poetry. When I went in the Army, I just found I could write things, so I wrote a lot of love poems for my buddies. They'd pay me a few bucks or so."

His real poetry has no romance, adventure or sweetness: just raw war truth:

We went on patrol one day,

When we ran into an ambush;

A shot rang out.

My friend fell to the ground.

I knew then that he would never again be around.

As I held him in my arms,

He spoke softly in my ear,

Be happy for me, he said,

I will never be dead.

I am going to a place where there

Are no more wars and only peace.

He said, ‘I'll be seeing you again one day,

Then he slowly passed away.



One Feather won't say if he personally experienced all the stories in the poems. That's a long story, too. But in our fourth conversation, he finally spoke of a foxhole buddy who died in his arms.

He wrote a three-page poem on the 10-day fight over Hamburger Hill in May of 1969. U.S. troops won the battle and the hill, but heavy American casualties (46 killed and over 400 wounded) swayed public opinion against the war.

One Feather's wounds from the punji pit had healed just in time for him to fight at Hamburger Hill. "It's a long story," he said. But he did provide a copy of the poem. It spoke of the ground shaking with artillery shells. The soldiers got half way up, then were pushed back down; over and over again.

It was monsoon season; rains poured down. The men called for air support, but planes couldn't come in the rain. The commander was shot, so he and a buddy temporarily took charge of the men.

Then he saw a small boy aiming at him. A shot rang out. He regained consciousness; the boy is standing over him with a tear in his eye.

Maybe, just maybe, he knew

That I could have killed him

But I was willing to die

Instead of killing him,

I held out my hand to him

As I lay on the ground

He dropped his weapon.

I knew then that I found

A little boy who needed a friend

I knew then that this would never be the end.

The little boy tended to the soldier as best he could; then he picked up his rifle and dragged it through the mud. Then more American soldiers arrived, and shots rang out.

I turned my head to see

There lay the little body of the boy

All covered with blood.

I started to cry,

"Oh, God! Why can't it ever be me!"



HAMBURGER HILL, a dense thicket of grasses and bamboo, is half a world away from the Black Hills. It is about the same height as many of South Dakota's mountains, but it has nothing else in common. Maybe that's why Johnny One Feather settled down in the Hills.

On nice days, he spends a lot of time on a bench outside his little white trailer south of Rapid City. The yard is landscaped with a bird bath, flower beds, pink pelicans and a black POW/MIA flag on a pole with the American flag. Just east of his trailer, heavy traffic rushes past on Highway 16, also known as Mount Rushmore Road. He could see the presidents' heads on a clear day if he took the time; but he's too busy for mountain-gazing.

Along with poetry, he also learned arts and crafts from his Chippewa mother, and that's how the 66-year old One Feather occupies his days. He makes leather belts and billfolds, tooling intricate designs on each. He fashions hunting knifes from old steel, and then carves eagle heads on his elk horn knife handles. He also makes porcupine necklaces and earrings, hatbands of rattlesnake skins, beadwork, sinew dream catchers and horseshoe candle holders.

On Fridays during the summer tourism season, he sells his art, along with rummage items he collects from friends, on folding tables along Highway 16 (across the highway from the big water park). Prairie Edge, the Northern Plains' premier art gallery, also sells some of his work in its downtown Rapid City store.

"We met Johnny when we hosted the Vietnam Veteran's Art Museum exhibit from Chicago," recalls Dan Tribby, general manager of Prairie Edge. "We weren't sure how to take him at first, but pretty soon you realize he's just a guy with a great heart and it's easy to buy into his program. He's got such a soft spot for kids and for veterans."

Tribby says some of his store customers really like One Feather's relatively inexpensive "farmstead" style of art. "He's a ‘utilize everything you've got laying around' kind of artist. Johnny is the poster boy for that style, and it's exactly what some people want to take home."

He spends all his art and rummage income on gifts and clothing for children at Wellspring, a Rapid City facility for youth with abuse, neglect or behavioral problems. "The kids all think he's great," says Amber Steele, a Wellspring staffer. One Feather brings a Christmas tree and gifts in the holidays. He holds pizza parties, and entertains staff and teens with stories from his stuntman days. Everybody at Wellspring knows the bear story. His most recent project at Wellspring is an art contest for the youth. Prairie Edge has donated beads and other art supplies.

One Feather even helps the kids after they leave. When a boy's family lost everything in a fire, he found them a microwave and other appliances. "He is a wonderful role model for these kids," Steele says. "They don't relate to just anyone."

His stories from Hollywood and Vietnam get their attention, she says, "but what really impresses them is his big heart."





ONE FEATHER'S TELEVISION debut came in Fort Riley, Kansas, before his first Vietnam tour of duty. Between lessons in rappelling from helicopters, he hung around nearby Abilene where the television series Gunsmoke was being filmed. When the TV directors found that he could ride (and fall off) a horse, they put him to use. Before long, he was being shot from rooftops, getting slugged in saloons and suffering indignities and death in numerous other ways. Like most Minnesota kids in the 1950s, he was a practiced "quick draw" artist. He even dueled James Arness (Marshal Matt Dillon) for a time in the show's trademark gunfight scene. His face was never shown - only his hand and holstered hip - so he never gained any recognition.

During his war years, he got married and fathered two sons. The marriage ended sooner than the war, and when he was discharged in 1969 he headed for familiar territory - the "Gunsmoke" family in Hollywood, Calif. He enrolled in stuntman's school at Universal Studios; the dangers seemed like child's play after Hamburger Hill.

He learned a trade, but nightmares, flashbacks and depression made life miserable. "I was really down and out," he says. "People (in California) told me to go back to the jungle where I belonged. At times, I wished I could go back. Nobody would give me a job and I couldn't find a place to live."

In the early 1970s, his "Gunsmoke" pals took him with them to the Black Hills to film a lengthy series of made-for-TV movies called "How the West Was Won," starring Arness as Dakota Territory mountain man Zeb Macahan. Arness and the other actors and crew didn't stay long in South Dakota, but One Feather knew he'd found a home. "I just took to the Hills," he said. "I lived in a cave for awhile. That was just what I needed. I lived off the land by panning gold, fishing, trapping, and hunting. That was the life. Then I lived in an old shack in the mountains." He learned to hunt rattlesnakes by his nose ("they smell just like a cucumber patch") and he learned how to get a porcupine to release some quills by bundling rags on a long stick and poking it.

"Wild Horse" Harry Harding of Keystone taught him how to pan for gold. "Harry used to break horses for the cavalry many years ago. He rode into Keystone on a mule and hung out at the Red Garter Saloon." The Vietnam vet found a kindred spirit in Harding, and he learned more than just how to find gold; he learned the history and culture of his new home.

In 1979, a friend introduced him to Linda Hytrek, a young single woman. They struck up a friendship (which he suggests is far better than a romance) and they've been together ever since. "Just roommates," he says. "That's all." She's helped him through illnesses and surgeries, and he's done the same. A nursing home cook by profession, Hytrek makes the small white trailer into a real home. They share the place with a pet bird, a cat and two dogs.

He was pleasantly surprised to find a friend, and he was also delighted to discover the need for a stuntman in South Dakota. Old West re-enactments were popular at Rockerville, Deadwood and Cheyenne. There was also a Gunville West show south of Rapid City. He was dragged through a wall of fire by a horse on more than one occasion. "What I did was build a wooden wall, and then we tied the sections to bales of straw and we scattered some straw on both sides of the wall," he said. "It made a bed of flames. I had a big beard back then and it smoldered a little but that was about the worst of it."

What was the pay for being dragged through fire? "Not near enough," he grins, and not much higher for robbing stage coaches, suffering Indian attacks, riding bulls and broncs, or fleeing on foot from the bear. But he subsidized his stunt pay by panning for gold, for real and as a guide. He still serves as prospector-in-residence at Dakota Design Direct, a gold jewelry store located just a few hundred yards from his trailer.

He eventually found safer work as handyman for Moore & Kandaras, a Rapid City law firm. "As I got older, I got tired of getting busted up," he says, "and it takes longer to heal up as you get older." He quickly became a fixture at the law offices. When new staff came on board, he welcomed them with his handmade jewelry. Oddly enough, the mountain recluse discovered that he liked people quite a lot. Now, he says, his philosophy for life is "treating people like I like to be treated. Love goes a lot further than war."

When he retired after 26 years with Moore and Kandaras, he decided to devote his talents and time to the kids at Wellspring. He is always planning a youth event - or making his crafts and collecting rummage items to fund the activity.

"I like all the people I meet from panning gold, or selling along the highway here by the tables," he says. "You see people from all over the world, and some of them keep coming back. I didn't figure that out for the first seven or eight years. But when they started asking to see the old gunfighter, I started to recognize and remember some of them."

He's hard to forget; his felt hat always has an eagle feather, and it's apt to have a rattlesnake skin for a band. He was wearing patriotic suspenders on the day we found him, and long graying sideburns that wind into a graying mustache.

Many times he's played the bad guy, but now at age 66 he looks more the marshal than the outlaw. The Rapid Citians who know him, the youth at Wellspring, and tourists from around the world all see him as a good guy; so, no doubt, would a young Vietnamese at Hamburger Hill if he had the chance to know the real Johnny One Feather of the Black Hills.

Buy the January-February 2007 issue of South Dakota Magazine to get this article with all photos and other stories in this issue.

Call (800) 456-5117