Ojibwe, Activist, Priest: The Life of Father Philip Bergin Gordon, Tibishkogijik by Tadeusz Lewandowski

Abstract

Reviewed by: Ojibwe, Activist, Priest: The Life of Father Philip Bergin Gordon, Tibishkogijik by Tadeusz Lewandowski Brandon Dean Tadeusz Lewandowski, Ojibwe, Activist, Priest: The Life of Father Philip Bergin Gordon, Tibishkogijik. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2019. 200 pp. $28.95 (cloth). With Ojibwe, Activist, Priest, Tadeusz Lewandowski provides a concise, compelling biography of Philip Gordon, the first Indigenous person to be ordained as a Catholic priest in the United States. Lewandowski points out that, unlike his contemporaries among the “Red Progressives,” Gordon has received little attention from scholars. This is despite his prominent role in the Society of American Indians (SAI) and his determined opposition to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Lewandowski’s biography, however, illuminates the life and work of a complicated individual, whose careers as both a priest and a Native rights advocate speak to the larger issues facing Native Americans in the early twentieth century. At the heart of Gordon’s complexity was the apparent tension between his adoption of assimilationist beliefs that were steeped in early twentieth-century progressivism and his tireless advocacy for Native rights. A product of Indian boarding schools himself, Gordon was a true believer in the “civilizing mission” that sought to assimilate Native Americans into White culture through education and religious conversion. And yet, it was Gordon’s lifelong determined defense of Native people that earned him the moniker “Wisconsin’s Fighting Priest.” Avoiding the temptation to judge Gordon harshly for his assimilationist ideals or to dismiss his relevance, Lewandowski instead argues that Gordon’s zeal for religious reform drove him passionately in both directions at once, often much to the chagrin of friends and opponents alike. After briefly recounting the history of the Ojibwe people from earliest [End Page 181] European contacts through the nineteenth century, Lewandowski details Gordon’s family background and his early life as a promising young Catholic student. Following Gordon’s story chronologically, Lewandowski pays attention to two distinct narrative threads, which often converged at key moments. The first is Gordon’s ecclesiastical career. This work suffered a series of ups and downs but was most fulfilling when Gordon was able to minister directly to his fellow Native people. The second thread is Gordon’s involvement with the “Red Progressives,” particularly his participation in and influence on the SAI. Through that society, Gordon came into contact with influential Native progressives such as Carlos Montezuma, Charles Eastman, and Gertrude Bonnin. Gordon also published a short-lived but groundbreaking newsletter entitled War-Whoop, which was the precursor to Montezuma’s influential anti-BIA publication, Wassaja. Although Lewandowski covers Gordon’s entire life and career, the majority of his chapters focus on 1913–1924, a time when both Gordon’s influence and epistolary output were at their peak. Lewandowski’s final chapters briefly detail Gordon’s activities post-1924. In that period, he finally found a stable appointment as a beloved parish priest in Centuria, Wisconsin. He ministered there until his death in 1948. Where sources directly related to Gordon are thin, Lewandowski turns to more general events relevant to Native American experiences so as to highlight the context in which Gordon worked. In this way, Lewandowski’s biography of Gordon also becomes a window into the everyday struggles on Indian reservations in Wisconsin and Minnesota. These struggles were exacerbated by poverty, disease, and the unscrupulous actions of White loggers. Overall, Lewandowski’s biography offers a flattering account of Gordon, while also noting the often-disagreeable personality traits that made controversy and personal conflict his constant companions. One notable exception to Lewandowski’s favorable portrayal concerns the Ojibwe priest’s short tenure at the Haskell Institute in 1915. The abysmal conditions at this Lawrence, Kansas, facility represented everything that was wrong with the Indian boarding school system; and yet, Gordon seems to have overlooked the illness, death, and psychological toll of family separation and forced assimilation while ministering to the spiritual needs of the school’s Catholic students. Lewandowski is right to recognize this blind spot, given that Gordon’s judgment seems to have been consistently clouded by perceived rivalries with Protestant missionaries and ministers. On this particular point, Lewandowski knowingly invites a degree of controversy [End Page...