Wooden Knife hopes to inspire Native women

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Kathleen Wooden Knife said she isn’t one for the limelight, but also knows why she’s getting a lot of attention these days.

Wooden Knife was recently elected the first female president of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe.

“…in 1924 Native women earned the right to vote. It’s been 100 years,” Wooden Knife said. “It’s 2024. Our tribe has never had a female president and here I am.”

“I’m not the type of person that likes to be in the forefront and in pictures. I don’t like to boast. But it’s something I think is going to inspire a lot of women and young girls,” Wooden Knife said.

Wooden Knife said she didn’t expect to be involved in politics, but she won a tribal council seat several years ago. She said her desire to serve her community and her understanding of the people’s hardship fit the council role.

“Never did I think I’d be where I am now,” Wooden Knife said. “I do what I do because I have had needs. I have gone without a job. I have gone without a home. I’ve gone without a car. I’ve gone without food. I know the struggles our people,” she said.

She’s been an advocate for health care in the community.

She pursued the establishment of a pet clinic because care and veterinary service access were very limited on the reservation. She is now working on obtaining a grant to start an animal shelter.

“I’m very proactive in being that person that I can help when I can,” Wooden Knife said. “If being elected allows me to help in any way shape or form, then that’s I like to do.”

“I want to inspire… young women, all women, to know that you can excell , you can be a leader. And you can make a difference in people’s lives,”.

Wooden Knife is one of the few female tribal presidents in South Dakota. She joins Janet Alkire, who is the current chairwoman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, plus several women who have been in the same role for other tribal communities,

Three women served as president of the Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe. There are pictures of those three women in the tribal office.

“There’s a big line of all the chairpersons, mostly men, but there are three women in there,” Jonathan Schrader Sr. said of the Flandreau tribal leaders. One of the women is his grandmother Carolyn Sorensen.

Schrader is a trustee on the tribal council.

“For me, as a young person, it gives me motivation to see her picture and know she was only one of three female chairwomen,” Schrader said.

He wants those three women and the recent election of Wooden Knife as well as Alkire to inspire other women.

“I hope that at least once in my lifetime, we have another chairwoman of our (community),” Schrader said.

He is encouraged by multiple young women in the tribe who are pursuing education and leadership opportunities, Schrader said.

Wooden Knife said that several years ago, her daughters and other females in her family asked about what it means to be a leader. “At that point in time I didn’t we didn’t even think of me being a president,” she said.

But Wooden Knife had an example of community involvement as a child.

She was raised by her grandmother who was active in the Rosebud community.

“Everywhere she went I went with her. She was part of committees and went to meetings and I was always went with her. I was always at her side,” Wooden Knife said.

Her grandmother also had a strong work ethic, Wooden Knife said.

Females can do what some may think is impossible, she said. Wooden Knife doesn’t consider herself special but she does know that she is invested and passionate about improving her community.

She wants to inspire other women and she wants them to know, if they want something to succeed they need to invest themselves in it.

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