The Sixth Grandfather is a book that needed to be written. It is a scholarly
work done over a period of years and with singular dedication. Because
Black Elk Speaks has attracted serious attention in the United States and in
many other countries, certainly a full-length scholarly work on its creation
is in order. But to Raymond DeMallie, The Sixth Grandfather has been
much more than a research project. As an anthropologist, he has used his
wide knowledge of the American Indian, and particularly the Lakota
Sioux, both to prove a scholarly premise and to learn--insofar as that is
possible in this still imperfect world--the truth. The special value of this
book, to me, is this: it is an essay in understanding.

Upon their first, seemingly accidental, meeting, Black Elk told Nei-
hardt that Neihardt "had been sent" to learn what the holy man would
teach him. Through an awareness we cannot fully comprehend, the old
Lakota somehow knew the essential truth about the poet; Black Elk
believed that Neihardt could understand his teachings and had faith that
this white man would communicate his vision to the world at large. To
make the meaning of this vision a part of people's lives was a responsibility
Black Elk felt had been placed upon him by the Grandfathers. Having
himself only partially succeeded in carrying out the vision, he apparently
decided to entrust it to the man who "had been sent" to him. "It is true
and it is beautiful," Black Elk said, "and it is for all men." And so the
interviews for Black Elk Speaks were planned.

John Neihardt was well pleased with the firsthand recounting by Black
Elk and the other old Lakotas of historic events and the old Sioux way of
life, which cast new light on matters already familiar to him as a student of

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