In the summer of 1930, as part of his research into the Native American perspective on the Ghost Dance movement, the poet and writer John G. Neihardt, already the Nebraska poet laureate, received the necessary permission from the Bureau of Indian Affairs to go to the Pine Ridge Reservation. Accompanied by his two daughters, he went to meet an Oglala holy man named Black Elk. His intention was to talk to someone who had participated in the Ghost Dance. For the most part, the reservations were not then open to visitors.[4] At age 13, Black Elk had also been part of the Battle of the Little Big Horn, and he survived the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre.
Neihardt recounts that Black Elk invited him back for interviews. Flying Hawk served as their translator.[4] Neihardt writes that Black Elk told him of his visions, including one in which he saw himself as a "sixth grandfather" - the spiritual representative of the earth and of mankind. Neihardt also states that Black Elk shared some of the Oglala rituals which he had performed as a healer, and that two men developed a close friendship. Neihardt's daughter, Hilda Neihardt, says Black Elk adopted her, her sister, and their father as relatives, giving each of them Lakota names.[4]
