Historian Angie Debo Leading Scholar of Indian History
Dr. Angie Debo
Historian Angie Debo
One of Oklahoma's most accomplished but little known citizens was educator, historian and author Dr. Angie Debo. Dr. Debo was a leading scholar of Indian history, and her work has been cited as evidence in federal court cases involving tribal land rights. Her classic work And Still the Waters Run: The Betrayal of the Five Civilized Tribes published by Princeton University Press after much controversy in 1940 has been in print for over 70 years.
Dr. Debo’s portrait hangs in the Oklahoma State Capital, seen at the right, with that of humorist Will Rogers and Indian athlete Jim Thorpe.
In 1993 Debo was inaugurated to the Oklahoma Historians Hall of Fame. The Angie Debo Elementary School in Oklahoma City is named in her honor as well as a state highway.
She has been the subject of numerous books and a PBS American Experience television documentary: Indians, Outlaws and Angie Debo.
Debo's papers are on file at Oklahoma State University’s Edmond Lowe Library.
Our late partner Ed DeClerck represented Angie before her death in 1988. She wrote a total of nine books, edited others and published many articles in different journals, including Harper’s Magazine. Her last book, Geronimo: The Man, His Time, His Place, was finished when she was 85 years old. Angie once said: “I am sometimes asked to state my ‘goals and ambitions in writing’. I suppose I have only one: to discover truth and publish it.”
