Indian Old-Man Stories

The Indians of the northwestern plains always laughed at the tales about Old-man, heard around the lodge fire in the wintertime after sunset. For a powerful character, he was comically flawed. Old-man made the world but sometimes forgot the names of things. Victim and victimizer, he seemed closer to common experience than the awesome god Manitou. Frank B. Linderman thought Old-man was, under different names, a god for many Indian communities. These stories—collected from Chippewa and Cree elders and first published in 1920—are full of wonder at the way things are. Why children lose their teeth, why eyesight fails with age, why dogs howl at night, why some animals wear camouflage—these and other mysteries, large and small, are made vividly sensible.