Indigenous Health
Black Bears and Blueberries Publishing for All Children
B
oth my wife (Betsy Albert-Peacock) and I are retired educators from the Education Department at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. As educators we saw the need for authentic, Native authored children’s books in schools, libraries, bookstores, and communities. We talked about starting a Native owned and operated nonprofit publishing company for some time, realizing it would fill a great need to a small niche population, all the while giving Native authors and illustrators an outlet for publishing their works. Larger publishers ignore many Native book ideas because they are too small a market to make them a profit. Our primary reason for starting the publishing company is that few authentic, accurate, Native-written children’s books are available in today’s schools. As educators, we know that non-Native students benefit from these books because they foster the development of empathy toward Native people. Native students have increased knowledge of one’s own heritage and develop healthy, positive self-concepts and identity. They see and read about characters that look like them and represent their communities and cultures. We went ahead with the idea and hit the ground running. We brainstormed a list of potential names for our venture and settled on a catchy one thought up by Betsy, Black Bears and Blueberries Publishing. I thought it was perfect as it captured the youthful essence and imagery of children. As a nonprofit we don’t pay ourselves. We
By Thomas Peacock
20
Spring 2022
told people this was our retirement gig. All the proceeds from sales go to produce new books, reprint existing ones. Authors are paid industry standard royalties. Illustrators don’t work for free. Graphic designers cost. Print companies have to pay for expensive equipment, ink, paper, and shop employees. Our plan was to do this for a few years and find younger Native people to take over. We’re old you see — akiwenzi, miinawa and mindimooyenh (old man and old woman). We need our naps. We published our first books in 2019: Grasshopper Girl by Teresa Peterson (Dakota) and Rez Dog by Heather Brink (Ojibwe), both illustrated by Lakota illustrator Jordan Rodgers, and Gitige by the Fond du Lac Reservation Head Start. All sold extremely well. Since our start we have gone on to release a total of 25 books, all by Native writers, and mostly Native illustrators. Some of the authors have gone on to publish books with other publishers. Teresa Peterson just released Voices From Pejuhutazizi (Minnesota Historical Society Press). Tara Perron (Dakota/Ojibwe), author of three of our books (Takoza Walks With the Blue Moon Girl, The Animals of Nimaamaa-aki, The
Animals of Kheya Wita) has three books from other publishers. Meantime, we received contracts to publish works for Red Lake Schools (Minnesota), a series of English/Ojibwe traditional winter stories by Dr. Giniwgiizhig and several translators, Niizhobines and Zhaawanwewindamook. All of Red Lake’s books were illustrated by Native illustrators, including Jordan Rodgers (Lakota), Sam Zimmerman (Ojibwe), Cameo Boyle (Ojibwe), Bambi Goodwin (Ojibwe) and Anna Granholm (Ojibwe). Most are Neneboozhoo stories, the most recent one Neneboozhoo and Paul Bunyan. We also received a contract to publish Voices Rising, a collection of stories and poetry by Minnesota Indigenous women, through the Hennepin (Minnesota) County Library.
MetroDoctors
The Journal of the Twin Cities Medical Society
