SAINT FRANCIS, S.D. - Founder of the National Indigenous Women's Resource Center Tillie Black Bear, Sicangu, died on July 19.


Black Bear became known as the Grandmother of the Battered Women's Movement for her leadership spanning almost four decades.


In 1978, Black Bear began her national movement building by testifying at the first U.S. Commission on Civil Rights hearings on wife beating.


The same year, she led the way in building organizations such as the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the South Dakota Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, which was formerly the South Dakota Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Black Bear also organized the White Buffalo Calf Woman Society in her home communities on the Rosebud reservation.


For the next three decades, Black Bear's leadership continued to indigenize federal legislation such as the Violence Against Women Act and the Family Violence Protection & Services Act. In 1995, after the passage of VAWA, Black Bear met with the Department of Justice to plant a stake that VAWA included Indian tribes. In 2000, she helped shape the new VAWA tribal coalition program.


In 2003, Black Bear led a Wiping of the Tears Ceremony at the Senate building to launch the struggle for the VAWA '05 Safety for Indian Women Act and in 2011, as part of the National Congress of the American Indian Task Force, she met with United Nation's Special Rapporteur Rashida Manjoo, overall restoring VAWA jurisdiction over non-Indians to Indian tribes.


Tillie Black Bear became known as the Grandmother of the Battered Women's Movement for her leadership spanning almost four decades.