SOURCE: A preface and appendix to Mountain Wolf Woman, Sister of Crashing Thunder: The Autobiography of a Winnebago Indian, edited by Nancy Oestreich Lurie, The University of Michigan Press, 1961, pp. xi-xx, 92-108.

An American educator, editor, and critic, Lurie was adopted into the Winnebago tribe as an adult and was considered a niece of Mountain Wolf Woman. At Lurie's urging, Mountain Wolf Woman began the process of telling her life story. In the first part of the following excerpt, taken from the preface to Mountain Wolf Woman, Lurie discusses the composition of the autobiography, her relationship with and impressions of Mountain Wolf Woman, and Mountain Wolf Woman's adherence to Winnebago customs. In the second part of the excerpt, which is taken from one of Lurie's appendices to the book, she relates the events surrounding Mountain Wolf Woman's death.

Autobiographies are published for a variety of reasons. Authors often...