Our Carrier of Sacred Values

One of First Peoples Fund founding inspirations, Leksi (uncle in Lakota) Ben Sherman, took his journey to the next world on Friday, April 5th. When it came to practicing the values he professed, there was no daylight between the values of Ben Sherman and the values that he instilled in First Peoples Fund work.

Beginning in 1999, from the kitchen table of his niece, Lori Pourier (then the brand new president of First Peoples Fund), Ben was shaping the founding days of the organization with his signature elevation of Native values. In his quietly insistent way – through curriculum development, training, listening, encouraging, governance, bridge-building and being an ambassador to hundreds of artists – Ben ensured that the work of supporting artists and culture bearers would include their consideration and regular revisiting of the Native values of integrity, respect, honesty, compassion and generosity.

From young beginnings as a member of the Oglala Lakota tribe on the Pine Ridge reservation, he attributed his strong orientation to values to his upbringing by his mother, Alice Sherman and to her upbringing from her grandmother. He carried these values through all of his experiences – from boarding schoo;l to working as a welder; to being an executive in the aerospace and technology fields; to earning a masters degree in business; to 25 years mentoring the field of Native arts, culture and tourism; to serving as a founding board member, long-term trainer, and wise counsel to First Peoples Fund; to founding  the World Indigenous Tourism Alliance (a global network to center Indigenous experiences, values and worldview) – Ben was always intentional and thoughtful, humble and wise.

Ben’s methods of unveiling inherent Native values in the fellows of First Peoples Funds programs usually entailed talking circles. In the first gathering of any FPF fellowship and training program, he would inquire of the artists about the values they carried from home that were the most important to them. Usually surprised by this unfamiliar line of inquiry, the artists would dig deep to remember and offer what these values were to each of them. The ensuing sharing resulted in a sense of reverence for ancestral knowledge; a building of trust with their fellow artists; and the beginning of an intimate and lifelong connection between the artist-fellows’ values and their expressions of their artistic work and community-spiritedness.

Theresa Secord, the Penobscot founder of the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance and 2009 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award honoree, board member and longtime trainer alongside Ben, described his way of being in this work:

“Ben served as a natural mentor to all, especially those in the FPF Native Artist Professional Development Trainings (NAPD). Emerging artists, in particular, were drawn to him and his wisdom. He helped transform the way they saw themselves in their communities and in the larger arts world through his lens and their own values systems. He mentored the trainers – myself included – and developed the train-the-trainers materials."

“In the FPF Indigenous Native Arts Ecology work, Ben was so respectful of the sovereignty of each Nation, that upon arrival in new communities, as co-trainers or co-advisors, we would immediately travel together to the seat of tribal government to meet with the President  and/or Councilors."

“In the FPF Indigenous Native Arts Ecology work, Ben was so respectful of the sovereignty of each Nation, that upon arrival in new communities, as co-trainers or co-advisors, we would immediately travel together to the seat of tribal government to meet with the President  and/or Councilors. Here he would make our First Peoples Fund presence and business known and establish proper protocols. Ben was a consummate professional and an ambassador for FPF. He would often characterize our work in the field as acting like the bridge for the artists between FPF, the Tribe, and organizations, such as the Native CDFIs (Community Development Financial Institutions) that served artists. We helped the artists weave an entrepreneurial network within their own tribe and the larger Native arts world.”

Juan Lucero (Isleta Pueblo), the Program Manager of the First Peoples Fund Native Artist Professional Development program, worked side by side with Ben with dozens of artists across many communities.

“What we are doing in NAPD has been guided by Ben Sherman from the beginning. When implementing updates to our trainings, I would often ask myself ‘What would Ben think about this change?’ It wasn’t just about his approval, but also about making sure his voice was still represented in the trainings. His voice is vital to NAPD and our trainers do their best to reflect the values he exhibited, which were so tremendous—so I’m comforted that his legacy in NAPD carries on.”

“What we are doing in NAPD has been guided by Ben Sherman from the beginning. When implementing updates to our trainings, I would often ask myself ‘What would Ben think about this change?’ It wasn’t just about his approval, but also about making sure his voice was still represented in the trainings. His voice is vital to NAPD and our trainers do their best to reflect the values he exhibited, which were so tremendous—so I’m comforted that his legacy in NAPD carries on.”

As both a student and teacher of Lakota star knowledge, Ben professed that the constellations shining from the night sky are reflected on the geographies of the Earth. He taught the Lakota cosmology of the stellar Medicine Wheel or ‘Race Track’  mirroring the Bighorn Medicine Wheel and the buffalo formed by stars as the Tatanka Symbol of the Sun. One needed to study these to recognize them, both in the night sky and on journeys to the sacred places of the earth that they reflected. This practice stands as a metaphor for Ben, his power of observation, and his dedication to the practicing of values.

Though we will miss Ben’s physical presence here with us at First Peoples Fund, we will rely on his Star Knowledge teaching: as above, so below. His teaching, his values and his practices will echo through First Peoples Fund works: through all of the artists he has touched, all the kindnesses he has offered, all of the integrity and respect he modeled during his eight decades of life as a respected Lakota culture bearer.

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- Kalima Rose, longtime friend and FPF Board Co-Chair

Ben’s family has requested that anyone who wishes to honor him and his legacy, may do so by making a gift to First Peoples Fund.