This week marks the a hundredth anniversary of the delivery of probably the most revered Mardi Gras Indians — Massive Chief Allison “Tootie” Montana, born on Dec. 16, 1922.
Montana’s father Alfred was Massive Chief of the Yellow Pocahontas tribe, of which Tootie later grew to become chief. He made his first swimsuit in 1947. “I do it as a result of it’s in my blood. My daddy did it, and earlier than him my great-uncle did it. It’s been a practice in my household for 100 years,” Montana mentioned in 1997.
He labored as a carpenter and lather, constructing frames for plaster buildings. He additionally used his abilities to create his feathered, beaded Mardi Gras Indian fits every year, assisted by his spouse Joyce.
Often called “the chief of chiefs,” Montana helped protect and improve the Black Masking Indian tradition. He led the shift from sometimes-violent encounters between tribes to extra of a contest to see who might masks the “prettiest,” as he referred to as it.
Montana masked as an Indian for greater than 50 years earlier than his son Darryl took over management of the Yellow Pocahontas in 1998.
On June 27, 2005, Tootie Montana attended a New Orleans Metropolis Council assembly to talk out in opposition to police harassment of Mardi Gras Indians. As he spoke, he collapsed from a deadly coronary heart assault. As he lay on the ground, different Indians gathered round him, chanting and singing.
There’s a bronze statue of Montana in Armstrong Park. In 2012, the Metropolis Council declared Jan. 6, the beginning of the Carnival season, as Tootie Montana Day in New Orleans.