He became tribal historian and anthropologist for the Crow.

Sources differ slightly on the exact year of formal appointment, generally placing it in the late 1940s, but the role became one of the central commitments of his adult life.

This was not honorary employment in the modern ceremonial sense.

A tribal historian has responsibilities to memory.

Medicine Crow interviewed elders, recorded stories, studied historical accounts, interpreted the Battle of the Little Bighorn, wrote about Crow life, and helped preserve knowledge that existed partly in oral form.

He understood that a generation was disappearing.

People who remembered the pre-reservation era or had learned directly from those who lived through it were dying.

If their knowledge was not preserved, future generations might encounter their own history only through books written by outsiders.

Medicine Crow was uniquely positioned to prevent that.

He knew the academic world well enough to write for institutions.