One of Medicine Crow’s most important contributions came from the fact that he understood both the value and the vulnerability of oral history.

For generations, American historians often treated written documents as inherently superior to spoken memory.

Military reports, government records, diaries, maps, and newspapers were classified as evidence, while Native oral traditions were dismissed as folklore unless they could be confirmed by a written source.

That hierarchy favored the people who controlled literacy, printing, bureaucracies, and archives.

It also created obvious distortions.

The U.S.

Army produced written reports about campaigns against Native nations.

Federal agents wrote reports about reservations.

Missionaries wrote about Native religion.

Anthropologists wrote field notes.