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CHARLES “CHUCK” TRIMBLE


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MARCH 12, 1935 – MARCH 2, 2020

Charles “Chuck” Trimble was born March 12, 1935 to John Guy and Lucy (Randall) Trimble in the village of Wanblee on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. He was preceded in death by his parents and twelve siblings: Gertrude Zephier, Grace Montgomery, Bessie Cornelius, Emma Nelson, Leona Gary, Shirley Plume, James Trimble, Albert Trimble, Nelson Trimble and Eugen Trimble. Another brother, Ralph Ulysses and sister Sophie, died in infancy. He is survived by his wife Ann and daughter Katherine Fenz Trimble.

Trimble attended Holy Rosary Mission on the reservation, graduating in 1952. He attended Cameron College in Lawton, OK, and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1957 from the University of South Dakota.

Up to his retirement in 2001, Charles E. Trimble was president of Charles Trimble Company, a national consulting firm specializing in economic development on Indian reservations. He was president of Red Willow Institute, a non-profit corporation he founded to provide technical and management assistance to Native American non-profit organizations.

Born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, Trimble was an enrolled citizen of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. He received his elementary and high school education at the Holy Rosary Mission Indian School in Pine Ridge, South Dakota and received a B.F.A. degree from the University of South Dakota (1957). Following service in the US Army, he did further studies in journalism at the University of Colorado.

In 1969 he was principle founder of the American Indian Press Association and served as the organization’s executive director until 1972, when he was elected Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indians.

Trimble was involved in international affairs for protection of indigenous rights and human rights. In 1975 he represented US Indian tribes at the charter meeting of the World Council of Indigenous Peoples in Copenhagen, Denmark. In 1983, he served as a US delegate at the UN Sub-commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities in Geneva, Switzerland. In 1985 he was a US delegate4 to the Human Rights Experts meeting of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (Helsinki Accord) in Ottawa, Canada.

Trimble served on the Board of Directors of the American Indian National Bank in Washington, DC, from 1975 to 1986. He served as president of ARROW, Inc., and on the Board of the National Center for American Indian Enterprise Development. He also chaired the Economic Development Committee of the National Congress of American Indians.

Trimble had an active interest in western history and served from 1991-1997 on the Board of Trustees of the Nebraska State Historical Society, the last three of those years as President. He was again elected to the NSHS Board in 2003. He also served on the Board of the Nebraska State Historical Society Foundation and as a member of the State Historic Preservation Board. From 1994-98 he served on the Omaha Landmarks Heritage Preservation Commission. In 1996, he was appointed by the Senate Majority Leader to the American Folklife Center Board of Trustees in the Library of Congress.

In 1999, as president of the John G. Neihardt Foundation, Trimble established the Institute for Vision and Learning, a summer workshop in literature and writing for Native American high school students. In 1970, he was an instructor in Native American affairs at Fort Lewis College in Durango, CO, and in 1988-91 he taught courses in contemporary Indian affairs in the University of Nebraska-Omaha College of Continuing Studies. He has also taught in the Nebraska State Historical Society’s Nebraska Institute for Teachers. From 2005-07 he served as interim Director of the Institute of American Indian Studies at the University of South Dakota.

In 1998, Trimble received the Pioneer Award from the Nebraskaland Foundation at its Statehood Day Dinner in the Nebraska Capitol Rotunda. In October 1999, he was honored by the University of South Dakota with its annual Alumni Achievement Award, and in October 2003 by Cameron University in Lawton, OK, with its Distinguished Alumni Award. In December 2000 he received an honorary Doctor of Cultural Sciences degree from Creighton University. In May 2002, he received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Wayne State College. In 2008 Trimble received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of South Dakota and an honorary degree from Oglala Lakota College.

Trimble lived in Omaha, Nebraska, with his wife, Anne. Those who wish may send memorial contributions to The Lucy Trimble Memorial Scholarship Fund c/o Red Cloud Indian School, 100 Mission Drive, Pine Ridge, SD 57770

Visitation and Mass of Christian Burial were held on March 06, 2020 at the St. John Catholic Church at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska.

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