ISHI'S RETURN is a half-hour film about Ishi, billed in 1911 as the “last wild Indian" when he wandered out of the woods in Oroville, CA, and became a national sensation. When Ishi died, his brain was removed and sent to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. Eighty years later, his descendants in California fight to have his remains repatriated to his ancestral home. ISHI'S RETURN is from Native filmmakers Chris Eyre (Cheyenne/Arapaho) and Brian Wescott (Athabascan/Yup’ik) and producer Roberta Grossman (500 Nations, Homeland).
ISHI’S RETURN is a co-production of Katahdin Productions, Independent Television Service (ITVS), and Vision Maker Media, with funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Susan Swanson and Lisa B. Thomas Foundation.
This project was made possible with support from Cal Humanities, a nonprofit partner of the NEH. Visit www.calhum.org.
