by Chester Nez
The War, a Ken Burns film, PBS Home Video, 2007.
INDEX
Page numbers followed by “n” indicate notes.
Aaseng, Nathan
Adams, Robert
“air” (nitXch’l)
Air Force (U.S.)
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Allied forces
See also United States of America
“all service” base
alphabet and Navajo code
“always faithful” (semper fi)
America. See United States of America
“Among the Oak Trees” (Chichiltah)
Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet
Angaur
Apache tribe
Apra Harbor
“April” (tah-chill)
A “red ant” (wol-la-chee)
Arizona
“Arizona” tag
Army (U.S.)
arroyo baths
arthritis
atabrine
“auntie” (Shimá Yázhí)
Austen, Mount
Australia
Axis powers
See also Japan
B, “bear” (shush)
Bad Way ceremony
Baker, Davey
Baltimore-class cruisers
Banzai (suicide attackers)
Bataan Death March
Battle of Bloody Ridge
Battle of Empress Augusta Bay
Battle of Guadalcanal
See also Guadalcanal
Battle of Midway
Battle of Savo Island
Battle of the Coral Sea
Battle of the Java Sea
“battleship” (lo-tso)
battleships
“bazookas” (ah-zhol)
“beer,”
beer, military issued
Begay, Charlie (code talker)
Begay, Jack
Begay, Roy (code talker)
Angaur
Chester worrying about
Begay, (cont.)
Guadalcanal
Marine recruit
Navajo code development
New Caledonia
Peleliu
Begay, Samuel (code talker)
Begay, Thomas (code talker)
Beijing, China
Benally, John (code talker)
Benny, Jack (code talker)
Betoli
See also Nez, Chester (childhood and youth)
Bingaman, Jeff
Biníshiit Baa. See Nez, Dora (Chester’s sister)
Bitsie, Wilsie (code talker)
Black Sheep clan (Dibé-lizhiní or DibétXizhiní)
“Bloody Nose Ridge” (Umurbrogol Mountain)
boarding school
alter boys
babysitting by older schoolmates
beds at
“big harvest” and
birth dates
bullies
Catholicism and
Checkerboard vs. boarding school
church attendance
classes
cowboy dreams
cultural heritage, erasing
dormitories
“English” all the time
“English” names assigned
food at
forbidden areas
“fried bread” helmets
girls (speaking to), prohibited
graduating from
haircuts
hockey
humiliation of students
kindergarten
lice treatment
marbles
matrons
nightmares at
punishments
religion
runaways
teeth brushing with soap
trading post at
uniforms
“bomb” (a-ye-shi)
Bonis (Japanese airfield)
Bosque Redondo
Boston Red Sox
bottle feeding lambs and kids
Bougainville
bows and arrows
Brown, Cosey (code talker)
Brown, John (code talker)
Brown, John, Jr. (code talker)
Budweiser
Buin (Japanese airfield)
Buka (Japanese airfield)
bullies, boarding school
Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA)
Burma
Bush, George W. (President)
Bushido code (no surrender)
C, “cat” (moasi)
camaraderie of code talkers
Camp Elliott, California
Camp Pendleton, San Diego
cans from field rations used as alarms
Canyon people
Cape Esperance
Cape Torokina
Capital Rotunda
card playing
Carlson, Evans (Lieutenant Colonel)
Carlson’s Raiders
Carson, Kit
Cassidy, Hopalong
casualties
Bougainville
code talkers (Navajo code)
Guadalcanal
Guam
Iwo Jima
Peleliu
Catron, Ethel Pearl (Chester’s wife)
cedar
celebrity, Chester as a
Chamorro natives
Changing Woman
Charley, Yolanda Jane
Checkerboard, New Mexico
Chee, John (code talker)
Cherokee tribe
Chiang Kai-shek
Chichiltah (“Among the Oak Trees”)
“Chief,”
China
Choctaw tribe
Christmases
civil servant incident
clans, Navajos
Cleveland, Benjamin (code talker)
Clinton, Bill (President)
Coast Guard (U.S.)
“coastwatchers,”
code black
code talkers (Navajo code)
alcohol problems of some
bodyguards assigned to
camaraderie
casualties
“Chief,”
Congressional Gold Medals
Congressional Silver Medals
declassification of code
errors in messages, handling
exhibit, Pentagon, Washington, D.C.
friendly fire death of Harry Tsosie
heroes, code talkers as
honored by Nixon
Honoring the Navajo Code Talkers Act
Japan learning about
jobs, difficulty in finding
Marines and
Navajo Code Talkers Dictionary
pairs, working in
POWs and
promotion protocol for
recruits (new)
R&R for
success of
tagged messages
training new recruits
transmitting, moving
undocumented code talkers
uniforms
walking code machines
See also Begay, Roy (code talker); Marines (U.S.); Navajo language; Nez, Chester (code talker); radios (TBX radios); Tsinajnnie, Francis (code talker); World War II; specific code talkers
code talkers (Navajo code), development
accuracy of code
alphabet and
dictionary of Navajo Code Talkers
double encryption
expansion of code
Japanese mistaken for
Johnston, Philip and
memorization of code
military men, assigned to help
military terms and
months of year and
officers and
one-letter-one-word pattern
“original” code talkers
personalities of
phonetic English spelling
pilot project
practicing code
printing vs. script
code talkers (cont.)
secrecy of
Shackle code vs.
testing code
unbreakable code
Cole, Nat King
Collier, John
Comanche tribe
combat fatigue
coming-of-age ceremony
“commando,”
Commission of Indian Affairs
community sense of Navajos
Como, Perry
condition black
condition yellow
Congressional Gold Medals
Congressional Silver Medals
Connor, Howard (Major)
cookhouses
Cooper, Gary
cornmeal mush
corn pollen and Navajos
Corn Pollen people
corpsmen (“docs”)
Cousins, Bob
Coyote the trickster
coyote threat to sheep
Crawford, Eugene (code talker)
Crawford, Gene
creation of the world
Crosby, Bing
“cruiser” (lo-tso-yazzie)
cruisers
“cultural freedom” for Indians
cultural heritage (erasing), boarding school
Curley, David (code talker)
“Curse of the Bambino,”
D, “deer” (be)
daisy cutters
Damon, Lowell (code talker)
Darwin, Australia
declassification of Navajo code
Dennison, George (code talker)
Depression (Great), U.S.
“destroyer” (ca-lo)
destroyers
development of Navajo code. See code talkers (Navajo code), development
dictionary of Navajo Code Talkers
Diné (“the People”)
dive-bombers
Dixon, James (code talker)
“docs” (corpsmen)
“Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree,”
“do or die,”
Durrett, Deanne
dust bowl in Great Plains
“earth” (nahasdzáán)
East (ha’a’aah)
Empire of the Rising Sun
See also Japan
Empress Augusta Bay
Enemy Way ceremony
“English” all the time, boarding school
Father (Chester’s father)
boarding school
code talker declassification
hogan, building Grandmother’s
homecoming (Chester’s)
Korean War and
sheepherding
Sleeping Rock people
stories (great)
sweat lodge
Fels-Naptha soap
“fighter plane” (da-he-tih-hi)
First Man and First Woman
First Marine Division
Guadalcanal
New Caledonia
Peleliu
R&R for
See also Begay, Roy (code talker); Marines (U.S.); Nez, Chester (code talker)
flame throwers
Fletcher (Admiral)
Fletcher-class destroyers
Flores, David (Major)
Florida Islands
Fort Defiance School, Arizona
Fort Sumner, New Mexico
Fort Wingate, New Mexico
“49-er” party
Fox tribe
French dislike of Marines
friendly fire death of Harry Tsosie
fry bread
Fryer, E. Reeseman
Fuji Evening
Galloping Horse
Gallup, New Mexico
Gallup’s Catholic Hospital
Gallup School, New Mexico
Geiger, Roy (General)
Germany
ghosts (chindí)
GI Bill
Gifu Ridge
girl babies as highly valued
“glittering fourth world,”
goats as best friends
Golden Gloves tournament
Good Life (Right Way)
Good Way ceremony
Goon (Japanese translator)
Gorman, Carl (code talker)
Gorman, Zonnie
government employees (“Washing-done”)
Grable, Betty
Grande Terre
Grandmother (Chester’s grandmother)
boarding school and
clans and marriage advice
Great Livestock Massacre
herd, building
hogan, building
homecoming (Chester’s)
sheepherding
stories (great)
Grants, New Mexico
Gray, Charlie
Gray, Johnny
Gray, Raymond
Great Depression (U.S.)
Great Livestock Massacre
Great Plains dust bowl
grid system, field-testing
Guadalcanal
Austen, Mount
Banzai (suicide attackers)
Battle of Bloody Ridge
Battle of Guadalcanal
Battle of Savo Island
Bougainville training
burying bodies with tractors
capture strategy
casualties
crabs and crocodiles at
dog tags
dysentery
fear of soldiers
first battlefield use of Navajo code
food
foot problems
foxholes
friendly fire, avoiding
Gifu Ridge
“jungle rot,”
landing
malaria
Melanesian population of
“Midnight Charlie,”
mosquitoes
night attacks by Japanese
radios (TBX radios)
Slot, The (“Ironbottom Sound”)
South Pacific voyage to
sunbathing Marines
“Tokyo Night Express, The,”
training for Guam
training for Iwo Jima
typhus
“walking fire in,”
Guam
Gutierrez, Benny and Sally
Haile, Father Berard
Halsey, “Bull” (Admiral)
“hand grenade” (nimasi)
hand grenades
hand-to-hand combat
hand-trembler
Harvard
Haskell Indian Nations University, Kansas
Haskie, Ross (code talker)
Hataathlii, Ned
Hawaii
Hawthorne, Roy (code talker)
“hearing” Navajo
Hellzapoppin Ridge
helmets, uses of
Henderson, Lofton R. (Major)
Henderson Field
Higgins boats
high explosive (HE) warheads
Hirohito (Emperor of Japan)
Hiroshima, Japan
Hisey, Henry, Jr.
hitting corporal incident
hogan, building Grandmother’s
Holcomb, Thomas (Commandant)
Holy People
Holy Way ceremony
homecoming (Chester’s)
home memories
Honoring the Navajo Code Talkers Act
Hoover Dam project
Hopi Indians
howitzers
humor of Navajos
“hunger,”
Hunt (Lieutenant)
Hunter’s Point, Arizona
Hyakutake, H. (General)
Ichiki, Kiyono (Colonel)
“I do not like” (doo shil yá’ át’ ééh da)
“I Love You for Sentimental Reasons,”
Ilthma, Oscar (code talker)
Indian Reorganization Act
Inoue, Sadae (Lieutenant General)
“Ironbottom Sound” (Slot, The)
Italy
“I’ve Got Sixpence,”
“I will return” (MacArthur)
Iwo Jima
“jackass” (tkele-cho-gi)
“January” (yas-nil-tes)
Japan
American vs. Japanese soldiers
atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Banzai (suicide attackers)
blue-white artillery tracers of
bombing of Tokyo
Bushido code (no surrender)
codes cracked by
code talkers mistaken for Japanese
dishonor of soldiers’ families
divine right to rule world
earthquake of 1923,
expansion of
14th Division
HakkoX ichiu (manifest destiny)
invasion of China
learning about Navajo code
“Midnight Charlie,”
“missing,”
Naval masters
night attacks by
176th Army
Pearl Harbor attack by
prisoners of war (POWs), Japanese
“scalp” for Bad Way ceremony
Shinto religion
snipers
South Pacific dominance by
surrender of
tanks
“Tokyo Night Express, The,”
Tokyo Rose
unbreakable Navajo code, learning about
underground systems built by
World War I and
wounded, abandoning
Yamato race
Zeros
See also casualties; code talkers (Navajo code); Guadalcanal; World War II
“Japan” (beh-na-ali-tsosie)
Japan, Sea of
Johnston, Philip
Jolson, Al
Jones, Buck
Jones, James E. (Colonel)
“June” (be-ne-eh-eh-jah-tso)
June, Allen Dale (code talker)
junipers
Ka-bar knives
Kawaguchi (Major General)
Kieyoomia, Joe
“kindness” (hozoji)
King, Jimmie (code talker)
kitchen duty
Kluckhorn, Clyde
Korean War
Kotb, Hoda
kunai grass
Laguna people
land craft, vehicle and personnel (LCVPs)
landing ship, tank (LSTs)
landing vehicles, tracked (LVTs)
“Land of the Rising Sun,”
See also Japan
land vs. ship positions
Larry King Weekend (TV show)
Lawrence, Kansas
Leighton, Dorothea
Leonard, Alfred (code talker)
Leonardo da Vinci
Lew Wallace Elementary School, New Mexico
“light” (’adinídíín)
“light complexion” (Betoli)
See also Nez, Chester (childhood and youth)
lightning bolts as weapons
“little man” (Hachi Yázha)
“little mother” (Shimá Yázhí)
Livestock Massacre, Great
Lockard, G. R.
Long Walk
Louis, Joe (“Brown Bomber”)
MacArthur, Douglas (General)
Mack, Ted
mail call
Malay Peninsula
manifest destiny (HakkoX ichiu)
Manual of Navajo Grammar, A (Haile)
Manuelito, John (code talker)
Mariana Islands
