Code talker / Chester Nez, with Judith Schiess Avila.
Material type: TextPublisher: New York : Dutton Caliber, 2018Copyright date: ©2011Edition: First Dutton Caliber trade paperback editionDescription: viii, 310 pages, 16 unnumbered leaves of plates : illustrations, maps ; 23 cmContent type:- text
- unmediated
- volume
- 9780425247853
- 0425247856
- Nez, Chester, 1921-2014
- United States. Marine Corps -- Biography
- Navajo code talkers -- Biography
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Cryptography
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, American
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Participation, Indian
- Marines -- United States -- Biography
- Navajo Indians -- Biography
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book | Main Library | Biography | NEZ, C. N575 | Available | 33111010910897 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
The first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers of WWII.
His name wasn't Chester Nez. That was the English name he was assigned in kindergarten. And in boarding school at Fort Defiance, he was punished for speaking his native language, as the teachers sought to rid him of his culture and traditions. But discrimination didn't stop Chester from answering the call to defend his country after Pearl Harbor, for the Navajo have always been warriors, and his upbringing on a New Mexico reservation gave him the strength-both physical and mental-to excel as a marine.
During World War II, the Japanese had managed to crack every code the United States used. But when the Marines turned to its Navajo recruits to develop and implement a secret military language, they created the only unbroken code in modern warfare-and helped assure victory for the United States over Japan in the South Pacific.
INCLUDES THE ACTUAL NAVAJO CODE AND RARE PICTURES
"Includes the actual Navajo Code and rare photos"--Cover
Includes bibliographical references (pages 293-296) and index.
Although more than 400 Navajos served in the military during World War II as top-secret code talkers, even those fighting shoulder to shoulder with them were not told of their covert function. And, after the war, the Navajos were forbidden to speak of their service until 1968, when the code was finally declassified. Of the original twenty- nine Navajo code talkers, only two are still alive. Chester Nez is one of them. In this memoir, the eighty-nine-year-old Nez chronicles both his war years and his life growing up on the Checkerboard Area of the Navajo Reservation -- the hard life that gave him the strength, both physical and mental, to become a Marine. His story puts a living face on the legendary men who developed what is still the only unbroken code in modern warfare.