In Native Spirit and The Sun Dance Way, Thomas Yellowtail, Crow Sun Dance Chief for over 30 years, explains and describes the ancient Sun Dance ceremony.

Yellowtail’s profound and authoritative words, taken from his memoirs, provide the narration for this documentary, which he saw as a means of preserving the sacred ways of his people for future generations.

Born in 1903, medicine man and Sun Dance Chief, Thomas Yellowtail, was the principal figure in the Crow-Shoshone Sun Dance Religion during the last half of the 20th century.

As a youth he lived in the presence of old-time warriors, hunters, and medicine men who had lived in the freedom and sacred ways of pre-reservation life. Yellowtail received the Montana Governor's Award for the Arts in recognition of his work in preserving the traditional culture of the Crow tribe.

The program read:

“This man is outside of time as we know it, centered in the spiritual world. Thomas Yellowtail has perpetuated the spiritual traditions of his Crow tribe as one of the last living links to pre-reservation days. But his legacy is not limited to Native Americans because his principles and his message benefit anyone searching to find a balance in this fast-paced technological society.”