Lessons of compassion taught by his grandmother lead Brown senior to use $20,000 she left him to found an organization to help the Lakota
When he was young, Brian Swett rolled the spare change his grandmother had set aside to donate to charities. Now the Brown senior will honor her memory by helping those in need.
The idea came to him by chance. The same week Swett received the inheritance,
he read a newspaper article about a Massachusetts man who annually transports
food, clothes, toys and books to the struggling Lakota of the reservation.
"I was looking for a way to honor her," said Swett. "The compassion that she
had for other people was contagious."
Swett, a public policy and international relations student from Newton, Mass.,
read about John Paul Sullivan's annual cross-country trek in a Boston Globe
article published last summer.
Since 1995, Sullivan has spent each Thanksgiving holiday driving a rented truck
filled with donated items from Massachusetts to South Dakota. He was motivated
to help Lakota children when he came across a sponsorship brochure at a Native
American crafts store in Quincy, Mass.
"He just does things because he feels moved to do them," Swett said of
Sullivan, a telephone lineman from Whitman, Mass. "I was blown away by that
simple act of generosity."
Swett had just returned from a semester abroad when he read the newspaper
article. The reservation's horrible living conditions mirrored those he saw
during his travels through shantytowns in South Africa and poor communities in
Cuba, Vietnam and India, said Swett.
"It's basically Third World conditions in the United States. It's shocking that
it's here and nobody knows about it," he said.
For Sullivan, Swett's promise sounded like so many others he has heard and
never seen fulfilled.
"When Brian first called I said `That would be nice,'" said Sullivan. "Nine out
of ten times I don't hear from the person again. I depend on no one. I
anticipate nothing. I expect nothing.
"But Brian is a man of his word."
Although both men live in Massachusetts, they met for the first time in South
Dakota. Swett flew there in November to help Sullivan unload the 24-foot rental
truck at three sites within the 2-million-acre reservation.
While there, Swett also met 39-year-old Marian White Mouse, a member of the
Lakota tribe and a community leader in the efforts to improve the lives of
those on the reservation.
White Mouse, who has a degree in counseling, talked about her dreams of
starting a free counseling center for those who abuse alcohol and drugs. Some
60 to 80 percent of babies born on the reservation have Fetal Alcohol
Syndrome.
The goals outlined in the statement of his nonprofit organization, called Na'ca
'Cikala, or Little Warrior, include acquiring property on the reservation to
establish the counseling center and to establish a distribution center for
clothing, toys, books and furniture.
After graduation from Brown this May, Swett will spend a year seeking grants
and donations to foster Na'ca 'Cikala's growth. "The grassroots network is
there," said Swett. "There are some fantastic people like Marian, but they just
need the funding."
Brian Swett, center, and John Paul Sullivan, left, with Marian White Mouse, second from right, and members of her family on the Lakota reservation. (Photo courtesy of Brian Swett)
It was a project in which Muriel Swett would have been interested. The woman
who had received a master's degree in social work contributed to Native
American causes, including serving as an early sponsor of the American Indian
College Fund. She died in 1996 at the age of 87.
Lakota children select a toy at a distribution center. (Photo courtesy of Brian Swett)
Swett contacted the newspaper reporter to find out how he could get in touch
with Sullivan. When he called Sullivan, the two talked for over an hour. Swett
ended the conversation with a vow: Rather than make a one-time donation to
Sullivan's grassroots effort, he would establish a nonprofit foundation that
would support work like Sullivan's as well as create year-round programs to
help the Lakota address the challenges they face.
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