Ishi: The Last of His Tribe (1978)

Ishi: The Last of His Tribe (1978)



A more oral-historically accurate re-telling of the story of a Northern California Indian named "Ishi" by anthropologists. He was the last member of the Yahi tribe by the year 1911 and became a living museum exhibit in San Francisco until his death in 1916. Originally directed by Robert Ellis Miller, the tele-play was written by black-listed screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. The film originally aired on TV in 1978. Dennis Weaver
plays anthropologist Thomas Wa


In 1911 in Northern California, a rancher found a naked, unconscious Indian, near death, lying in his horse corral. After he was revived and brought back to health, it was eventually discovered that the Indian, named Ishi, was the last surviving member of a small tribe called the Yahi, which had been decimated by disease, starvation and clashes with other tribes high in the mountains, and was so reclusive that none of the area's white residents, and few of its Indians, knew of their existence or had ever even heard of them. Ishi was studied and eventually befriended by a San Francisco anthropologist, who wrote a book about him, upon which this film was based.