Among famous Native American chiefs, Geronimo's name is synonymous for .
Although there were no records kept of his birth, he was .
probably born in 1829 in the mountains of Arizona. His Indian name was Goyahkla [One .
Who Yawns] and his early years were spent as a typical youth of the Apache tribe. As an .
adult he married and started a family but when Mexican soldiers killed his wife and .
children in 1858, he vowed revenge. His ferocious attacks earned him the nickname of .
"Geronimo" and his vengeance continued for decades. When the Americans came to the.
Southwest, they became his new enemy and he fought them until his surrender in 1886.
For the next twenty-three years, until his death in 1909, he remained a prisoner-of-war.
Geronimo's life has been the subject of numerous books and a recent movie but .
they rarely focus on his last decades as a prisoner-of-war of the American Army. When .
he surrendered in 1886, the Americans promised to eventually return him and his people .
to their home land. Instead, Geronimo spent the rest of his life in various military camps.
He tried to learn the ways of the Americans and he would, in his own way, become a .
successful businessman. But he would never see his native Arizona again.
After Geronimo's surrender in 1886, the army moved his Apache band to .
Alabama, where they lived for several years. But the climate of the South, very unlike .
the mountains and deserts of their native Arizona, was unsuitable for them and in 1894.
they were relocated to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. This was considered a positive change .
because the Apache people had expressed a desire for a drier climate and for land to .
farm. [Martin, Geronimo, p.151].
Geronimo's arrival in Oklahoma stirred considerable controversy because the .
stereotype of the "savage Indian" was still common in the West, even though he was .
about sixty-five years old. Indeed, one rumor about his fierce past plagued Geronimo for.