Gowongo Mohawk

Gowongo (Go-Won-Go/Go-Wan-Go) Mohawk was a Seneca playwright and actor (11 August 1860 - 7 February 1924). She was born in Gowanda, New York, to father Ga-Na-Gua, also known as Dr. Alan Mohawk, a chief medicine man of the Seneca Nation, and mother Lydia, who was known as “The Angle” on the Cattaraugus Reservation. Gowongo’s stage name (Gowongo) translates to “I fear no one.” Her English name was Carrie A. Mohawk.

Beginning her performing career in America, Gowongo’s prestige as an actor and playwright translated across the Atlantic to the United Kingdom where she toured her work. She died in 1924 at the age of 63 and is buried in Edgewater Cemetery, New Jersey, with her husband Charles W. Charles, an army captain who served with General Custer.

Gowongo’s most famed work, Wep-ton-No-Mah, The Indian Mail Carrier, sparked the interest of audiences and the general public across America and Britain. Playing the role of Wep-ton-No-Mah, a Native American man, Gowongo troubled stereotypes of Indigeneity, race, gender, and sexuality while engaging in the contemporary urge to reimagine the frontier, as seen in the popular Buffalo Bill Wild West Shows, which she also performed in.