Richard Oakes was a Mohawk iron worker, community organizer, and academic deeply involved in Indigenous sovereignty movements. He was one of the leaders at the occupation of Alcatraz, helped created one of the first American Indian Studies programs at SF State, and also helped the Pit River Tribe in their land struggle against PG&E (Pacific Gas and Electric Company). He was the target of multiple attacks by settlers throughout his life, and ultimately was shot and killed in 1972 by a YMCA camp manager, Michael Morgan, who was backed by the police. A racist jury acquitted Morgan of voluntary manslaughter despite the fact that Oakes had been unarmed at the time of the shooting.