Only two American Indians at work in opinion writing. (Diversity of Opinion).

I think it's fair to say that never in the history of Minnesota has a journalist compared Crazy Horse with President Kennedy in an opinion column.

Quite probably, no other writer suggested that when Clayton Moore died, he take the "Lone Ranger" reruns with him because the show's writers insisted on making Tonto so grammar-challenged. How could any Indian hang out with so many white people for so many years and never master pronouns?

Until I joined the St. Paul Pioneer Press editorial board, I doubt if any writer here thought through the economic impact of gambling on the state. Editorials often complained about the social costs of gambling, and rightly so. l argued, however, that social costs are half the story. Learn how many jobs have been created, I insisted, and how many people left welfare. Learn the way the new money has improved the lives of reservation and off-reservation Indians. Tell the whole story, I pleaded. Initially, the suggestion was met with mostly furrowed brows.

Maybe the owners of those brows can more readily answer the question of whether a person of American Indian heritage makes a difference on an editorial board. Statistically, their replies would tell nearly the whole story because Indians are almost invisible in newsrooms across the country.

A survey by the American Society of Newspaper Editors last year determined that of 54,414 journalists, 307 were American Indian, or about one-half of one percent. Two-thirds of the country's daily newspapers answered the ASNE survey.

The Native American Journalists Association reports that two of its members are on editorial boards, Doreen Yellow Bird with the Grand Forks Herald in North Dakota, and me. Almost every year I call NAJA to learn if more Indians are on boards. Every year, the answer is no.

That reply is dispiriting but understandable. I don't know of too many Indians who would welcome the loneliness of this job with its predictable stream of hate mail after an "Indian" piece is published. To write for a mainstream newspaper means leaving a closely knit reservation. A lot of Indians simply can't and won't do that.

Even urban Indians, however, avoid journalism programs, largely because no one ever encouraged them, they have few role models, and education isn't valued. I remind Indian high school students that they come from an oral storytelling tradition that's at least 12,000 years old. I remind them that more of the truth about our people will emerge if they tell it. The kids listen, but too many run out of hope by the time we meet. Too many drop out of school.

That said, let me take you to a world of make believe. If every editorial board in the country had an Indian journalist with background in his or her tribe's culture and history, the overall quality of life for all Indians would vastly improve. The cumulative effect could change every corner of Indian country simply because the chorus would rise to a volume impossible to ignore.

This is not to say that all Indians speak in the same voice. But when only two are speaking on editorial boards-- Doreen and me--we produce less than a squeak. To complicate things further, many readers believe that all Indians are the same.

I try to remind people that I don't represent the views of all 250 Indian nations in the United States. Each has its own culture and history. Here's an example. While living in Milwaukee, non-Indians were puzzled that I didn't travel to see the white buffalo calf born on a farm west of the city. I explained that buffalo weren't culturally significant to the woodland Ojibwe.

Explanations of that kind are most effectively made to a broad audience, transforming opinion writing into a kind of classroom teaching. I think it's safe to say that the average adult in Minnesota knows squat about Indians. Not even elementary matters are understood, such as the special political status of Indians. We aren't just "minorities" based on race or ethnicity. A background and respect for treaty law is crucial to understanding the never-ending baffles Indians must fight to protect their cultures and traditions.

I've written about some of those battles. Many Minnesota Indians appreciate the effort. Once in a while at a pow wow or social gathering, someone will approach. "I saw that thing you wrote' I'm told. "Keep it up."

So I keep it up.

Someone has to.

NCEW member Deborah Locke is an editorial writer with the St. Paul PioneerPress in Minnesota and a graduate of the Minority Writers Seminar. E-mail her at [e-mail]