KYLE, S.D. (AP) – Family members of Russell Means are planning four services to honor the former American Indian Movement activist.
     Means, an Oglala Sioux Tribe member and actor, died at home on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation on Monday. He was 72.

     There will be four services because the number is significant in
Lakota culture, representing, among other things, the four seasons.
     The first ceremony to honor Means is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 10
p.m. Wednesday at the Little Wound School in Kyle, on the Pine
Ridge reservation.

Three more ceremonies will take place next year.
One will be at the site of the 1973 Wounded Knee occupation.
Another will be at Wind Cave National Park.

 Means’ ashes are to be scattered in the Black Hills, which are sacred to the Lakota.

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SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) – Former American Indian Movement
activist and actor Russell Means has died.
Oglala Sioux Tribe spokeswoman Donna Salomon says Means died Monday morning at his ranch in Porcupine, S.D. Means was 72.
     Means helped lead the 1973 uprising at Wounded Knee, reveled in
stirring up attention and appeared in Hollywood films, including
“The Last of the Mohicans.”
     The Wanblee native grew up in the San Francisco area. He
developed inoperable throat cancer and eschewed mainstream medical
treatments for traditional American Indian and alternative
remedies.
     AIM was founded in the late 1960s to protest the U.S.
government’s treatment of Native Americans and demand the
government honor its treaties with Indian tribes.

It was oft embroiled in controversy, partly because of the organization’s
alleged involvement in the 1975 murder of Annie Mae Aquash.