Lone Star Dietz – On Trial

William “Lone Star” Dietz in his traditional American Indian regalia. Courtesy of University of Wyoming Athletics.

Sometime around 1884, a dark-eyed baby boy was born. This is certain. But was this dark-eyed baby boy wrapped
in a blanket by his American Indian mother, or laid in a crib by his white mother?

Tom Benjey, author of Keep A-goin’, the first book about Dietz, says no one will ever really know, but that Dietz and those closest to him believed he was part Indian.

“He was convinced,” says Benjey, who has studied Dietz’s life for five years. “And many people who view his photographs today assume he was Indian.”

In 1889, a birth certificate was signed in Rice Lake, Wis., naming this baby William Henry Deitz. William Wallace Deitz, a German American, signed the certificate as the father. He and his wife, Leanna, were raising the boy. (Lone Star later changed the spelling of his name to “Dietz.”)

Children taunted young William for looking like an Indian. But twice Dietz’s claim to Indian origin has been controversial.

In 1919, at the height of his football coaching career, he was tried for draft evasion. He had registered as a noncitizen Indian and, during the nationalistic frenzy of World War I, some doubted his Indian heritage.

The fact that he was coaching football for the Marines and training with a Marine drill sergeant did not save him from the humiliating trial.

Dietz testified in his own defense that he overheard his parents talking about his Indian blood, and that his father admitted his mother was a Sioux woman, and that his name was One Star, later translated to Lone Star.

Dietz testified that he met a Sioux Indian named One Star at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904, who believed Dietz was his nephew, born to his sister, Julia One Star, who had left the reservation.

The mother who raised Dietz, Leanna Deitz Lewis, testified that she was pregnant in 1884 and the child was stillborn.

The Spokesman Review, Spokane, Wash., printed that Mrs. Lewis testified: “The father took the dead child and buried it in the timber. He then said that he had a secret and told me of the existence of another child of his which he asked permission to bring home to replace the one that died.”

The trial, which included testimony from Indians who refuted Dietz’s claims, resulted in a hung jury. The government reindicted Dietz on almost identical charges.

Lacking funds to defend himself, Dietz pleaded no contest and was sentenced to one month in jail.

A second controversy began after his death and continues today. According to Washington Redskins history, owner George Marshall needed a new name for the professional football team, formerly the Boston Braves. Marshall renamed the team the Redskins to honor Dietz, the coach, and then moved the team to Washington.

Dietz’s trial has been recycled into a fresh news story during the legal battles over the club’s name.

Benjey says Dietz’s best defense is that there were disadvantages to being Indian.

“Due to prejudice, white people did not benefit by assuming an Indian identity,” says Benjey. “His life would have been easier if he had not claimed to be an Indian.”