Nez was born in
Chi Chil Tah, New Mexico, to the Navajo Dibéłizhiní (Black Sheep Clan) of the Tsénahabiłnii (Sleeping Rock People). He was raised during a time of difficult relations between the U.S. government and the
Navajo Nation. His mother died when he was only three years old. Nez recalled children often being taken from
reservations, sent to
boarding schools, and forbidden to speak the
Navajo language. At eight years old, Nez was sent to a school run by the
Bureau of Indian Affairs. His English given name, Chester, after US president
Chester A. Arthur, was assigned then.[4] It was from one of the government-run boarding schools, in
Tuba City,
Arizona, that Nez was recruited into the Marine Corps.[1][2][3][5]
Code talker
Nez kept his decision to enlist from his family.
He and 28 other Navajos formed Recruit Training Platoon 382 at Marine Corps Base San Diego in May 1942. The 29 who graduated from boot camp, including Nez, were then assigned to the Camp Elliot, California, where they were tasked with creating a code for secure voice tactical (battlefield) communications. At the time, tactical radios were not equipped, as they are today, with encryption/decryption technology, allowing the enemy to listen to radio traffic, often with disastrous results. The Navajo language was chosen because its complex syntax and phonology made it exceedingly difficult to learn as a second language, and it had no written form. Nez stated the developers used everyday words, in order to easily memorize and retain them. In 1942, he was among the code talkers to be shipped out to
Guadalcanal, where they worked in teams of two: one to send and receive, the other to operate the radio and listen for errors. Nez also fought in
Bougainville,
Guam,
Angaur and
Peleliu. He was
honorably discharged as a private first class in 1945 and returned to serve stateside in the
Korean War from which he was discharged as a
corporal.[1][2][3]
From 1946 to 1952, Nez attended the
University of Kansas to study commercial arts, but by 1952 discontinued his studies after having exhausted funding from his
G.I. Bill; he was awarded an honorary bachelor's degree by the Kansas University College of Liberal Arts and Science on Veterans Day, 2012.[7][8]
Following his military service, he worked as a painter for 25 years at a
V.A. hospital in
Albuquerque. In 2011, he wrote the memoir Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir by One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII with Judith Avila.[1][2][3][5]
Congressional Gold Medal
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Today, we marked a moment of shared history and shared victory. We recall a story that all Americans can celebrate and every American should know. It is a story of ancient people called to serve in a modern war. It is a story of one unbreakable oral code of the Second World War, messages travelling by field radio on Iwo Jima in the very language heard across the Colorado plateau centuries ago.[9] – President George W. Bush.
Nez was born in
Chi Chil Tah, New Mexico, to the Navajo Dibéłizhiní (Black Sheep Clan) of the Tsénahabiłnii (Sleeping Rock People). He was raised during a time of difficult relations between the U.S. government and the
Navajo Nation. His mother died when he was only three years old. Nez recalled children often being taken from
reservations, sent to
boarding schools, and forbidden to speak the
Navajo language. At eight years old, Nez was sent to a school run by the
Bureau of Indian Affairs. His English given name, Chester, after US president
Chester A. Arthur, was assigned then.[4] It was from one of the government-run boarding schools, in
Tuba City,
Arizona, that Nez was recruited into the Marine Corps.[1][2][3][5]
Code talker
Nez kept his decision to enlist from his family.
He and 28 other Navajos formed Recruit Training Platoon 382 at Marine Corps Base San Diego in May 1942. The 29 who graduated from boot camp, including Nez, were then assigned to the Camp Elliot, California, where they were tasked with creating a code for secure voice tactical (battlefield) communications. At the time, tactical radios were not equipped, as they are today, with encryption/decryption technology, allowing the enemy to listen to radio traffic, often with disastrous results. The Navajo language was chosen because its complex syntax and phonology made it exceedingly difficult to learn as a second language, and it had no written form. Nez stated the developers used everyday words, in order to easily memorize and retain them. In 1942, he was among the code talkers to be shipped out to
Guadalcanal, where they worked in teams of two: one to send and receive, the other to operate the radio and listen for errors. Nez also fought in
Bougainville,
Guam,
Angaur and
Peleliu. He was
honorably discharged as a private first class in 1945 and returned to serve stateside in the
Korean War from which he was discharged as a
corporal.[1][2][3]
From 1946 to 1952, Nez attended the
University of Kansas to study commercial arts, but by 1952 discontinued his studies after having exhausted funding from his
G.I. Bill; he was awarded an honorary bachelor's degree by the Kansas University College of Liberal Arts and Science on Veterans Day, 2012.[7][8]
Following his military service, he worked as a painter for 25 years at a
V.A. hospital in
Albuquerque. In 2011, he wrote the memoir Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir by One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII with Judith Avila.[1][2][3][5]
Congressional Gold Medal
This section is a candidate for
copying over to
Wikisource. If the section can be
edited into encyclopedic content, rather than merely a copy of the source text, please do so and remove this message. Otherwise, you can help by formatting it per the
Wikisource guidelines in preparation for the duplication.
Today, we marked a moment of shared history and shared victory. We recall a story that all Americans can celebrate and every American should know. It is a story of ancient people called to serve in a modern war. It is a story of one unbreakable oral code of the Second World War, messages travelling by field radio on Iwo Jima in the very language heard across the Colorado plateau centuries ago.[9] – President George W. Bush.