Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

He cherished heritage, artifacts

By Marty Clear
Published August 24, 2007

By MARTY CLEAR

Times Correspondent

PLANT CITY - His parents named him Frank, but when he was in his 30s, he had his name legally changed to reflect his persona. His name was Indian Joe Hendricks.

Mr. Hendricks, who died of cancer Aug. 6 at age 62, was the son of a full-blooded American Indian father and a white mother. He was raised to cherish both sides of his heritage.

"When my parents got married, in the 1930s, for an Indian man to marry a white woman, that was equivalent to a black man marrying a white woman in the '60s," said Charlotte Hendricks Johnson, Indian Joe's sister. "Growing up, we were called every derogatory name you could think of. But we were always raised to be proud of being Indian."

His father's name was Joe, and when Mr. Hendricks was a boy, most people called him "Little Joe" or "Little Indian." When his father died, Mr. Hendricks changed his name to honor the man and the culture that had given him so much.

Mr. Hendricks was raised in Palmetto, on the shores of Terra Ceia Bay. His father was a commercial fisherman, and Mr. Hendricks learned the trade and the skills from him.

Mr. Hendricks followed his father's career path, fishing the bay waters for most of his adult life. While his competitors may have favored larger boats with crews, he preferred to fish alone on skiffs he had built himself.

"It was just him, his net and his oars," his sister said. "And a lot of times he'd end up with more fish than the big commercial fishermen at week's end. He knew where the fish were. He was a finder."

In Indian culture, she explained, "finders" are valued members of a society. They're skilled at locating game, fish and just about anything else.

One of his passions was collecting Indian artifacts. He would ask a property owner's permission, and then use his skills to locate arrowheads, spearheads, tomahawks and other relics.

Once, while searching some old mining land, Mr. Hendricks stopped, looked down and said, "There's a point for me right here." He scooped up three handfuls of sand and uncovered a perfect arrowhead.

He gathered boxes of artifacts that could have drawn big money, but his collection wasn't for sale.

He felt a thrill every time he held an arrowhead that had been crafted centuries ago by one of his ancestors and had quite possibly never been touched by anyone since.

Fifteen years ago, Mr. Hendricks and his wife moved to Plant City, mostly to be near his sister.

"He was my playmate," his sister said. "We'd leave our respective spouses behind and go fishing or camping, just the two us."

Charlotte Hendricks Johnson has a master's degree and reads voraciously about anthropology. But when there was something she didn't understand, she'd turn to her brother, who always seemed to have an answer despite a learning disability that kept him from being able to read until he was 44 years old.

"He knew so much, and he learned it all by listening," his sister said, "His IQ must have been off the charts."

Also surviving are his wife, Barbara Batson Hendricks; daughters Frankie Lynn Hendricks and Mary Batson Click; sons Joseph Hendricks, James Hendricks and Steven Batson; sisters Orie Mayceile Mills and Sandra Hendricks Schleif; and three grandchildren.

[Last modified August 26, 2007, 13:05:32]