Charlie Soap and Greg Shaw

Magic City Books is proud to welcome Charlie Soap and Greg Shaw for a special event in celebration of the new biography, Last One Walking: The Life of Cherokee Community Leader Charlie Soap on Wednesday November 20 at 7:00 pm in the Algonquin Room at Magic City Books (221 E Archer Street).

Combining memoir, history, and current affairs, Last One Walking charts for the first time the life and work of Charlie Soap, husband of the late Wilma Mankiller, the first woman to serve as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation.

In telling this story, author and former journalist Greg Shaw gives voice to his sources. As a longtime colleague and friend of the family, he draws on his many travels and interviews with Soap and on previously unpublished writings, including a Soap family history penned by Mankiller, included here as the book’s prologue. Shaw offers a rich profile of Soap’s singular career–particularly as a champion of water rights.

Last One Walking is available now at Magic City Books or you can order a copy online to have signed by Greg and Charlie and shipped out after the event: https://magiccitybooks.square.site/product/last-one-walking/3005.

About Last One Walking

The Native American fight for land has been well-chronicled, but the fight for water has not. Last One Walking helps to fill that void with a narrative that is also deeply moving, revealing on every page the spirit of ga-du-gi.

You probably know the story of the late Wilma Mankiller, the first woman to serve as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. You might not recognize the name of her husband, Charlie Soap, yet his role as a Native community organizer is no less significant. Combining memoir, history, and current affairs, Last One Walking charts for the first time the life and work of this influential Cherokee.

In telling this story, author and former journalist Greg Shaw gives voice to his sources. As a longtime colleague and friend of the family, he draws on his many travels and interviews with Soap and on previously unpublished writings, including a Soap family history penned by Mankiller, included here as the book’s prologue. Shaw offers a rich profile of Soap’s singular career–particularly as a champion of water rights.

In managing public infrastructure projects, housing assistance, and water development in the Cherokee Nation, Soap has exemplified ga-du-gi, the Cherokee word for community members working together for the collective good. Shaw portrays a dynamic partnership between Soap and Mankiller. Together they reignited community development for the Cherokee people by listening to everyone, including the poorest of the poor, and hearing their pleas for reliable water, a basic human need and a sacred element in Cherokee culture.

Charlie Soap’s name in Cherokee, Ohni ai (ᎣᏂ ᎠᎢ), translates as “the last one walking.” In the Cherokee wolf clan, this is the member who trails the rest of the pack to watch for danger and opportunity. The last one walking forms a bond of trust with the pack’s leader.

Oklahoma native Greg Shaw has reported for the Cherokee Advocate and served as an executive for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Charlie Soap is a full-blood, bilingual Cherokee. He served in the United States Navy from l965-l969 and received an honorable discharge. He later earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Education from Northeastern State University.

Mr. Soap has dedicated virtually his entire career to working to strengthen the many Cherokee communities in northeastern Oklahoma. Serving under three chiefs, he served as the community service group leader for the Cherokee Nation, overseeing a $100 million budget dedicated to public transit services, roads, bridges and infrastructure projects, environmental health services, self-help housing assistance, youth programs and natural disaster relief.