Homer White Buffalo, an honest cop
Homer White Buffalo, an honest cop
1944-2010
By Marilyn Hudson
Three Tribes Museum
I was fortunate to have known Homer White Buffalo both as a co-worker and a friend. We worked together for many years at the Bureau of Indian Affairs in New Town before our respective retirements in the 1990s. Homer was a dedicated law enforcement officer. He was highly respected by all who knew him. He worked in many locations in the Midwest, but he always came back to Fort Berthold.
He considered New Town his home and the people here a part of his family. Homer was from the Standing Rock Reservation. He told close friends about his difficult childhood and about how he came to choose law enforcement as his career. When Homer became ill with complications from diabetes and was hospitalized in Grand Forks, he wrote me a number of letters which contained some of his life history, his philosophies, his aches and pains and, of course, his always present humor.
If Homer had not gone into the law enforcement field, I have no doubt that he could have been a highly successful comedian. He knew how to tell a joke. He often said that his understanding of humor gave him another perspective or dimension into which to analyze and interpret actions and events. This talent also gave him an advantage when he interviewed or questioned suspects or witnesses. He had the uncanny ability to put the individuals at ease and to resolve the difficulties at hand. I never heard anyone, victim or suspect, speak ill of Homer. He was considered to be fair and honest – in other words, a good cop.
