He was born Geswanouth Slahoot on a First Nations reserve in North Vancouver in 1899. His English name was Dan Slaholt. His last name was changed to George when he entered a residential school at the age of 5. He worked at a number of different jobs including longshoreman, construction worker and school bus driver. He was chief of the Salish band from 1951 to 1963.
During his acting career, Chief Dan George also worked to promote better understanding by non-natives of First Nations people. His soliloquy, Lament for Confederation, was performed at the city of Vancouver's celebration of the Canadian centennial in 1967.
ChiefDanGeorge was born Tes-wah-no (also known as Dan Slaholt) to a tribal chief on Burrard Reserve No.3 on Vancouver Island.
His last name was changed to George when he entered a mission boarding school at the age of 5, where the use of his native language was discouraged, if not forbidden.
After spending much of his early life as a longshoreman, a construction worker, and a school bus driver, ChiefDanGeorge auditioned for the role of Old Antoine on "Cariboo Country" (1960), a CBC television series, and was offered the part.
ChiefDanGeorge was an accomplished performer, poet, philosopher, champion of first Nations peoples, loving patriarch of a large family, was born in 1899 on a Salish Band reserve on Burrard Inlet, in North Vancouver, one of twelve children of the chief.
Dan worked as a long-shoreman off and on for the next twenty-seven years, during frequent strikes supplementing his income with hunting and lumbering, until he had a serious accident on the docks in 1947, which damaged a hip and leg.
ChiefDan received the New York Film Critic's Award and the National Society of Film Critic's Award, as well as an Oscar nomination for the depth and sincerity of that characterization.
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