When he was born in 1850, his mother held him in her arms.  She smiled down at her little boy.  His father held his boy child and was very proud.  They could not know that their son would grow up to be the last chief of his tribe.  Chief Peta Nocona and Naudah (Cynthia Ann Parker) named their son Quanah. His name meant "fragrant" or "sweet smelling" in Comanche.

The Comanches liked Naudah's courage.  The Comanches adopted both children.  Naudah liked the life of the Indians.  She rode bareback on half-wild ponies.  She fished in the river.  She helped skin buffalo and tan their hides.  Naudah learned how to build a teepee and how to skin rabbits.

When she grew older, Naudah fell in love and married Chief Peta Nocona.  They had two children, Quanah and his sister, Totsiyaa (Prairie Flower).  In 1860, Naudah was captured again.  This time, Army soldiers snatched her and her little girl.  She was returned to her white relatives.  But Naudah and Totsiyaa were not happy.  They wanted to return to their Indian home.  They no longer felt white inside.  They were not happy living with whites.  Several times Naudah and her daughter tried to escape.  Once she rode bareback across part of Texas.  She was trying to go home.  After a time, Naudah's daughter Totsiyaa  caught a fever and died.  Naudah died in 1864.

Quanah Parker grew up to be a great warrior.  He and his tribe fought all the time with the settlers.  The settlers wanted the Indians' land.  Quanah fought with the Texas Rangers and with the U.S. Army.  The Indians killed many white people.  The whites killed many Indians.  At last, Congress wanted to make a treaty.  The treaty was called the Treaty of Medicine Lodge.

Congress took a vote to solve the Indian problem in the West.  They voted to put the Plains Indians on a reservation.  The Comanches refused to go.  They kept raiding on the plains for several years after the treaty was signed.

Quanah wanted his people to live the way they had always lived.  But this was hard for his people to do.  More and more strangers moved into the plains every day.  The hunters were killing all of the buffalo.  There was less and less for the Indians to eat.  The U.S. Army chased the Comanches.  The old people and the children grew sick.  Many died.  Quanah was afraid that many more of his people would die.  He knew the time had come for his people to surrender.  He knew they would have to live on the reservation.  This was a hard choice for him to make.

On June 2, 1875, Quanah brought his braves and their families to Fort Sill.  Fort Sill is in Lawton, Oklahoma.  The Comanches were the last tribe in the plains to surrender.  None of them wanted to live on the reservation, but they were out-numbered.  They had no choice.

Quanah went on to do great things for his people.  He was named chief of the Comanche Nation.  He became a reservation judge.  Quanah always fought for the causes of the Comanches.  He was a very good businessman.  He rented the tribe's land to cattle ranchers in Texas and made money.

Quanah Parker had many famous friends.  One friend was President Theodore Roosevelt.  Quanah and Teddy hunted wolves together.  Quanah asked the President to set aside land and bring back the buffalo.  The President turned the Wichita Mountains into a national wildlife refuge.  When the buffalo returned to the Wichita Mountains, Quanah and his people went to greet them.  They dressed up in their best Indian regalia.  When Quanah saw the buffalo had returned, he was so moved that he cried.

In 1911, at the age of 65, Quanah Parker died of pneumonia.  He was buried next to his mother Naudah (Cynthia Ann) and his sister Totsiyaa (Prairie Flower) at the Fort Sill cemetery.