At 82 years old, Marie Wilcox realized something heartbreaking — she was the last person on Earth who could speak the Wukchumni language fluently.
Wukchumni, a Native American language from California, had never been written down. When its last speaker was gone, the language would vanish forever.
So Marie did something extraordinary.
With no computer experience, she taught herself how to use a computer. Then, day after day, she sat at a keyboard and began typing her language from memory — word by word, meaning by meaning. For seven years, she worked almost daily, determined not to let her ancestors’ voices disappear.
The result was a 6,000-word Wukchumni dictionary, the first written record of the language in history. She also helped create audio lessons so future generations could hear how the language truly sounded.
Marie passed away in 2021, but Wukchumni did not die with her.
