Nephi Craig
speaker
419 appearances
2 recordings
1 series
first heard Jul 2026
last heard 25 Jul
Nephi Craig’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 2.
Appearances
Fresh Air · Best Of: Broadway legend André De Shields / Apache Chef Nephi Craig · 25 Jul 2026
podcast
My dad's dad, Bob Edsidi Craig, was a Navajo Code Talker.
He served on Guam, Guadalcanal, and was wounded on Iwo Jima.
The Navajo Code Talkers created a code to send transmissions that helped to win the war.
And so I grew up in that tradition, and all the great men in my life were that.
And so I kind of looked up to the discipline and the rigor of that lifestyle.
Well, I was just one of the cooks.
It was in county jail, and it was nothing glamorous, but it was industrial-style cooking.
What made it stand out is that I was bunched in with the other Native Americans.
In jail, we call ourselves chiefs, or somehow we didn't get that name.
The group of chiefs and getting to meet some of the people that were cooking there, all of their different varied stories and the things that they were in for, but also banding together to feed, I think it was like 7,800 inmates a day.
It was really eye-opening.
It showed me that I was not above or below any style of cooking.
And it was a cultural moment where I was reminded that no matter what, we bless our food as natives.
That no matter what, we pray and offer gratitude as natives.
Coming from a time and a place that didn't seem like that would be where it came from, I guess.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, I think they nicknamed it the food factory.
There was literally probably about 200 inmates on a chain gang walking to work every day to do that.
Oh, yeah, man.
It was crazy because, you know, at that level, food's coming in from food banks and donation centers and whatnot.
Showing 81–100 of 419 · page 5 of 21
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