Sigrid Khera (1934-1984) was born in Vienna, Austria. After coming to the United States she got a position as assistant professor in the Anthropology Department at Arizona State University in Tempe. When she was newly arrived at ASU, a letter dropped into her hands that a Yavapai elder wanted his tribe's history written as they themselves knew it. In March 1974 Sigrid Khera started working with Mike Harrison (1886-1983) and John Williams (1904-1983), two Yavapai elders from the Fort McDowell reservation in Arizona. When Sigrid Khera died in 1984, she left behind a completed manuscript, Oral History of the Yavapai.

Carolina Castillo Butler took an activist's path. While giving her time to house, husband, and four children, she was a leader in a ten-year battle, helping the Yavapai Tribe at Fort McDowell save their land. The government wanted to relocate the tribe for a dam. She was a successful leader in two county-wide elections: first, working for a "yes" vote for the construction of useful bridges over the Salt and Agua Fria Rivers; second, working to defeat the $3 billion Rio Salado Project and a new property tax for it. She was a water activist, testifying numerous times to reform water policy. Carolina is a Mexican American born in Arizona and very proud that her ancestors came to Arizona from Mexico in 1864. Carolina and Walker, her husband of forty-six years, live in Scottsdale, Arizona.