Laverne Madigan was born on September 13, 1912, in Clifton, New Jersey, and was the daughter of George Madigan and Georgia Farrell.
Her father, a dentist, died when Madigan was fourteen. Her mother, a dynamic and well-educated woman, became a nurse to support the family.
Early on, Madigan demonstrated an interest in politics and liberal causes that reflected her mother's commitment to racial integration and Progressivism.
Madigan was educated in Catholic schools, then enrolled part time at New York University, from which she received the B. A. in classics in 1940 and the M. A. in 1941.
Madigan took a job with the War Relocation Authority (WRA) as a relocation officer in New Jersey. This was far from her formal training, but she quickly mastered the skills needed to make her an effective administrator. Furthermore, her concern over the treatment of Japanese Americans in West Coast internment camps during World War II led her to find alternative living arrangements for these citizens in the East. Coincidentally, the WRA was headed by Dillon Myer, who later became commissioner of Indian affairs during the Eisenhower administration the time when Madigan formally became involved with Indian issues.
In 1945, Madigan left the WRA. She returned to public life in 1949, taking a short-term job as assistant to the director of the American Women's Voluntary Services, a private social welfare agency in New York. She had yet to find a meaningful full-time career.
In 1951, Madigan wrote to Oliver La Farge, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author and a founder of the reform-minded Association on American Indian Affairs (AAIA). Although she had never studied Indians, she wanted to work for the AAIA and thought La Farge would help her. She cited her experiences with the WRA and her interest in minority rights as evidence of her concern for the plight of Indians.
Although her credentials and previous work experience made her overqualified for the job, she willingly accepted a position as a "glorified secretary" and administrative assistant. Alexander Lesser, the AAIA's Executive Director, admitted this mismatch in a letter to La Farge. "My only fear in her case is that Madigan's intellectual abilities are too great for the dirty work of the job, " he noted. Nevertheless, they hired her in October 1951 at a salary lower than their current secretary.
During its first three decades, the AAIA focused primarily on Indian legal rights and the passage of legislation such as the Indian Claims Commission Act (1946). Madigan charted several new courses.
Madigan's most important contribution was perhaps her work with Alaskan natives. In particular, she gave unstinting support to their land and treaty claims. Madigan assisted scores of uprooted families, helping them to integrate into urban communities. She set up a successful farming cooperative for Japanese Americans in southern New Jersey. Madigan put her personal stamp on the association by giving equal attention to the non-political aspects of Indian affairs. Her strong interest in education resulted in the establishment of a scholarship fund for Indians wanting a college education. It was the first full-scale private endeavor of its kind. Madigan used her WRA background to secure funds and conduct a major national study of the 1952 BIA program of voluntary Indian resettlement.
In the monograph, The American Indian Relocation Program (1956), she presented a balanced and well-researched picture of federal efforts to aid Indians in finding work and housing in white America.
Madigan concluded that the program was neither as good as the BIA claimed nor as bad as its critics suggested. She discovered that 30 percent of the Indians who had left the reservations returned within a year. Many managed to "commute" between jobs in the cities and the family life in Indian country.
Historically the AAIA had been interested in Indians of the Plains and the Southwest, but Madigan broadened its perspective on native rights through her "We Shake Hands" program, which brought American Indians together with Alaskan Eskimo and Aleuts for the first time.
Madigan, a tiny woman (four feet, eleven inches) with a quick wit and an accompanying temper, had prodigious energy. She easily mastered the association's files, absorbing vast amounts of information regarding Indians their diverse experiences and problems. She worked late at night and on weekends and used her vacations to travel to reservations and meet tribal chiefs.
Possessing an unusual talent for working with all kinds of people, from the least-educated Indians to professors of anthropology, Madigan somehow got them to do what she wanted. She frequently paid her way to work-related conferences and organized policy seminars for the AAIA and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Not surprisingly she advanced rapidly within the association and, only five years after she joined the AAIA, became its executive director.
Madigan's death at Orleans, Vermont, the result of a fall while horseback riding, left many projects unfinished. Prominent among them was a primer for non-Indian children that was to provide "a clearer picture of Indian history, " which attested Madigan's unswerving concern for education and the importance of knowing other cultures.
Madigan had proved that she could work for Indians and minority rights in a variety of public arenas, but she always emphasized education as the best and most lasting mechanism for improving human relations (as opposed to relying solely on legal remedies).
Madigan married Harold Bordewich on January 26, 1941.
