Jewel Grutman

Jewel Humphrey and her identical twin, Gay, born in Manhattan, graduated from Mt. Holyoke College with honors and as members of Phi Beta Kappa. Jewel went to Columbia Law School, where she was an editor of the Columbia Law Review and Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar. Gay received a master's degree from the Russian Institute at Columbia and later went to the Soviet Union as one of the first Americans to visit after World War II. Both married and had families. Jewel formed a litigation firm with her husband, Norman Roy Grutman. They tried cases throughout the nation, and twice before the Supreme Court. As a Russian expert, Gay became a consultant. Later, after studying at the Parsons School of Design, she became a prominent decorator.

In 1994, they wrote The Ledgerbook of Thomas Blue Eagle, about the transition Plains Indian children made from their buffalo hunting culture to life in the white man's world. Published by Charlesbridge Publishing, it is told through a Sioux boy's pictographic art that documents his journey to and his life at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in 1879. Illustrated by Adam Cjanovic, the book won a Christopher Award, an International Reading Association Award, and an award for best design. It acquainted readers with this unrecognized type of story-telling and popularized Native American pictographs. It is a top seller in its genre and was translated into several languages. The sisters also produced a CD-rom that told Thomas Blue Eagles's story with related Indian material that won international prizes and awards. They wrote two additional books about the Lakota, Julia Singing Bear and The Sketchbook of Thomas Blue Eagle, published by Chronicle Press.

In 2009 they started a historical novel about a group of Plains Indians sent in 1875 as prisoners to St. Augustine, Florida. Gay died before they could finish. Jewel continued the novel with George Putnam. It became Redfish Oak.

Website: https://RedfishOak.com