Last Living Navajo Code Talker from WWII Visits RLT

On Oct. 13, R. L. Turner High School welcomed the last remaining Navajo Code Talker from World War II, Chester Nez. Nez explained to the students that he was one of 29 Navajo young men recruited in the U.S. Military’s top secret program.

The Code Talkers used the unique language of Navajo and created their own code to be used by the U.S. Military and to thwart attempts at cracking the code. Throughout the war, no attempts by the Japanese government were successful at cracking the code. The program remained top secret until it was declassified in 1968. Until that time, Nez and the other Code Talkers were unable to tell their families what they had done during the war. Nez’s story has now been published in the book, Code Talker: The first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers.

Local news affiliate, CBS 11, visited RLT to interview Mr. Nez. The video can be viewed on their website here.