Douglas Miles Junior is one of the scions of a new wave of indigenous skaters fusing their roots in native American culture with the modern movement of skateboarding.
Born and raised in Arizona´s San Carlos Apache Reservation, he was introduced to skateboarding by his father, the acclaimed fine artist Douglas Miles Sr.
Doug Sr. had started painting on skateboards as a medium and given the groundswell of interest this created, he founded Apache Skateboards, a brand in which the Apache community could recognise a connection to their own culture within this relatively new form of expression.
As a marginalised and often overlooked people, Native Americans have proven incredibly resourceful in developing and nurturing new iterations of their ancient culture, and Doug Junior spent his formative skating years touring other indigenous reservations teaching Native American youngsters how they could become drawn into skate culture without losing sight of their own heritage.
Sometimes, when you can’t find space for your own chapter, you have to re-write the book.