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Hoopa Valley Tribal member Danielle Rey Frank made a splashy debut in the latest issue of Vogue Magazine for her remarkable work as a youth climate activist. The story is a part of the magazine’s new photographic series, “Tokala,” which spotlights the efforts of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) youth climate activists across the country.

The article highlights Frank’s work as a young activist with Save California Salmon and focuses on the Hoopa Valley Tribe’s connection to the Trinity River and ever-increasing threats to water quality and critical salmon habitat.

“The Trinity River runs through the heart of the Hoopa Indian Reservation, and our home is beautiful – it’s built around the river,” Frank told Vogue. “We perform our boat dances on top of the river in canoes dressed in regalia. It’s a world-renewing ceremony. It’s meant to balance the good and the bad in the world.”

Frank also describes the decades-long fight to undam the Klamath River. Removal of the four dams along the Lower Klamath River will restore 420 miles of historical salmon runs and reduce temperature conditions that cause disease in threatened fish species and toxic algal blooms.

“It’s going to be the biggest dam removal project in American history,” she continued. “The permits are in the tribe’s hands now; we’ve got indigenous engineers designing the destruction of the dams.”

Frank’s story is a part of the Future Coalition’s Youth Direct Action Fund Tokala project, an effort spearheaded by creative director/stylist Marcus Correa, photographer Carlos Jaramillo and filmmaker Jazmin Garcia. The name “Tokala” comes from the historical Tokala (Kit Fox) Society of the Lakota Tribe, according to the article’s author Christian Allaire — a group of warriors who exhibited bravery and leadership from a young age.

…In the new photography project, which is published exclusively on Vogue, the team set out to find present-day youth who are proving to be leaders in their respective communities.

The team traveled across the U.S. to capture activists—all under the age of 25—and the evolving environments that have motivated their work. “Our goal is to empower all these subjects and give them a platform to hopefully inspire younger generations or other people in their community,” says Jaramillo. The first segment of the series focuses on the West Coast, looking at issues happening in Hoopa Valley—focusing on Frank—and in L.A., where they zeroed in on the activist Atlakatl Ce Tochtli Orozco. “We wanted to shine light on places that have not been given light—getting a good mixture of different regions and issues,” says Correa.

You can read the full article here.