Harmon, Leonard

Leonard Harmon is a Native artist and citizen of the Lenape Tribe of New Jersey and the Nanticoke Tribe of Delaware. He currently (2021) resides in Virginia. Leonard has sung and given dance performances at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. He has made pieces for several museums. Harmon is known for his pine needle baskets and pine needle necklaces. He also makes woodland bonnets to replicate original American Indians’ bonnets. Leonard has discovered how to fade an arrangement of colors throughout the pine needles, and uses synthetic thread and natural materials when making his pieces.

Both tribes’ ancestral homelands were once part of the Chesapeake region and within the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Due to colonialism and colonization, the tribes were forced off their ancestral homelands and forced to relocate. The Nanticoke Tribe of Delaware wishes to keep their cultural identity intact and protected, and are recognized by the state of Delaware. The Nanticoke Indian Association is located in Millsboro, Delaware. The Lenape Tribe is considered the “parent” tribe of other Algonquin tribes and so were given the title “Grandfather."