Jim Jewell, director of The Lone Ranger radio show from 1933 to 1939, took the phrase from Kamp Kee-Mo Sah-Bee, a boys' camp on
Mullett Lake in Michigan, established by Charles W. Yeager (Jewell's father-in-law) in 1916.[3] Yeager himself probably took the term from
Ernest Thompson Seton, one of the founders of the
Boy Scouts of America, who had given the meaning "scout runner" to Kee-mo-sah'-bee in his 1912 book The Book of Woodcraft and Indian Lore.[4]
Kamp Kee-Mo Sah-Bee was in an area inhabited by the
Ottawa, who speak a language that is mutually comprehensible with
Ojibwe. John D. Nichols and Earl Nyholm's A Concise Dictionary of Minnesota Ojibwe defines the Ojibwe word giimoozaabi as 'he peeks' (and, in theory, 'he who peeks'), making use of the prefix giimoo(j)-, 'secretly'; Rob Malouf, now an associate professor of linguistics at
San Diego State University, suggested that giimoozaabi may indeed have also meant scout (i.e., 'one who sneaks').[5]
In media
Tonto has been represented by the following actors:
^Sargent, Porter E. (1916).
"Boys' Summer Camps". A Handbook of Private Schools. Boston: Porter E. Sargent: 267.
Archived from the original on 2021-01-01. Retrieved 2020-11-28. Kamp Kee-Mo-Sah-Bee, a summer camp and school of wood-craft at Mullet Lake, will open this year under the direction of Charles W. Yeager, Gymnasium and Athletic Director at the Detroit University School.