Appointment of John B. Keliiaa as superintendent of the Jicarilla Apache Indian Agency, Dulce, N. Mex., succeeding Guy Robertson, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.
Mr. Keliiaa has been serving as acting superintendent of the agency since January 5 when Mr. Robertson transferred to the post of assistant area direct in the Indian Bureau’s office at Sacramento, Calif. He will take over full responsibilities of the position February 23.
Born at Oakland, Calif., in 1923 of Hawaiian and American Indian descent, Mr. Keliiaa joined the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1950 as a junior management assistant in the office at Albuquerque, N. Max. In 1951 he transferred to the Bureau’s central office in Washington, D. C., and served there approximately three years as a social science analyst.
When the area office was established at Gallup, N. Mex., in 1954, he was named assistant to the area director and remained in that post until 1956. For the past two years he has been serving as tribal relations officer of the United Pueblos Agency with headquarters at Albuquerque.
He is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley in political science and had two years of service in the Air Force during World War II.
