she used to always downplay her Indian heritage. Back in her day, if they had found out that she was a 'half-breed' they'd have boycotted her husband's business and probably shunned her and her family.
That was the way it was in our family too. I remember my great grandma well (we called her "little grandma" because whe was about 4'10") but we never knew she was Indian. She lived to be 93 years old. Grandpa used to tell us we were part Indian, but Grandma would shush him. After he died in 1961 (I was 16), I asked grandma about it, if we were really part Indian, and she said it was nonsense. It was a closely guarded secret. My father is the one who always said we definitely were, and that the tribe was Montauk, but he didn't know where the line was from. As far as he knew it was through his mother. He was extremely close to his grandmother but never knew whe was an Indian. There seemed to have been a rift in the family when my great grandfather married her back in 1880, and that is why he moved to this part of the country (Washington State) and homesteaded. He was from Maine, but was a schoolteacher in Wisconsin. That is where they met.
But my hair is mousey brown. Mostly I look English, which most of me is.