The Honorable Donna Loring is one of six individuals honored by the Wabanaki Alliance at the 2026 Nihkaniyane event on October 1 in Freeport, and one of two honorees chosen by the Wabanaki Policy Youth Initiative.
Loring was raised by her grandmother on Indian Island. From early in her life, she served the country, the State of Maine, and the Penobscot Nation in ways that have broken barriers and advanced the stature of Wabanaki people. While still a teenager, she joined the Women’s Army Corps and served as a Communications Specialist at Long Binh Army Base, north of Saigon. She was one of few women to serve in a combat zone in Vietnam, and to earn a combat patch.
After graduating from the Maine Criminal Justice Academy, from 1984 to 1990 she served as Police Chief of the Penobscot Nation, becoming the first woman to serve as Police Chief in the State of Maine. During those years she completed her bachelor’s degree at UMaine in Political Science. In 1992 she became the first woman Director of Security at Bowdoin College, holding that position for five years.
She was selected by the Penobscot Nation as Tribal Representative to the Maine Legislature (walking in the footsteps of several women before her), and during her decade there, she authored and sponsored the landmark piece of legislation LD 291 An Act to Require Teaching Maine Native American History and Culture in Maine Schools, which was signed into law in 2001. She has served as advisor to two Maine governors, and in 2002 she established the “State of the Tribes Address” to the Legislature.
Since 2009, she has hosted the monthly talk radio show “Wabanaki Windows” on WERU Community Radio. Her guests and interviews have ranged widely on topics including law, history, Wabanaki arts and cultural traditions; recent conversations are focused on issues of Indigenous sovereignty. Loring is the author of books and plays, including “The Gluskabe Chronicles: Creation and the Venetian Basket” and “Mary and Molly”; her plays have been produced in staged readings throughout the state, and “Mary and Molly” was produced as an animated film in 2023 by Speedwell Projects, premiering at the Portland Museum of Art. This year she helped to curate an exhibit at the Abbe Museum in Bar Harbor that aims to share a greater understanding of Wabanaki Nations’ place within the ongoing US national narrative; In the Shadow of the Eagle focuses on themes such as Wabanaki military service, treaties, and self-governance and will be up through October 2026. The exhibit title is taken from Loring’s 2008 book by the same name, which narrates her pathway to and time in the Maine Legislature.
Loring continues to serve communities and be honored by institutions. Since 2022 she has been a member of the University of Maine System Board of Trustees; UMaine conferred an honorary doctorate in humane letters on her in 2017, the same year she received the UM Alumni Association Career Award. She is Vice-President of the Board of the Wabanaki Alliance, helping the organization provide leadership and public education concerning Wabanaki sovereignty, Tribal-state relations, treaty responsibilities, economic rights, and the collective priorities of the Wabanaki Nations in Maine.
Return to the Nihkaniyane: Let’s Go Forward Together post to read more about the other 2026 honorees.
