CapeCodToday Obituaries

Alice Mae Lopez, Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe member, dies at 49

Former Plimoth Plantation interpreter, director of tribe's housing department dies

The Patriot Ledger reported today that Alice Mae Lopez died Saturday at her home in Mashpee. She was 49. Lopez was the director of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe's housing department. The department, which provides safe, affordable housing to eligible tribe members, was started by Lopez in 2003.

She was born in Hyannis and raised in Mashpee. Lopez graduated from Falmouth High School in 1979. Lopez began her housing career in 1992 when she went to work for the Community Aciton Committee of Cape Cod and the Islands as a housing advocate in 1992.

After graduating, Lopez worked as an interpreter of Native history at Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth in the Wampanoag Indigenous Program. As part of the program she also worked as an artisan, reproducing artifacts for exhibits at the Museum.

Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Chair Cedric Cromwell told the Ledger, "Alice Lopez represented the very best of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe."

Her funeral will be held at 11 a.m. this Saturday, January 8, at the Old Indian Meetinghouse in Mashpee. Burial will follow at the Old Indian Cemetery.

Click here to read Alice Mae Lopez's obituary.

Sources: Patriot Ledger; Chapman, Cole & Gleason Funeral Home.