When Catherine Jones first learned of the Navajo code talkers, she never dreamed it would become her mission to tell the world about them.

But after researching these little-known heroes of World War II for her young adult book, "Navajo Code Talkers" (Tudor Publishers, 1999), Jones' fascination with their dedication and loyalty inspired her to tell their story.

"The thing that really strikes me the most is that after all the mistreatment they lived with from the U.S. government, they used their language to save our skins," the Kerrville writer and educator says. "They got punished for speaking (their language) in school because the government was trying to make white kids out of them. These guys had such great loyalty."

Today, Jones gives two presentations on the Navajo code talkers — one for children at 2 p.m. and one for adults at 4 p.m. — at the Steven Stoli Foundation's World War II Memorial Museum, 11838 Wurzbach at Lockhill Selma roads. The talks are free and open to the public.

The event coincides with the opening of director John Woo's film "Windtalkers," starring Nicolas Cage.

That the native tongue of the Navajo code talkers was indecipherable by Japanese intelligence during World War II and its use helped America win the war form the basis of Jones' book. While machines of the time required 30 minutes to encode, transmit and decode a three-line English message, the Navajos could do it in 20 seconds.

After completing training, a Navajo code talker joined a Marine unit in the Pacific theater. There, he transmitted information on tactics and troop movements in the Navajo language.

Jones says Woo's film has some inaccuracies. One of the most noticeable is the assignment of a bodyguard (Cage's role) to the code talkers.

"Every one of those code talkers understood that they had to guard the code with their life," she says. "They didn't need a bodyguard to ensure they kept the code."

Jones stumbled upon the idea for her book when she was writing a World War II story for a teen history magazine. After discovering material on the code talkers during a visit at the Admiral Nimitz Museum in Fredericksburg, she was hooked. She researched the topic for more than a year, then chose to write a book for children. "I have two children; one is a reluctant reader and one has reading disabilities. I wanted to write it for them," she says.

After completing the book, her next step was finding a publisher. She received rejections from 12 publishing companies before Tudor gave it the green light.

"It's important for young people to know these things about their own history," says Eugene E. Pfaff Jr., owner of Tudor Publishing. "Any person who has taught history is usually shocked about the lack of knowledge that kids have about their own history, especially that of ethnic minorities."

Jones' story fit the bill.

"This is a very compelling and little-known story," Pfaff said. "She (Jones) wrote with a historical objectivity, yet a balanced sympathy toward the story being told.

"I think it's a well-written, well-researched, timely and timeless topic for young people," he added. "It's a very useful contribution to the literature of that time period for young adult readers, both in terms of history and the particular focus on the contribution of ethnic minorities to the United States in the war."

A hardback edition of Jones' book was published in 1999, and the paperback copy became available last year. The editors of the World Book Encyclopedia also asked Jones to write an article about the code talkers for the 2002 edition.

In spite of her extensive research with the Navajo people and their language, Jones hasn't broken the code herself.

"It's an extremely complicated language," she says. "It's tonal, and there are some sounds that are difficult to learn. I can recognize some of the words, but I can't speak it."

rpatton@express-news.net

06/14/2002