FROM OJIBWE ROOTS TO EMMY SPOTLIGHT: Band member Leah Lemm takes top awards
Band member Leah Lemm with the Upper Midwest Emmy Award for her production of the film Finding Manoomin: A Search for the Spirit of Wild Rice. Leah is the Sr. Editor of MPR News Native News. Submitted photo.
By Vivian LaMoore, Inaajimowin Editor
Leah Lemm is more than just a journalist — she's a storyteller rooted in her culture, and her work recently earned her major recognition. As a senior editor for MPR News's Native News team and a citizen of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, Leah has spent her career amplifying Indigenous voices and connecting community traditions to broader audiences.
In 2024, Leah released a deeply personal and powerful documentary titled Finding Manoomin: A Search for the Spirit of Wild Rice. The film follows her journey to reconnect with her cultural roots through the harvest of manoomin — wild rice — a sacred food and ancestral relative for the Ojibwe people. This fall, Leah and her team took home an Upper Midwest Emmy Award for the film.
Through the film, Leah learns to use knocking sticks, travels to rice beds, and sits in conversation with Elders, all while reflecting on the cultural loss and resilience embedded in the manoomin tradition. She credits her family for being a driving force in her journey. A huge support from her husband and her son (who is also featured in the film) and mostly her dad, Bill Premo, for helping her find her way and teach her what she always knew she had inside as Anishinaabe.
What makes Finding Manoomin especially meaningful is how Leah frames the story: part personal rediscovery, part cultural chronicle. In interviews, she has shared that she started the project knowing "just enough to know I needed to learn more."
Leah said it took a lot of people to make it happen and she is grateful to every one of them who are credited in the film. She especially thanks Pat Kruse, Mikayla Schaaf, Brad Harrington, Curt Kalk, and Travis Zimmerman. Also, her team Lindsey Seavert and Ben Garvin.
"It all started as a vision," she said. Having grown up in the Suburban and Urban Areas, she felt a disconnect from a cultural spirit and wanted to more fully understand her roots.
Along the way, she learns traditional harvesting methods, shares meals with community members, and even writes a song — Manoominike Giizis ("Wild Rice Moon") - as a tribute to the people and teachings she encountered. Her brother, Cole Premo, accompanied her on guitar. The song is in the video and can be found on digital music platforms.
Leah's talents and interests are an eclectic collection of art, music, journalism, whimsy and fun. She has "no shame," she said in showing her love and collection of Labubus nor her passion for the Lord of the Rings.
Leah's academic and professional journey is as diverse as her storytelling: she holds a bachelor's degree in economics from MIT, a professional diploma in music production and engineering from Berklee College of Music, and a masters of fine arts in creative writing from the Institute of American Indian Arts.
Before diving into deep cultural stories, she worked in public media starting in 2008, first as a master control specialist at MPR, then as a freelance radio reporter and host.
Her work has clearly resonated. For Leah, this isn't just a professional triumph — it's also a legacy. Her journey in Finding Manoomin is about honoring ancestors, deepening her connection to the land and community, and passing knowledge to future generations. It's a reminder that culture is not static; it's living, breathing, and always growing.
Links to the film and song can be found at www.mprnews.org/wildrice.