- He was born into the Bedonkohe, the smallest band of the Chiricahua Apache tribe who lived in what is now New Mexico and Arizona. His given name was Goyahkla (“The One Who Yawns”). Where the name "Geronimo" actually came from is uncertain. It may have been a mispronunciation of “Goyahkla” by his enemies, the Mexicans, or it may have come about from frightened Mexican soldiers invoking St. Jerome during battles.
- Geronimo had nine wives during his life. His first wife was called Alope - he married her at the age of 17 and they had three children. Then, while Geronimo was away on a trading mission, Mexican soldiers massacred his village. He came back to find his mother, wife and children had all been killed. This triggered a lifelong hatred of Mexicans.
- Geronimo was never a tribal chief. Although it was usually the tribal chief who would lead the battle to avenge the massacre, the Apache tribes in this instance chose Geronimo to lead them, because his loss had been the greatest.
- He was, however, a shaman, or medicine man. There are legends about him having supernatural powers which included healing the sick, slowing time, delaying the sunrise, bring rain and tame wild Horses. There are also accounts of how he apparently could witness things that were happening great distances away. On one occasion he had a vision, while sitting around the campfire that U.S. troops had attacked their base camp, which later proved to be correct. It's also said that he had a vision will grieving for his family in which a spirit spoke to him saying “No gun can ever kill you. I will take the bullets from the guns of the Mexicans, so they will have nothing but powder.” While Geronimo was often injured in battles, he was never fatally wounded, which led credence to this belief.
- Geronimo eventually surrendered to the US soldiers, but not before he'd evaded them for several months. A quarter of the American army, around five thousand soldiers, plus three thousand Mexican soldiers searched for him in vain. The leader of this force, General Miles, refused at first to use Apache scouts who could have found Geronimo and his band of 40 easily, because he didn't trust them to work against their own people. In the end, he relented and used scouts, who negotiated a deal with Geronimo that America would spare their lives and those of their families if they surrendered.
- In his later years, Geronimo may have become a Christian. He went so far as to say “I have heard the teachings of the white man’s religion, and in many respects believe it to be better than the religion of my fathers." However, some believe this was merely a tactic so his captors would believe he was no longer a threat and would let him go.
- In his later years he became something of a celebrity, making appearances at fairs and once he had learned to write his name, selling his autograph for 25¢. People flocked to see the “Apache Terror” and the “Tiger of the Human Race” as he was billed, and he even took part in Theodore Roosevelt’s presidential inauguration parade. He seemed to be peaceable and co-operative, but reports of his last words before he died of pneumonia after a fall from a horse, suggest otherwise. “I should have never surrendered,” he reportedly said. “I should have fought until I was the last man alive."
- So why do people yell "Geronimo!" when they jump out of a plane? It may be down to a paratrooper called Private Aubrey Eberhardt who was part of the platoon which first tested parachutes. He and his colleagues went to see a film the night before their first jump, which happened to be a Western movie featuring Geronimo. In response to teasing about how scared he was going to be, Eberhardt said he would prove he wasn't scared by yelling "Geronimo!" as loud as he could as he jumped. He did, and so the cry was adopted by his platoon and spread beyond it. At first, the cry was seen by commanders as a lack of discipline but they later came to see it as a sign of bravery.
- The United States military initially used the code name "Geronimo" for the raid that killed the al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in 2011. However, following complaints from Native Americans, it was renamed "Operation Neptune's Spear".
- There is a rumour that Geronimo's Skull was stolen by a Yale University society known as the the Order of Skull and Bones, who allegedly keep it in a glass case and new recruits are required to kiss it as part of their initiation. It's also said that one of the people involved in the theft was one Prescott Bush, who was the father of George H.W. Bush and the grandfather of George W. Bush.
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