By Tracy Sherlock, Postmedia News October 18, 2013
Adam Beach, a Canadian actor who stars in Arctic Air, lost both of his parents within a two-month period when he was eight years old. Although there was a lot of fear in his life growing up, he says it was a connection to his First Nations ancestors that made him who he is today.
“I grew up in sexual abuse and got involved in gangs in my teenage years. I was always running away from the fear of what happened to me,” Beach said in an interview at We Day. “I noticed myself being drawn toward the identity of who I am as First Nations and I realized that there are teachings there and a timeline that hasn’t changed.
“That helped me become brave and strong, a leader and who I am today.”
The Golden Globe-nominated actor was born in Manitoba, raised on the Dog Creek Reserve, and is a member of the Saulteaux First Nation. He has starred in more than 60 films and TV shows, including Big Love, Hawaii Five-O and the blockbuster Cowboys Vs. Aliens with Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig.
His Golden Globe nomination was for his role in the 2007 HBO film Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. He also won Best Actor at the American Indian Film Festival in 1995.
He says the entertainment industry changed his life by allowing him to have a voice. As an example, he said he was able to get a group of chiefs together to agree unanimously on the Save the Fraser Declaration because of that voice.
“That’s the voice I have and the strength I have … because of the entertainment value of being the ‘Hollywood Indian,’” he said. “And I respect it, I don’t abuse it, and I know that there is a value to this entertainment status. Every kid wants to be a star and looks up to an entertainer.”
The 40-year-old started the Adam Beach Film Institute last year in Winnipeg to help other native youth get involved in film careers.
“I want to find the next Adam Beach. I think we need to tell our stories — we haven’t tapped into that, so this will encourage an aboriginal workforce,” Beach said.
At We Day, Beach performed a First Nations blessing ceremony using a bear pipe and an eagle wing. He said the blessing was a way of connecting the crowd with its ancestors.
“I am asking our ancestors to hear (these) youth and help them with their vision of making social change,” Beach said.
“(The eagle wing is for) asking to take the energy of the eagle to help bless us … and to allow us to connect with it in the way that an eagle soars, has a longer vision and the gift of flight — so help us in our journey to fly.”
Construction Starts Next Month; Completion Set for December 2014
Expanded casino An artist’s drawing shows what the Red Wind Casino will look like once a $45 million expansion project is completed. Work is set to begin in November on the project, which will add 42,700 square feet of floor space to the casino, including a non-smoking section. The project will be completed in December 2014.
OLYMPIA, WA – A $45 million expansion of the Nisqually Red Wind Casino will bring 70 new jobs to the area and will continue to fuel a significant economic expansion that has occurred within the Nisqually Indian Tribe in the last year, said Cynthia Iyall, chair of the Nisqually Tribal Council.
Construction is set to begin on the casino expansion project next month and will be completed by December 2014. In all, 42,700 square feet of gaming space will be added to the current 95,000-square-foot structure. A remodeling of the parking structure will add 600 spots. The expanded space will include a smoke-free casino.
Only about 1 percent of the roughly 400 employees at the casino are members of the Nisqually Tribe, Iyall said. Many of the tribe’s 766 members are employed in tribal government positions; there are about 300 such positions.
“We rely on the surrounding community for employment, and it seems to be a good partnership,” Iyall said.
The remodeled and expanded casino will carry on with a natural elements theme begun with the construction of the Tribal Center. That building’s roof is curved to
reflect the back of a fish and the flowing Nisqually River. The old tribal building behind it is being remodeled with a pitched roof, which is reflective of a mountain, Iyall said. The upgraded casino building will incorporate grass-like elements because the Nisqually Tribe’s historic name, Schally-Absch, means people of the river and people of the grass country, Iyall said.
The original casino, which was built in 1997, is the tribe’s economic engine, Iyall said, and revenues from that business have allowed the tribe to expand its economic presence in the region. Four new tribal businesses have opened within the past year alone. The tribe has a new construction company called Nisqually Federal WHH Construction.
The tribe opened a seafood processing plant, called She-nah-num Seafood, in Tumwater about six months ago. Tribal fishermen sell their catch to the plant, which processes it and prepares it for retail sale. Then the seafood is purchased by casinos, buffets and fine-dining restaurants up and down the coast.
The tribe has also opened two convenience stores, the Nisqually Market in Lakewood and the Nisqually Market Express in the Nisqually Valley near Interstate 5. Both of those have opened within the past year, Iyall said.
“We utilize our gaming as a springboard to get into other types of businesses for the tribe,” Iyall said. “It is the engine of our economic development. With a portion of these funds, we have been able to diversify our economy on and off the reservation, strengthening our sovereignty and building the tribe for the future.”
The money generated from those jobs brings security into tribal homes, Iyall said. There are just so many positives from the casino operation, she added, and the expansion will help spur future economic growth.
The casino earnings will also help fuel an upgrade of the convenience store on the reservation, the Rez-Mart. That project will begin soon and will add products and services, including perhaps a post office and office space, Iyall said.
In addition to these projects, the tribe is also extending its wastewater treatment system and is building a public safety complex, according to a statement provided by Iyall.
“The Nisqually Tribe is investing in the future,” Iyall said in that statement. “The tribal council wants to provide long-term opportunities for our members and their families — opportunities for good jobs, good health care, good homes and good education. We especially want to provide quality care for our elders.”
The tribe contributes more than $1 million each year from casino revenues to charitable and nonprofit organizations and local governments that extend the benefits of the operation into the surrounding communities, according to the statement. The current casino boasts three restaurants, 975 video lottery terminals and an assortment of gaming tables.
The tribe’s Medicine Creek Enterprise Corp. manages the casino. That corporation is chaired by John Simmons.
“We’re proud of the casino’s success,” Simmons said in the statement, “and we welcome the opportunity to keep growing, to keep generating income and to benefit our members.”
Korsmo Construction will be the general contractor for the expansion, according to a statement. That is the same company that built the new Tribal Center across the street from the casino. KMB Designs is the architect for the project.
Today’s casinos of flashing lights and slot machines in smoke-filled rooms attract high rollers and bad losers. Many see casinos as a lucrative business for Native American reservations — but does this myth of money-making match reality?
Twenty-five percent of the U.S. population aged 21 and over visited a casino and participated in gambling in 2010. In that year alone, U.S. casinos enjoyed revenues of $34.6 billion, according to the American Gaming Association.
It’s a common assumption that the gaming industry is a cash cow for Native Americans, especially since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1976 that as part of tribal sovereignty, state tax and regulatory laws do not necessarily apply to Native Americans living on reservations.
Tribal sovereignty refers to tribes’ right to govern themselves, define their own membership, manage property, and regulate tribal business and relations while recognizing a government-to-government relationship with states and the federal government. But despite tribes’ independence and exemptions, the Native American population as a whole comprises the minority living with the largest disparities in health, education and income in the United States.
The unemployment rate on some reservations can reach as high as 75 percent, with nearly 10 percent of all Native families being homeless. For some of those families who do have homes, they may lack electricity or running water, Liberation news reports.
Gaming has helped raise tribal communities out of poverty by providing funds for housing, schools, health care and education, as well as stable jobs for community members, but according to the Native American Rights Fund, of the estimated 560 federally recognized American Indian nations, only 224 are involved in gaming. Tribes who are geographically located on rural, unpopulated land may never take part in the industry, while those who reside near major urban areas benefit the most from gaming operations.
Can tribal sovereignty exist within a city?
The Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa not only has a casino on its reservation in northern Minnesota, but one that is located 20 miles to the east in downtown Duluth. With the “Fond-du-Luth” casino establishment located outside of the reservation, issues pertaining to tribal sovereignty and gaming revenues are currently being disputed by city leaders.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that because Fond-du-Luth is outside the reservation, a 1994 agreement was enacted, stating that the casino would pay a 19 percent “rent” of its gross income for 25 years and an unspecified rate for the following 25 years to the city in exchange for services. This provided Duluth with around $6 million income annually from the Fond du Lac band, but in 2009, the band stopped paying.
Karen Diver, chairwoman of the Fond du Lac band, said payments were halted when it began questioning the legality of the agreement. After asking the National Indian Gaming Commission to review the 1994 consent agreement, it found the agreement violated the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, which requires tribes to have “sole proprietary interest” for tribal casinos.
The band negotiated a payment-per-services model, covering services like law enforcement and fire protection, but a U.S. District Court judge ruled this month that $10.4 million is owed from the Fond du Lac band’s halted payments from 2009 to 2011, which the band might be able to appeal.
The issues that arose in Duluth were similar to those when New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) was onboard for a plan to build casinos under the Seneca Nation in Rochester and other areas upstate.
Initially, like Fond-du-Luth, there was discussion of the state government receiving a negotiated piece of the casino’s gross intake, but the sovereignty issue again posed question.
“How could you put a sovereign nation in the middle of your downtown?” said Lovely Warren, Rochester city council president.
Steve Siegel, formerly of the College of Hospitality and Tourism Management at Niagara University, told Rochester City Newspaper that most of the time, when a tax-exempt casino is placed on what is claimed to be sovereign land within an urban setting, all of the gain goes to the casino complex.
“Local businesses are devastated because they can’t compete with this massive nontaxable entity,” Siegel said.
Native Americans are still Americans
Although the casino institutions themselves are not federally taxed, in 2006 the IRS issued a bulletin stating that individual Native Americans, especially those living outside of a reservation, are still subject to federal income tax every year.
More than seven in ten Native Americans and Alaska Natives now live in metropolitan areas, and 27 percent live in poverty, according to the Census Bureau.
The bulletin states:
“While there are numerous valid treaties between various Federally Recognized Indian Tribal Governments and the United States government, some of which may contain language providing for narrowly defined tax exemptions, these treaties have limited application to specific tribes … Taxpayers who are affected by such treaty language must be a member of a particular tribe having a treaty and must cite that specific treaty in claiming any exemption. There is no general treaty that is applicable to all Native Americans.”
Even so, many Native American families subject to treaties are still not exempt from taxes. The IGRA has provisions that permit tribes to make per-capita distributions from gaming activities to tribe members and the community. But according to the bulletin, “Under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, any distribution of casino gaming proceeds to individual tribe members is also subject to federal income tax.”
Essentially, Native Americans are living in a nation where the majority of its population is struggling to make ends meet. They face taxes and economic strife while trying to support their families. Some may sit more comfortably than others, but the late-night hours from visitors at the slot machines or blackjack tables don’t quite live up to the dream.
ARLINGTON — The Angel of the Winds Casino, which drew more than 1 million visitors last year, has announced plans to add a $20 million, 125-room hotel.
Construction is scheduled to last 14 months. “I would like to see a grand opening maybe on New Year’s Eve of 2014,” said Travis O’Neil, the casino’s general manager, on Wednesday.
The casino, which opened in 2004, is one of the last along the I-5 corridor to add a hotel, he said.
The five-story hotel will make the casino a destination rather than just a day-trip site, he said. “It’s something the guests have been asking for for quite a while.”
The project also will add more than 100,000 square feet onto the casino and include a new gift shop, smoke shop and drive-up entryway.
Bellingham-based Exxel Pacific has been selected as the project’s general contractor.
Plans for the hotel have been under consideration for the past 18 months, O’Neil said. Casino staff went to members of the Stillaguamish Tribe to see “what we could do and what we could afford,” he said.
The hotel doesn’t aim to be a copy of the five-star, 370-room Tulalip Resort Casino, O’Neil said. Instead, he said, it will fit the character of the casino, known by its advertising tagline, “The World’s Friendliest Casino.”
Room prices will be in the $100- to $120-a-night range with plans to offer promotional packages with discounts on those rates, O’Neil said.
Groundbreaking for the project is scheduled for 10 a.m. Friday. Workers erected a fence around the construction site on Monday.
That has greatly reduced the parking on the south side of the casino, but parking on its north side hasn’t been affected. Shuttles are available to help people navigate the area, O’Neil said.
The casino is expected to hire an additional 50 employees to work at the hotel.
“We are truly blessed to have an opportunity to add a hotel to our facility and provide more services to our guests,” Shawn Yanity, chairman of the Stillaguamish Tribe, said in a statement. “Not only are we growing our tribal economy, but growing the local economy too by increasing job opportunities and tourism.”
The last major expansion at the casino, at 3438 Stoluckquamish Lane, was in 2008, a $44 million project that tripled the size of its gaming area.
Click image to watch video or listen to interview.
Oct. 23, 2013
PBS NEWSHOUR
The Pacific Northwest is known for its seafood, but when algae blooms in coastal waters, it can release toxins that poison shellfish and the people who eat them. Katie Campbell of KCTS in Seattle reports on the growing prevalence and toxicity of that algae, and how scientists are studying a possible link to climate change.
Transcript
HARI SREENIVASAN: Next to the West Coast, where algae has been poisoning shellfish and subsequently people.In recent years, toxic algal blooms have been more potent and lasted longer.That has scientists trying to understand whether climate change could be contributing to the problem.
Our report comes from special correspondent Katie Campbell of KCTS Seattle.She works for the environmental public media project EarthFix.
KATIE CAMPBELL, KCTS:Every family has its legends.
For Jacki and John Williford and their children, it’s the story of a miserable camping trip on the Olympic Peninsula in the summer of 2011.It all started when the Willifords did what Northwest families do on coastal camping trips.They harvested some shellfish and cooked them up with garlic and oregano.
JOHN WILLIFORD, father:Oh, they were amazing.I was like, wow, these are pretty much the best mussels I have ever eaten.And I think I said in a text to Jacki.
JAYCEE WILLIFORD, daughter:They were the best mussels in the whole wide world.
JOHN WILLIFORD: Is that what you said?Yes.
KATIE CAMPBELL: Two-year-old Jessica and 5-year-old Jaycee were the first to get sick.Next, John got sick.
JACKI WILLIFORD, mother:They just were so violently ill, and I just knew it had to be the mussels.And that next week, I called the health department and said, I think we got shellfish poisoning or something from the shellfish.And that’s when all the calls started to come in.
(LAUGHTER)
KATIE CAMPBELL: It turned out that Willifords were the first confirmed case in the United States of people getting diarrhetic shellfish poisoning.DSP comes from eating shellfish contaminated by a toxin produced by a type of algae called Dinophysis.
It’s been present in Northwest waters for decades, but not at levels considered toxic.
NEIL HARRINGTON, Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe:It’s unfortunate to discover you have a new toxin present by people getting ill.
KATIE CAMPBELL: Neil Harrington is an environmental biologist for the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe in Sequim, Washington.Every week, he collects water and shellfish samples from the same bay where the Willifords harvested mussels two summers ago.He tests for Dinophysis and other naturally occurring toxins in shellfish.
NEIL HARRINGTON: Shellfish are filter feeders, so they are filtering liters and liters and liters of water every day.If they are filtering phytoplankton that is a little bit toxic, when we eat the shellfish, we’re eating essentially that — that toxin that’s been concentrated over time.
KATIE CAMPBELL: A number of factors can increase the size and severity of harmful algal blooms.As more land is developed, more fertilizers and nutrients get washed into waterways.It’s a problem that has also hit Florida and the Gulf of Mexico as well.
NEIL HARRINGTON: The more nutrients you add to a water body, the more algae there is, and the more algae you get, the more chance that some of those algae may be harmful.
KATIE CAMPBELL: But on top the local problem of nutrient runoff is the larger issue of global warming.Scientists believe the increase in prevalence and toxicity of Dinophysis is linked to changing ocean chemistry and warming waters.
STEPHANIE MOORE, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration:There’s a whole lot of changes that are occurring in Puget Sound, and not — and they’re not occurring in isolation.And that’s the challenge for scientists.
KATIE CAMPBELL: Stephanie Moore is a biological oceanographer for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.She studies Puget Sound’s harmful algae.Most algal blooms here occur during warmer weather.
Because climate change is expected to raise temperatures in the coming decades, Moore says that could directly affect when and where harmful algal blooms occur.
STEPHANIE MOORE: We’re going to have to look for these blooms in places and during times of the year when, traditionally, we haven’t had to worry about them.Their impacts could then span a much larger time of the year, and that could cost a lot more money in terms of the effort that needs to go into monitoring and protecting the public from the toxins that they produce.
KATIE CAMPBELL: Washington has one of the most advanced algae and shellfish testing systems in the country.It’s in part because of the state’s 800 miles of shore and its multimillion-dollar shellfish industry.
Today, Moore is testing a new piece of equipment that has the potential to raise the bar even higher.The environmental sample processor, or ESP, automatically collects water from a nearby shellfish bed, analyzes the samples, and sends Moore a photograph of the results.
STEPHANIE MOORE: This is a huge advancement in our ability just to keep tabs on what’s going on, and in near real time.It’s amazing.
KATIE CAMPBELL: Moore says she hopes that, next year, the ESP will be equipped to monitor for Dinophysis, the toxin that caused the Williford family to get sick.
In the meantime, Jacki Williford says she will continue to be extremely wary of eating shellfish.
JACKI WILLIFORD: I think it’s scary because you just — you just don’t know what you’re getting anymore in food.
KATIE CAMPBELL: As for the rest of the family, well, not everyone has sworn off mussels.
JOHN WILLIFORD: It doesn’t change a thing for me.
(LAUGHTER)
JACKI WILLIFORD: For him.
(LAUGHTER)
HARI SREENIVASAN: Jaycee might keep eating mussels, but the high levels of toxins have forced the Washington State Department of Health to shutdown shellfish beds in six counties around the Puget Sound.
Flu shots today at the Tulalip Administration building from noon -3:00
By Monica Brown, Tulalip News Writer
TULALIP, Wash. – Flu season is here and if you want to prevent from getting the flu or contributing to spreading it, the flu vaccine is the way to go. Today, Oct. 22nd, from 12:00 to 3:00pm at the Tulalip Admin building, the Tulalip Pharmacy is issuing flu vaccines on the second floor in the lunch area. For non-tribal members please bring your medical insurance information.
The Center for Disease Control recommends that all those who are able to be vaccinated do so. Listed below is some information from the CDC about how the vaccine works and who should consider getting vaccinated.
How do flu vaccines work?
Flu vaccines cause antibodies to develop in the body about two weeks after vaccination. These antibodies provide protection against infection with the viruses that are in the vaccine.
The seasonal flu vaccine protects against the influenza viruses that research indicates will be most common during the upcoming season. Traditional flu vaccines (called trivalent vaccines) are made to protect against three flu viruses; an influenza A (H1N1) virus, an influenza A (H3N2) virus, and an influenza B virus. In addition, this season, there are flu vaccines made to protect against four flu viruses (called “quadrivalent” vaccines). These vaccines protect against the same viruses as the trivalent vaccine as well as an additional B virus.
While everyone should get a flu vaccine this season, it’s especially important for some people to get vaccinated.
Those people include the following:
People who are at high risk of developing serious complications (like pneumonia) if they get sick with the flu.
People who have certain medical conditions including asthma, diabetes, and chronic lung disease.
Pregnant women.
People younger than 5 years (and especially those younger than 2), and people 65 years and older.
JUNEAU, Alaska — A British Columbian gold mine would pollute a major tributary of a Ketchikan fjord, threatening fishing stock and tourism, locals say.
They allege the mine’s s massive amounts of water requiring treatment, sludge, tailings, rock and processing would be a “looming train wreck.”
A meeting of fishermen, environmentalists and tribal members convened by environmental groups focused on the Kerr-Sulphurets-Mitchell, also known as KSM, The Juneau Empire reported.
KSM is a proposed mine undergoing permitting in British Columbia. It would be one of the largest mines in the world once operational.
“Alaska has nothing to gain by this mine,” said Southeast Alaska Conservation Council Mining and Clean Water Project Coordinator Guy Archibald. “We’re only going to get contamination from it.”
The mine is proposed for a site on the Unuk River, which flows into the Misty Fjords National Monument.
The river supports five species of salmon. Mine owner Seabridge Gold conducted an environmental report that predicts minimal impact on fish and their habitat.
Most criticized at the meeting was the lack of objective data on the mine’s impact. Since all data so far has been generated by company-funded studies, Archibald called for state dollars to pay for scientifically accurate and defensible” studies.
“The first thing we need is some baseline water quality data on these rivers,” he said, referring to other mines as well. “Right now we’re relying on what the companies are telling us.”
The Juneau Empire attempted to reach Seabridge Gold, but the company did not return calls requesting comment by the paper’s deadline.
After mining, the site could need monitoring for decades, and speakers questioned the resilience of several of the structures the company plans to hold tailings and other byproducts.
“This is a long-term, very large issue of transboundary impacts,” said seiner and speaker Bruce Wallace, past president on the executive committee of the United Fishermen of Alaska.
KSM expects to employ 1,040 people at the site once the mine is operational.
At least one British Columbia tribe supports the project. The Gitxsan Treaty Society said in a letter that mine representatives’ “open, honest and transparent” interactions with the Gitxsan Nation led them to support the project and the jobs and economic benefits they expect the mine to provide.
Information from: Juneau (Alaska) Empire, http://www.juneauempire.com
High Country News map click image to read full article
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — Insurance enrollment helpers are encouraging Native Americans to sign up for coverage under the nation’s new health care law, saying it will help them better access X-rays, mammograms, prescription drugs and trips to specialists not covered under Indian Health Service.
American Indians are exempt from the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that people carry insurance, but the law opens up resources that for years have been limited through IHS, said Jerilyn Church, executive director of the South Dakota-based Great Plains Tribal Chairmen’s Health Board.
“There’s a huge gap in access to services, so being enrolled in the marketplace is going to make a big difference in terms of accessibility to health care,” Church said.
The Indian Health Service, a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, provides free health care to enrolled members of tribes, their descendants and some others as part of the government’s treaty obligations to Indian tribes dating back nearly a century.
Critics long have complained of insufficient financial support that has led to constant turnover among doctors and nurses, understaffed hospitals, sparse specialty care and long waits to see a doctor.
The Great Plains Tribal Chairmen’s Health Board received $264,000 in South Dakota and $186,000 in North Dakota to assist with Native American signups on the states’ reservations and urban areas.
The new law health care law will especially benefit people who seek treatment at urban Indian health clinics, which collectively are funded by just 1 percent of the IHS budget, said Ashley Tuomi, executive director of the American Indian Health and Family Services clinic in Detroit.
“Our resources are extremely limited, even more so than the tribes,” Tuomi said. “What we have within our walls is what we can offer for free.”
The clinic has seen a lot of patient interest in the health care marketplace, but “navigators” helping with signups have had to cancel many appointments because of continued issues with the federal healthcare.gov website, Tuomi said.
The Ponca Tribe of Nebraska has received about $38,000 in federal grant funds to encourage signups for tribal members scattered in 12 counties in Nebraska, two in Iowa and one in South Dakota.
The tribe’s IHS-contracted clinic in Omaha, Neb., has a medical doctor and two nurse practitioners, but the X-rays, specialists and prescriptions that are outsourced are not covered, said Jan Henderson, the tribe’s navigator project director. “And if they don’t have insurance, they have to pay for it themselves,” she said.
Tribes across the country get some federal money for referrals, but the small pools run out quickly, Henderson said.
She views the new health care law as a great step for Native Americans, but the greatest challenge is educating tribal members who are weary from decades of promises of improved health care.
“Education is very important in this right now to get people to be open to actually hearing about it,” Henderson said. “We hear a lot of people who say they don’t need this, they don’t want this.”
Largely unknown to mainstream America, Indian relay is a race like no other.
From left, Zack Rock and Luke Rock head into the home stretch during a relay race at the Crow Native Days in Crow Agency. MontanaPBS will feature the native sport in the documentary ‘Indian Relay.’
Fast and furious — Indian relay racing is like no other horse racing and no other sport you’ve ever seen.
And it’s largely unknown to mainstream America.
A new documentary by MontanaPBS, “Indian Relay,” focuses on this unique and dangerous sport. Before the film premieres nationally in November, Helenans can get a free sneak preview 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 24, at the Myrna Loy Center.
Filmed by Charles Dye, a Northwest Regional Emmy-award winner, it was written by Montana educator and poet M.L. Smoker, who is Assiniboine and Sioux.
You’ll see incredible and daring race film footage from a host of relay races in Indian Country and then the Indian Relay National Championships in Blackfoot, Idaho, in 2011.
Along the way, you travel with rider Myles Murray from Browning, Zack Rock and Kendall Old Horn of Crow Agency and Lance Tissisimit and Alonzo “Punkin” Coby, who are Shoshone-Bannock from Fort Hall, Idaho.
In this sport, riders race bareback at top gallop around a track. After one lap, barely slowing down, they switch horses by leaping down from one and onto another. After galloping around the track the second lap, the riders again leap onto a fresh horse and race to the finish line.
“These riders are very athletic and very fearless,” said Old Horn, who has been involved in Indian relay racing for 37 years.
“You could take any Indian relay rider and he could play with the best basketball and football players,” he said. “But you can’t take the best football or basketball player and put them in Indian relay. Professional jockeys wouldn’t touch Indian relay with a 10-foot stick. The degree and skill it takes to be an Indian relay rider is night and day from any other sport.”
With the sport comes a whole set of lingo — besides the rider, there’s a mugger who catches the rider’s horse when he dismounts, the set-up guy (or exchange holder) who holds the fresh mount, and then a back holder with the next fresh horse.
After the rider gallops off, the back holder passes the fresh horse to the set-up guy, while the mugger passes the horse he’s just caught to the back holder.
“There’s quite a bit of choreography that’s involved,” said Dye, the film’s director and producer. It takes a real trained team effort.
There’s also quite a bit of chaos and danger on the track throughout the race.
“It’s a unique and beautiful … sport,” said Dye. “It’s just amazing. Those thoroughbreds are huge. These guys are brave, and these horses are too. The horses are also athletes.”
Before he started making the film, Dye went to all the relay races in 2010.
“I wanted to see what it would look like with different camera angles,” he said. “It’s almost impossible to capture so many pieces.”
By the time his crew filmed the Indian Relay National Championship in Blackfoot, Idaho, in September 2011, they had 13 cameras running.
“The challenges were many,” Dye said. “The film is just one small bit of relay.”
One of the biggest challenges was after interviewing teams for months and filming them train and race in relays all over Indian Country, Dye had to edit it all down to a 1-hour film that primarily focuses on just three teams.
His interest in Indian relay was first piqued years ago, when he was filming the Montana PBS documentary, “Before There Were Parks,” which showed the views of Native people on the creation of Yellowstone and Glacier National parks. It aired at the time of Ken Burns’ 2009 PBS series “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea.”
“My curiosity was building,” said Dye, who had been seeing photos in different homes showing various Indian relay races. “I couldn’t figure out the photos. It didn’t look like standard horse racing.”
When Aaron Pruitt, director of content at MontanaPBS, heard Dye first describe “this crazy, dangerous, exhilarating sport,” he was surprised.
“I’m a native Montanan,” said Pruitt, “and I’d never heard of this. We were thrilled to tell this contemporary and popular story.”
“They did a good job,” said Old Horn. “I think the film speaks for itself.”
“It’s a very short version of the story,” Old Horn added. “To see the full impact and how Indian relay affects Indian families and Indian Country, you’d have to do a whole series.”
He’s hoping the documentary draws more attention to the thrilling sport and attracts bigger crowds and sponsorships.
The free screening is sponsored by Montana Historical Society, Montana PBS and the Myrna Loy Center. Pruitt and Smoker and possibly some of the participants will attend the show.
“Indian Relay” makes its MontanaPBS Broadcast premiere at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 31.
It’s also been selected by PBS’ five-time Emmy Award-winning series “Independent Lens,” and will premiere before national public television audiences on Nov. 18.
“It’s very prestigious for the film to have it selected by ‘Independent Lens,’” said Pruitt, who is also a co-producer for the film.
It was edited by Katie Lose Gilbertson and it was shot by Emmy-award winning cinematographers, Daniel Schmidt, Dawson Dunning and Rick Smith. Wayne Smith Jr., of the Blackfeet tribe, was an associate producer for the film.
October 20, 2013
