TULALIP, Wash. – Family and friends joined together to watch their precious ones graduate from Tulalip Montessori school. The ceremony, which took place at the Tulalip Don Hatch/Greg Williams Court on June 13, 2013, included songs sung by the children and a slideshow of the children’s photos that had been taken throughout the school year. School staff honored the children for their graduation achievement and cake and refreshments were served.
Montessori Graduation 2013 Photo by Monica Brown
Montessori Graduation 2013 Photo by Monica BrownMontessori Graduation 2013 Photo by Monica Brown
MOUNT VERNON, Wash. — Washington Department of Transportation officials have installed a webcam at the site of the collapsed Interstate 5 bridge on the Skagit River so residents can monitor the progress on repairing it.
Nearly all the materials for a temporary bridge have arrived at the site and DOT hopes to meet Gov. Jay Inslee’s goal of spanning a collapsed section by mid-June, officials said. The National Transportation Safety Board is still finishing its site investigation, The Skagit Valley Herald reported.
A section of the bridge collapsed May 23 after a girder was struck by an oversize load on a truck. Traffic currently is detoured through Mount Vernon and Burlington
.A temporary bridge will replace the 160-foot section that fell into the water. That will reopen two lanes in each direction. A permanent replacement this fall should restore the bridge.
To get to the DOT webpage that also includes traffic cameras for the George Hopper Road exit and Highway 20, click here. The webcams should automatically reload every 2 minutes, DOT said.
The American Indian Movement (AIM) stopped making headlines long ago, but it’s still making history.
Provided by Minnesota Historical Society Press. Photos by Dick Bancroft ‚ A group of AIM women protest at the front door of the US Courthouse in Minneapolis. This is a black-and-white photo of people holding signs outside the courthouse. One with back to camera wears a coat with sign on back saying‚”Indian Brotherhood.”
Article by: MARY ABBEStar Tribune
May 30, 2013
Last year the organization began planning an interpretive center to house the photos, artifacts and stories that document AIM’s importance in restoring Indian civil rights, identity and pride. This spring a sample of that material is showcased in two exhibitions: a powerful, emotionally stirring show of about 100 photos plus memorabilia (posters, buttons, articles) at All My Relations Gallery in south Minneapolis and a smaller display of about 25 photos downtown at the Mill City Museum. Accompanying them is a handsome new book, “We Are Still Here: A Photographic History of the American Indian Movement,” from the Minnesota Historical Society Press.
This Dick Bancroft portrait of a man at a 1981 treaty-rights conference serves as the cover for “We Are Still Here: A Photographic History of the American Indian Movement,” from the Minnesota Historical Society Press.
Founded in Minneapolis in 1968, AIM was ambitious in its goals and fortunate in its leaders. Responding to endemic poverty, racism, police harassment and centuries of broken treaties, the fledgling organization set out to reclaim native pride, much as the civil rights movement was doing for black Americans. Its goals encompassed everything from improved housing, education and employment for urban Indians to encouraging native people to assume responsibility and engage in civic affairs.
Now, 45 years later, its legacy is especially visible on revitalized Franklin Avenue in south Minneapolis, where banners announcing an American Indian Cultural Corridor flutter on new light poles, and Indian businesses and civic organizations (Northland Native American Products, Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, Native American Community Development Institute) anchor an increasingly upscale neighborhood.
Tough times documented
There was nothing upscale in the lives of urban Indians in the 1960s, as documented in “I’m Not Your Indian Anymore” at All My Relations. The earliest black-and-white images show the poverty and danger — junked cars, rickety stairs, holes in floors — in which Indians often struggled to raise their families. AIM’s early marches, rallies and confrontations were recorded at Minneapolis City Hall, the village of Wounded Knee, S.D., and at the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C.
The emotional power of the shows comes in the unvarnished authenticity and you-are-there candor of the grainy images, including a wedding, a funeral, and a clutch of camouflage-clad U.S. military men arriving at Wounded Knee. In a particularly striking picture by Kevin McKiernan, an elderly woman named Cecilia Jumping Bull proudly clutches a folded U.S. flag and photos of two young men, presumably her sons, in military uniforms. A bullet hole disfigures one of the portraits, prompting her remark: “The government shoots my house; they have no respect for me.”
Stacy LaBlanc, John Blue Bird and Tom LaBlanc in front of the FBI building in Washington, D.C., in 1978 during the Longest Walk, a cross-country protest march.
Other images document police beatings and harassment, protests at a Wisconsin power dam that had flooded tribal lands, and a long 1972 march to Washington known as the Trail of Broken Treaties Caravan. But AIM had broader goals, too, as evidenced in Roger Woo’s 1975 photo of kids being tutored at the Red School House, a St. Paul school for Indian youths, and of a boy being cared for at an Indian Health Board Clinic.
The earliest black-and-white pictures were taken by a variety of photographers, most notably Woo and McKiernan. Most of the color images, including a preponderance of those in the book, are by Dick Bancroft, who became the movement’s unofficial photographer.
Complex conflicts
Not surprisingly, the back story of many of the photos is complex. Official tribal leaders of the time often sided with federal bureaucrats against AIM, trying to discredit it as a ragtag group of “urban Indian” agitators, even though it enjoyed support of many traditional elders.
The magnitude of AIM’s reach became apparent in 1977 when an international delegation of indigenous people took their concerns to the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. Among the delegates was Winona LaDuke, then an 18-year-old Harvard student who had researched uranium and coal mining on Indian lands. “I was in awe of everybody,” she recalls in the book. “I’d never been exposed to all this cool political leadership.”
• ÄúAn unidentified woman listening to translated testimony on the sterilization of Indian women.‚Äù This pix of a lovely young woman crying was taken apparently at a United Nations International NGO Conference on Indigenous Peoples and the Land in Geneva, Switzerland, Sept. 15 ‚Äì 18, 1981. provided by Minnesota Historical Society Press. Photos by Dick Bancroft
The 13-point resolution the group presented became the basis of a U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People that was approved, finally, 30 years later.
Like all history, AIM’s story will doubtless be debated and interpreted for years to come. These compelling exhibitions and the engrossing, meticulously researched book are an essential foundation for that discussion.
I’m Not Your Indian Anymore
What: An impressive photographic history of the American Indian Movement (AIM), featuring images by Dick Bancroft, Roger Woo and Keri Pickett.
Some daredevils are setting the Internet abuzz with breathtaking and death-defying photos taken from the top of some of Seattle’s tallest landmarks.
The most recent one shows a climber perched in the rafters of Safeco Field’s retractable roof, 21 stories above the playing surface. While the photo has just started making the rounds, it was actually posted about 10 months ago on the Reddit account of a user who goes by the handle “shuttersubversive.”
The guy is absolutely fearless, if not nuts. His other accomplishments include scaling the top of Century Link Field, the Space Needle, and the Columbia Tower. He’s also likely the same climber who scaled Seattle’s Great Wheel before it opened last summer.
There’s no confirmation of his identity, but links lead to a blog called “No Promise of Safety,” that identifies him as Joseph Carnavale, a sculptor, photographer and adventurer.
The blog has even more insane pictures of death-defying climbs up various buildings, construction cranes, and other ridiculously tall structures.
It’s clear he’s not the only one making the risky (and highly illegal) climbs. Somebody has to take the pictures. One conquest shows a pair of climbers sitting atop the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
On his Reddit page, the guy says he no longer lives in Seattle, but a lot of people around here sure would like to talk to him.
An unidentified climber sits atop the roof of the Space Needle in Seattle. Photo by Reddit/ShuttersubversiveAn unidentified climber sits atop the roof of Seattle’s Century Link Field Photo by Reddit/Shuttersubversive
An unidentified climber scales Seattle’s Great Wheel. Photo by Reddit/ShuttersubversiveDaredevils sit atop the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in this undated photo posted on Reddit Photo by Reddit/Shuttersubversive
Tribal members clean the canoes every srping prior to canoe practice. Photo by Monica Brown
Article and photos by Monica Brown
On Wednesday, April 17th, Tulalip tribal members brought out the canoes; Big Sister, Little Sister and Big Brother, for the traditional cleaning and awakening them. This activity, referred to as protocol, is important spiritually for the canoes and tribal members.
The significance for waking the canoes is to clear any sort of negative energy that may be left over from the season before or any bad energy that may have accumulated over the winter.
Photo by Monica Brown
During the resting period the canoes are housed in a special canoe shed behind the Veteran’s Center. Tulalip tribal member Jason Gobin is the delegated as caretaker of the canoes and ensures that protocol is followed once the canoes are put away for the season and reawakened the following spring.
“The water is very powerful and the canoe is what takes care of us while we are out in the water,” says Tribal member and Canoe Family Skipper Darkfeather Ancheta, “Being in the Skipper position I have felt the negative energy. If the negativity is there then the canoe will not want to turn the way you are trying to make it go.”
The canoes are made from cedar trees and have a spirit giving them life for many years so they are taken care of diligently by tribal members. At the end of the season they are put to rest in their covered area until the following spring.
Canoe practice for the 2013 Canoe Journey will be held at the Tulalip Marina at 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday and is open to the community.
TULALIP, Wash.- The Hibulb Cultural Center’s Gardening Together as Families event was planned for Saturday April 13, 2013, rain or shine. Despite the cold and rainy weather, gardeners began arriving at ten am, dressed in rain gear and ready to garden. They made their way inside the Cultural Center where they enjoyed traditional prayers and songs prior to heading out to the garden and greenhouse.
Sweet peas vining on an old crab pot Photo by Monica Brown
In the garden’s raised planter boxes they replanted the starts from the green house. Cabbage, cauliflower and broccoli were all placed in the raised beds. Sugar snap peas were replanted in a raised bed and given an old crab pot to vine on. A spring mix variety of lettuce was replanted in a lettuce wall that looks like upside down stairs to maximize space and water. These cold weather plants are hardier to cold and some freezing temperatures. While the sweet peas and broccoli may produce all summer, cabbage, cauliflower and lettuce will need to be reseeded after they are done producing.
Master Gardener Richelle Taylor inspects the Kale plants Photo by Monica Brown
Early spring plants that are able to withstand the cooler temperatures were already thriving in the raised planter boxes. Master Gardener Michelle Taylor coerced me to try the fresh Kale that she tore from the stalk. Kale is surprisingly refreshing, sweet and tender; it is similar in taste to sweet peas. Michelle explained how Kale is an easy vegetable to grow in this area of Washington and is full of nutrients like Iron, fiber, calcium, Vitamins C, A and K. Kale is simple to cook with and prepare, it’s great in salad, soup, casserole, or in a smoothie.
Carol Kapua fascinates over the artichoke plant Photo by Monica Brown
Gardener Carol Kapua was enthralled when she saw the large artichoke that it was “so very healthy” and explained how the artichoke will grow and mature on the inside of the bushy plant. Artichoke is not usually grown in this wet climate and is a bit of a finicky perennial but is able to be grown as a low maintenance annual. The artichoke plant will need to be “overwintered” a term which means the plant will need to be cooled to a low temperature of 30 degrees in order to flower.
A peek inside the greenhouse Photo by Monica Brown
The next Gardening Together as Families event will be in May. All levels of experience are welcome and Gardeners do not need to bring any tools, although if you have your own garden gloves, knee pads etc. you are welcome to bring them. At the end of each Gardening Together as Families event a delicious and nutritious lunch is prepared by the Cultural Center staff.
For more information or you would like to attend future garden events please contact Veronica Leahy at (360) 716-5642 or email vleahy@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov
Chairman Mel Sheldon swears in Marie Zackuse and Theresa Sheldon to the Tulalip Tribes Board of Directors Photo: Monica Brown
By Monica Brown, Tulalip News Writer
TULALIP, Wash.- Family and friends arrived early Saturday morning, April 6th, at the Tulalip Administration building to witness the swearing in of Marie M. Zackuse and Theresa Sheldon to the Tulalip Tribes Board of Directors.
Tulalip Tribes Board of Directors, Chuck James, Theresa Sheldon, Glen Gobin, Melvin R. Sheldon Jr, Marlin Fryberg Jr, Marie M. Zackuse, Deborah Parker Photo: Monica Brown
Marie M. Zackuse thanks the board for welcoming her back as she takes her seat on the Services Committee of the Board Photo: Monica Brown
As Zackuse was welcomed to take her seat on the Services Committee along side Deborah Parker and Marlin Fryberg Jr, she responded, “I want to thank each and everyone that came today, my family and my elders.”
“I’m very grateful today that the Creator provided this opportunity once again for me and I will do the best that I can with what I know and what I have. I want to thank everybody who helped me”
New board member Theresa Sheldon thanks the board as they welcome her on the Business Committee of the board Photo: Monica Brown
“There are just so many inspirational elders and people in our community who helped encourage me to get to this point where I am today” said Sheldon as she took her seat along side Glen Gobin and Chuck James on the Business Committee.”It ‘s the beginning of a new journey and I am truly honored to be here and assist with this board of directors.”
“I’m very thankful for this and I’m excited to get work done”
Zackuse and Sheldon were elected March 16th 2013, at the Annual General Council meeting, they will both serve three year terms.
“Plans to auction the dramatic facial representations on April 12 spawned a protest from the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office and calls for the French government to intercede.”
A French auction house will auction off this Hopi kachina face depicting Crow Mother. Neret-Minet Tessier & Sarrou
By Dennis Wagner
The Republic | azcentral.com
Tue Apr 2, 2013 11:36 PM
The Heard Museum and the Museum of Northern Arizona have joined Hopi cultural officials in urging a French auction house to cancel the planned sale this month of about 70 ceremonial kachina faces, known to tribal members as “friends.”
In Hopi theology, kachinas are supernatural messengers depicted in fantastical costumes worn during religious ceremonies. There are several hundred spirit characters in the pantheon representing wildlife, plants, human qualities, weather and other facets of nature or society.
Also known as katsinas, these characters are more commonly depicted in smaller form as carved doll-like figures.
Plans to auction the dramatic facial representations on April 12 spawned a protest from the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office and calls for the French government to intercede.
The Museum of Northern Arizona’s director, Robert Breunig, posted a letter Friday to the Paris auction house on Facebook, urging that the iconic, masklike visages be returned to Hopis of Arizona and the related New Mexico pueblos of Acoma, Zuni and Jemez.
“I can tell you from personal knowledge that the proposed sale of these katsina friends, and the international exposure of them, is causing outrage, sadness and stress among members of the affected tribes,” Breunig wrote. “For them, katsina friends are living beings. … To be displayed disembodied in your catalog, and on the Internet, is sacrilegious and offensive.”
The Heard Museum also posted a message on Facebook, which was e-mailed to the auctioneers in Paris: “This sale of items of significant religious and cultural importance to the Hopi Tribe is of extreme concern to our American Indian employees, particularly our Hopi employees.”
The Paris auction house, Neret-Minet Tessier & Sarrou, advertised plans to put the spiritual figureheads up for sale. Online promotions list combined estimated values exceeding $775,000.
One of the “Hopi masques” has a listed value of up to $64,000. Officials at the firm did not respond to e-mail or phone messages.
Last month, Hopi Cultural Preservation Office Director Leigh Kuwanwisiwma released a statement opposing the auction and asking Neret-Minet to “begin respectful discussions to return them back to the tribe.”
Kuwanwisiwma did not respond to an interview request, but a tribal representative said he received no response from Neret-Minet.
Sam Tenakhongva, Katsina Clan leader for the Hopi village of First Mesa, declined to be quoted unless The Arizona Republic agreed to prior censorship of stories about the controversy.
Micah Loma’omvaya, chief of staff to Hopi Chairman LeRoy Shingoitewa, said his boss and the Tribal Council have yet to address the matter.
The Hopi religion is so secretive, and the kachina spirit figures’ roles so crucial, that tribal officials oppose publication of photographs. They also object to the word “mask” as a description of the supernatural caricatures worn by Hopi men during ceremonies.
That cultural sensitivity may be confusing, however, because Hopi artisans commercially produce and sell thousands of wooden effigies depicting the same spiritual entities. In fact, a Katsina Doll Marketplace scheduled April 13 at the Heard Museum in Phoenix boasts 100 artisans and is touted as “the nation’s largest gathering of Hopi katsina doll carvers.”
According to a Neret-Minet catalog, the collection in Paris was assembled by “a connoisseur with peerless tastes” who lived in the United States for three decades and spent time with the tribe.
“By his own admission, you have to see the masks in dances to fully appreciate them,” the text says. “The art and history of the Hopi are intimately linked.”
Objects that date from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are made from leather, fur, plants, feathers and other natural materials. They depict benevolent characters such as Crow Mother (Angwusnasomtaqa), the matron of all kachinas, and Mud Head Clown (Kooyemsi), who is “both the supreme mediator between good and evil and an insolent buffoon prone to scatological pranks.”
Jose Villarreal, editor and publisher at artdaily.org, which announced the auction, said he has been bombarded with e-mail complaints from Hopis who are “very mad.” Villarreal said he contacted the Neret-Minet and was informed that the sale will go as planned because the kachina art was legally obtained.
Marketing materials do not explain when or how the religious artworks were acquired. In past U.S. cases, some works have been secretly sold to collectors for a profit by tribal members.
The Hopi Cultural Preservation Office statement says, “It is our position that these sacred objects should never have left the jurisdiction of the Hopi Tribe. … No one, other than a Hopi tribal member, has a right to possess these ceremonial objects.”
The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 established a process for Indian tribes to reclaim funerary and sacred items within the U.S., but it carries no international authority.
The Heard Museum statement says France adopted provisions of the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and therefore should “take steps to return these ceremonial objects.”
In his letter to the auction house, Breunig noted that kachinas represent “a connection between the human world and the spirits of all living things and the ancestors” for tribal members. “I appeal to your sense of decency and humanity and request that you terminate the auction,” he added.
Numerous Hopis joined discussions of the controversy on museum Facebook pages, expressing outrage at the planned auction and at those who may have betrayed the tribe in the past by selling religious artifacts.
Reach the reporter at dennis.wagner@arizona republic.com or 602-444- 8874
“Appropriation of cultural Regalia, such as the war bonnet …causes sacred objects to lose their power when they are represented out of context,” wrote Luger in his artist statement.
By Marianne Combs
When Dyani White Hawk Polk asked a group of artists for work for her exhibition “Make it Pop,” she was looking for contemporary pieces responding to issues of the day.
“We’ve had somber exhibits, politically driven, fine art,” says White Hawk Polk, sitting at her desk in All My Relations Gallery. “I wanted this to feel more playful and cutting edge, something that really speaks to our youth and people interested in pop culture as well as fine art lovers.”
White Hawk Polk got what she was looking for; the colorful show reflects and comments on popular culture in a number of ways. Interestingly, two artists – Frank Buffalo Hyde and Cannupa Hanska Luger – chose to focus on an issue that has many Native Americans upset: the appropriation of Native Regalia by popular culture – in particular, the headdress.
“In-Appropriate 3,” a painting by Frank Buffalo Hyde responding to the use of a Native American headdress and jewelry on a Victoria’s Secret model at a fashion show held on November 7, 2012.
White Hawk Polk says she wasn’t surprised.
“It’s always been an issue,” reflects White Hawk Polk. “It’s always been there, but this past year, year and a half, it’s just been prolific.”
Native Americans belong to many different tribes spread across Native North America. But the headdress, or war bonnet, is a universal symbol of great spiritual importance worn only by highly respected individuals.
He was a friend to Indian tribes and served two terms as governor of Washington state; Booth Gardner, a democratic, died at the age of 76 on Friday, March 15 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease.
“Governor Booth Gardner was a wonderful man and an exceptionally good governor. He was clearly a very close friend of the tribes, a man who truly understood the great value of establishing and maintaining positive relations with us, on a government-to-government basis, and who had the courage to stand up for what is right,” said Fawn Sharp, president of the Quinault Indian Nation and the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians, in a statement.
“It was under Booth’s leadership that the State of Washington and the Northwest Tribes stepped away from constant court battles into a new era of cooperation in the 1980’s. It was he who signed the Centennial Accord with tribal leaders in 1989 and it was he who helped open the door to positive state/tribal relations in places where conflict and polarization existed before,” Sharp continued. “Booth Gardner was a brilliant and visionary man. We pray the leadership he provided in his life will live on for generations to come. We extend our deepest condolences to his family and to all the people of Washington who we know will also miss this great and vastly accomplished man.”
Published: May 30, 2013
