Tribal history comes to life
By TERRY MURRY of the East Oregonian
Terry Murry
MISSION — Wa Win Ta La Eytcht (Tina Montoya), UmYowit (Roberta Williams) and Pete Yana Shut (William Sigo IV) will make the past come to life at Tamastslikt Cultural Institute beginning Memorial Day weekend.
The three interpreters, who go by their Indian names at Tamastslikt, will work at the village being constructed outside the facility, teaching guests the history and traditions of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation.
May 27 is the anticipated opening date for the Living Culture Village. To make the history of their culture come to life, the three are working with Culture Village Coordinator Wenix Red Elk to complete the village in time and according to tradition.
“We wanted people to experience our culture and the way we have always done things,” Red Elk said. “We want people to see the way we still live at certain times of the year — to smell, taste and hear it.”
Visitors to the Living Culture Village will smell everything from smoking salmon and blueberries to the odors that accompany hide tanning.
“It’s not always going to smell good,” she said.
The interpreters and Red Elk have traveled in search of traditional materials like flint and tule reeds so they can create things in the traditional way. The Living Culture Village will teach visitors seasonally of the important practices of the tribes at each time of the year.
In making the village a reality, Red Elk said the group has been mentored by many elders and has experimented to gain skills when they could find no one who remembered how to perform them.
“The Indian people are always portrayed as a dead culture in the history books,” Red Elk said. “We’re here and we’re always going to be here.”
Even more important than educating the tourists is teaching tribal children to help revive the old ways, Red Elk said.
Such a learning experience is what began Red Elk on her journey to the Living Culture Village. She was 17 when she spent two years as an apprentice at the Indian Village that was set up in Pendleton as part of the Oregon Trail celebration. That sparked her interest in tribal history, and she qualified for college money to pursue her interest in museum studies.
As she continued her education, she took a summer position at Tamastslikt Cultural Institute once it opened.
“I went from that to being the coordinator of the Living Culture Museum,” she said. “I’m still learning, I learn from these guys all the time.”
Her interpreters — “these guys” — are still a little stunned to find themselves still employed. They had performed cultural education on the reservation funded by a grant that expired. Red Elk said they didn’t know that, impressed with their abilities, she had decided they were going to be her first interpreters.
But the interpreters are taking their challenge in stride. So far they have hunted for rocks, picked dog’s bane, gathered tule reeds and repaired beadwork on regalia handed down to them by their own ancestors.
“We figured out how to smoke berries,” Red Elk said. “It hasn’t been done for years. It was lost and we know how to do it now.”
We’ve learned how to cut meat for hanging and smoking. There are not very many people who know as much as we’ve learned in the last couple of years.”
Red Elk said the Living Culture Village will also keep the group learning once it’s open.
“There will always be a learning process going on,” she said. “Even when the village opens, you can move things around.”
The Living Culture Village will be open from Memorial Day to Labor Day every year as well as for special occasions, and Red Elk is looking for other interpreters to add.
Visitors will be able to view the village at their own pace.
“They can take a few minutes to however long they want to spend,” Red Elk said. “When we were doing the village in Pendleton we had some people walk through in a few minutes and some would just sit for hours. They can do that here, too.”
Link to Report
Thanks to Bea Woodward for the lead!
April Reports
Last updated on April 30, 2005