Tent of Many Voices: 11110503TMB

have you come on in take a seat join us we're just about to get started with our 1:00 program and welcome to the tent of many voices and the core of Discovery 2 core Discovery 2 is a national traveling exhibit it's a multi- agency Federal exhibit with a national parks service being the lead agency what we do here in the T of many voices is we bring in a wide variety of presenters both to talk about different aspects of that Lewis and Clark expedition but also to share with us some of the history and culture of all those American Indian nations that have been living here for thousands of years before the arrival of Lewis and Clark and this afternoon we're going to hear from a representative of one of those Nations we're going to hear from Ray Gardner he is vice chairman of the chinuk Nation he's going to talk about the road to Federal recognition so let's please give him a warm welcome to the T many voices so high welcome all of you to beautiful chinuk Nation this is just a nice average sunny day I really don't understand why LS and Clark had such a problem 200 years years ago when they got there well I'd like to talk a little bit about where the chinuk tribe is at how we got there things that have transpired over the years to get us in the situation that we're in for those of you that don't know about the chinuk nation we have been here for tens of thousands of years and for reasons that I will get into briefly as we go through the federal government has chosen to to not recognize the chinuk nation as a tribe now briefly right off on that I find that very hard to believe considering that Chinooks are one of the most documented tribes in the nation most certainly on the west coast I don't think anyone can argue that not only are we here but we have always been here I find it interesting that the same government that refuses to recognize this has a chinuk helicopter that they fly in their military and it's known for its strength and durability the same as the Chinooks were and they were known for their paddling skills in the river I'd kind of like to go back and kind of start in about 1792 to go forward from there in 1792 Robert gray came to the Columbia River he was looking for the Great River trade when he got here he sat offshore he sent a couple of his longboats in he actually lost a couple of his long boats trying to come into the Columbia after that we were sitting there and you have to remember the chuks controlled the trade on the Columbia River trade did not come into our out of the Columbia River without coming through the chinuk nation the chinuk nation traveled East repeatedly up as far as the Dows and salival Falls we traveled up and down the coast into Canada and Southern Alaska and down into about mid California we had a very well established trade mechanism that we had in place so when Robert gray showed up we saw an opportunity for train so we actually took our canoes went out across the Columbia River Bar and actually escorted Robert gray back into the Columbia so we could start trade relations with him he came in I I need to point out these different things as we go through these are the some of the things that the Chinooks have had to deal with as we move forward when Robert gray came in he came in and anchored his ship in Baker Bay which if any of you are familiar with the area and familiar with ELO you're familiar with Baker Bay trade relations started between Robert gray and the chinuk tribe they went on throughout the day into the evening Robert gray was very reluctant to have Tribal people around his ship after it got dark one he was afraid of what we might do the other is there was obviously more of us than there was of him so when it started getting Dusk and the tribes came out out and wanted to continue trade because you've got to realize when trade starts trade continues until it's done it doesn't matter whether it's day night it doesn't matter there's trade to be done so you just do it so as it started getting dark the tribe was continuing to come out and Robert gray and had his people fire shots to scare the Chinooks away which they left for a little bit but then they came back because again they wanted to keep trading in Robert's Gray's journals it talks about how one of our large canoes it doesn't say the size but it talks about one of our very large canoes with 20 plus chinuk members in it was coming back out to continue trade he ordered his men to to load their 9lb Cannon and he blew the canoe out of the water killing everyone on board I say that because there's importance to that one it shows the importance of the chinuk tribe wanting to control trade on the river the need to control that trade on the river tribal culture if you lose an elder or members in the tribe everything ceases until you properly can take care of your people the need to control that trade continued and showed the importance of that when the very next morning the chinuk tribe was back out trading with Robert gray before they were even able to take care of their own people I think that's important to point out because it does point out that need to control this river which the tribe did very well we moved forward past Robert gray other ships came in and I need to point out too Robert gray was was not the first Euro Americans that we traded with they found things in our village sites that actually predate Robert gray some of the earliest things that have been found in our trade with Euro Americans is actually Chinese so Robert gray was even not the first to be here we move forward from Robert gray and as we're everyone's here to hear about is Louis and Clark so LS and Clark show up in 1805 November a beautiful day like this and they're hidden behind a rock they can't get out they can't keep their canoes upright they're starving they're sick they're huddled up there trying to figure out how do we go from here to their amazement they look out into the Columbia River and not only do they see a canoe coming across the river towards them in the same river that they canot even Venture around a single point to continue down down but a chief of the chinuk tribe was standing up in the B it amazed Lois and Clark to see that the tribe came in started negotiations with them one of the things I always like to point out is because it's a question I usually get asked is what did the chinuk tribe think of Lewis and Clark when we found him it's very easy for me to answer we thought Louis and Clark were pretty pathetic but you got to remember we had been trading for years before Los and Clark ever got here we were used to trading with people that had items that were of value things that we needed things that we could use people who were dressed in fine clothes that came off the ships now you look at Louis and Clark again huddled behind a rock their clothes are rotting off their backs they're diseased they're sick they're starving it's easy to see why the tribe would have thought they were pathetic with Lewis and Clark we really look at this whole event that's going on obviously not as a celebration at all we do commemorate their feat it was an amazing feat they managed to come across the country they came through a lot of Indian nations all of the Nations helped them along the way when they got here they had mastered a great accomplishment they managed that entire Journey without losing a single person in canoes that they couldn't keep up right for more than probably a half an hour at a time I need to point out too kind of going forward 200 years and then I'll go back again 2002 the first group that was going to be working on P traying the journey of Louis and Clark were coming down the river making their trial run so they could have some experience for when they got here this year so the chinuk tribe heard that they were going to be coming down the river so we thought well maybe we should capitalize on this a little bit so we took one of our canoes and we tucked it into chinuk Cove and we were sitting there waiting for these people to go by in the river we had several of our El ERS there and our whole purpose was basically and I'll admit it was to snub these people that were portraying Louis Clark in the first meeting we had with him we offered him salmon they turned that salmon down and they wanted to trade for our dogs they didn't want to eat our salmon that was one of the things that showed how negligent Lewis and Clark was of learning the cultures of the tribes that they were meeting that was a huge honor we were bestowing on them to offer them saying so our intent when we were going to meet these people in 2002 was we were going to have our elders be on Shore we were going to come in with our canoe gift our elders salmon and just turn around and Pad away again as we're sitting there waiting one of our elders comes down to where the canoe is and they tell us they're at chinuk Park so we're asking them well how did they get to chinuk Park we've been sitting here for hours they said well they couldn't keep their news upright so they trucked it in obviously in 200 years some things have not changed we pulled our canoe out of Chip Cove paddled down this group of people that had read about us had heard about us were amazed probably in the same as the original Lewis and Clark were when they looked out into the Colombia and here again 200 years later came a chinuk canoe paddling into where they were they actually came down and waited out into the river to help us land our canoe and we actually had pity on them when we helped him Fay the fish and helped him cook it but if you go back to that that obviously started some major changes in the chinuk nation how we dealt with outside people how outside people influenced us how disease became more rampant in tribe as more Euro Americans came into our country and I need to keep establishing that it Not only was our country it still is our country they brought disease which decimated the chinuk nation I need to point out too the chinuk nation for those of you that don't know is comprised of five tribes the clat the Cathlamet the WAMS the whe apas and lower chut those are the tribes that comprise the chinuk nation those are the tribes that are all still here today as we're speaking so we move past Lewis and Clark coming here and we start looking at how does the government treat the chinuk nation how does the federal government treat the tribe that kept their expedition alive throughout the winter I don't think too many people could argue had not the Chinooks found Lewis and Clark at dismal Niche had had not the chinuk nation fed Lewis and Clark after Lewis and Clark had their boat to go across the river to the souths side had they not helped them build their Fort helped them get game so they could eat there's a very high likelihood that that expedition would have failed right here at the mouth of the Columbia River and have never returned home with disease I could say that the tribes numbers started getting smaller we were getting scattered about more we were being started people were starting to move us out of our homelands that all comes down to trade the same thing that we had controlled for thousands of years years the Euro Americans now wanted they also realized the importance of controlling the Columbia River and the trade on the Columbia river that came in and out of here we can come up to 1851 which was the first time that the federal government entered entered into a treaty with the chinuk nation the tany point treaty that treaty was signed in good faith by the chiefs of the tribes which I would like to add at that point the chief of the wheela tribe at that time was huxel who is my direct descendant that's where I descend from I'm also very proud to say that my family from the whea tribe has never ever left their homelands from the time of my birth in the first home that I lived in I could look out the window of my bedroom and look at the Willapa River when I got married I moved a whole Miles and again could look out at the willar river my wife and I put in a new home a little over 10 years ago I now own to the middle of the willar road I'm very proud of that I'm proud of the fact I can trace my lineage back 1700s I know where I came from I know where my people came from and again it dis emphasizes we have never left we have always been there when we entered into the Treaty of 1851 it was thought to be a good treaty for some reason Congress never ratified that treaty so as far as the government's concerned to this day that treaty doesn't mean anything In 1855 the government came back again to enter into a treaty with the chunuk nation nation in the negotiations on the Treaty 1855 they wanted to relocate all of our people off of the Columbia River off of the Willapa River and move us all North to about where the corals are that was unacceptable to our people so we refused to sign that and we kept arguing on that treaty that we did not want to be moved out of our homelands Stevens got upset stormed out of the treaty negotiations that was the last attempt that the federal government made at try to trying to enter into a treaty with nation treaty or not a treaty does not recognize a tribe A treaty is just a piece of paper that establishes negotiations between the tribe and governments so even at that point the chunuk nation was still a recognized Nation my grandmother my great aunties my uncles were all from the generation that was taken from their homes and put into tribal schools they were put into tribal schools for what the government wanted to say was to take the Indian out of the Indian they wanted to assimilate these people into what they deemed was their society my grandmother and my great aunt spoke fluently to each other in chinuk so they were separated from each other so they couldn't talk to each other as you go forward from there negotiations just kept getting worse and worse and the federal government kept acknowledging us less and less one of the things I'd like to point out it takes an act of Congress to terminate a tribe and legally take recognition away from him there has never been an act of Congress to terminate the chinuk nation are any of the five tribes that comprise the CH Nations so again you look at the fact that we are still a nation we still have our recognition the Bureau of Indian Affairs 1962 someone in the midst of all of their people that they have working back there started going through a list of tribes and they started looking at them and they said gez what tribes have we dealt with lately what tribes do we not know anyone they came to the Chinooks no one there seemed to know who we were so they crossed us off the list when they crossed us off the list the federal government decided we did not exist anymore since 1962 we have been working towards getting the federal government to we don't consider it be recognize because we do not agree that they have ever legally terminated us but to re-recognize us or put us back where we belong that's been an ongoing struggle the government in all of their wisdom they would come up with things that they would ask for and documentation do you have this do you have that we would Supply him with that as soon as they got it they asked for more we'd give them more as soon as they got that they would ask for more yet I'd like to point out at at this time because one of the things that I hear a lot which is very disheartening to me is one of the things I hear is well the Chinooks want to be recognized so they can have a casino well the Chinooks do not want a casino that is not why we're in this process that was never our intent to be in this process one of the things that I always like to point out to prove that point is several years ago there was a gambling Consortium from Back East that came in and I believe they offered us a million dollars and our fight for recognition if if when we got recognized we would let them build a casino in our area now you've got to remember the chinuk nation where the government cut off all relations with us has struggled since 1962 and even before to even stay here our office is in an old schoolhouse down in chinuk for those of you that that know chinuk we operate our office staff with grants that we get from small agencies from having fundraisers Seafood dinners garage sales whatever we need to do to make enough money to keep our office open so a million dollars is a lot of money to a tribe that has nothing and it was turned down by 99% of the people I think that says a lot to say who we are and the fact that we're not a gaming track the other thing I always like to point out is when we first started this process to get our recognition put back into place there was not a casino anywhere in the United States no tribes had even thought of them yet we've been in this process continually ever since then so I do need to point that out because I think that is an important element of who we are finally January 2003 the federal government acknowledged that we had proved our case and that we should be put back on the Federal Register as a recogn ni tribe it was a wonderful day I it was a huge day in chinuk nation now you got to kind of put this into perspective my own ancestors other ancestors within the tribe had fought for years and passed over to the other side being told that they were not an Indian so that was a huge day that we could now stand there and say the federal government has now acknowledged this and we're recognized again the first council meeting we had after recognition was huge it was a celebration everyone was just ecstatic most all of our council members at that time flew back to Washington DC and were present when the when the recognition was signed I'm sure they'll never forget that day it was huge then it was appealed appealed by numerous entities that decided they didn't agree with that decision through the process of that appeal it ended up in the appell at court the Appel Court upheld the decision that had been made to grant us recognition they did ask some questions but nowhere in that decision that came down from the court of appeals did it say after these questions are answered we might entertain changing our decision so their decision was Final they upheld the recognition again the Bureau of Indian Affairs took those eight questions as a way to open our case completely back up again when they did that there had been a change in leadership in DC it was re-evaluated relooked at and while our chairman was back in Washington DC at the invitation of George and Laura Bush at a function at the White House to kick off this whole event for lisis and Clark before he could get out of town back onto the plane he received a phone call that phone call was to tell him that the government had overturned our recognition and taken it back away that was a horrible day for the chinuk nation we had now finally gotten to where we wanted to be and had it snatched back away again we have continued with the process that we've been in unfortunately with the Bureau of Indian Affairs they tell us that as far as they're concerned they're done dealing with us that they have done what they need to do they've made their decision and that's fine we're in a process now where we have talked to members of the senate members of Congress our state representatives and we have asked all of these people to acknowledge us to recognize this to put put a bill on the floor of Congress and the Senate which by doing that they could grant us our recognition and it would be final there would be no Appeals there would be no decisions they could do it there were several of us went back to Washington DC to talk to members of the Senate and the Congress to try and get them to do just that while we were back there we worked on the language and the bill that would be submitted on the floor the first bill that they offered to us while we were there to me was another huge insult from the federal government they said we'll grant you your recognition in name if you give up all of your rights we won't let you fish we won't let you hunt we won't let you do anything that all other tribes in the nation are entitled to but we'll at least let you put your name on the register and you can say you're a Cho that obviously was not acceptable to us we argued adamantly while we were back there we got a bill that we thought was approp apprpriate one that would grant us full recognition as we should have with every other first nation in this country hunting and fishing rights with recognition of a tribe are not necessarily a given but we had to keep those in that bill because that would be a fight for another day then we would have to establish through the courts that we were in to hunting fish but at least it would still give us the opportunity to fight that battle so we were not willing to give that up when we left Washington DC we had pretty firm commitments from four Senators 17 members of Congress that they would submit a bill on our behalf well that's been 3 years ago and there's been no bill I have talked to those people since that time I hear everything from it's not a good time too politically it doesn't make good sense to its election year I don't have time well we've been here for thousands years we can outweigh them if we have to we haven't gone we aren't going I I myself feel it it's time for our government to step up acknowledge the chinuk nation acknowledges for who we are what we've done the fact that we are still here and let us get on with our lives we have things we want to do we want to bring our culture back we've been working very hard at that for last probably 10 years or more we brought ceremonies back that had not taken place for probably 80 to 90 years we've got tribal canoes that people if they're out there at the right time would have the opportunity to see back in wipa back into Columbia we establishing our presence as it never has been before one of the reasons for that as well is that the federal government says people in your area don't acknowledge you're there well I haven't talked to anybody in our area that doesn't acknowledge we're here but it's getting harder and harder for them to say that we don't exist and that the local community doesn't believe here one of the things that just happened here recently local people might have heard about it if you weren't from the area maybe you have maybe you haven't Station Camp was our Middle Village that was one of our largest Villages down here we have been telling the federal government state government for years the location of Middle Village we've talked about the importance of Middle Village we have repeatedly been told you don't know what you're talking about that wasn't there that was further out there after the dams were put in and the river changed that was washed out Middle Village doesn't even exist anymore they decided to put in a new park to commemorate Louis and Clark which was going to be at Station Camp as they were doing the preliminary digging in the area they dug into the corner of one of our plank houses one of our plank houses that I might add were burnt down by Euro Americans because when they came in we were at one of our other camps they thought it was abandoned so they burnt down a village that consisted of 13 to 14 long houses burnt the entire Village of the ground the plank house that they dug into had been burnt but they knew what they had dug into so they did studies all in the area they came up with different artifacts artifacts different items and then they started negotiating with the Chun up tribe and said we would like to proceed with this we want to work with the tribe we want to honor the tribe we realize that gez maybe you were right maybe you actually do know your own history and this was Middle Village working with six state agencies a couple of federal agencies the tribe came to an agreement to move forward with the new national park at station Again part of that agreement was the park was actually changed from a Louis and Clark park to a chinuk park there was going to be the things that were going to be added to the park were to commemorate the chinuk nation to honor our existence to let people know after what we figure is going to be a splash in history of what's taking place right now on the 200e commemoration that we are still here unfortunately as they move forward with their project they had a private contractor that veered off of the Reed location where digging was going to take place and they dug right through the middle of one of our grave sites it ended up that nine of our ancestors were disturbed by a back hole as a back hole ripped right through them the the nation has worked very hard to honor these people they are our ancestors and they need to be treated with respect excuse me we have properly covered them back up and we are now working to figure out what are we going to do to protect these people going forward the real interesting part to me was some of the comments I got from other agencies as to Jesus maybe we made a mistake maybe the chinuk nation was there well had they listened to us for all these years that we've been telling them the exact same thing we probably would not have our ancestors ripped the pieces by a Backle the way the tribes are perceived amazes me there was a cartoon that was put in a local paper about the remains of our ancestors in this cartoon they had a person standing there with a shovel and he hit bones in the cartoon a guy saying oh jeez just cuz we found a couple of Bones I guess we have to stop the project below the individual was a dog with a bone in his mouth the dog's comment was these bones ain't that old I should have just moved them to me I cannot believe that as Society has moved forward that anyone could be so callous to print a cartoon like that in a paper about mind ancestors that astounds me to this day I can't believe that that newspaper allowed that to happen but we're where we are the chinuk nation is a very proud Nation we're a very proud group of people we know who we are we know where we came from we know where we want to get to which was kind of the purpose of the title of this road to recognition we've been on this road for a long time we aren't giving up on this quest to get our people established again the things we want to do going forward we want to totally Revival our culture we would like to see the days where there was long houses on this River again as we lived in in the past we would like to be able to help the county the state to build an infrastructure of business again in this area that would not only allow our people who have had to leave an opportunity to come home to have jobs here for our youth that are growing up that they would have the ability to know that they have work here that they can stay in their Homeland with their people and not have to leave all of those things require recognition it's one of the things that I always ask of people that I I have yet to find people that know about the chinuk nation have heard about our history that would not like to see us get our recognition back always ask those people the only way we're going to get there is to get the government to acknowledge us if every person would contact their state representatives their Federal representatives and start asking them why are you not dealing with the chinuk nation why are you not granting them their recognition then maybe the federal government would maybe wake up and say hey these people have been there they're still there we need to grant them what they deserve in council meeting that we have we talk about recognition a lot it's obviously one of our main topics it's obviously one of our main goals as we sit in our Council meetings it's always interesting to talk about the news that's going on around world you talk about the wars that we're fighting for terrorism you talked about the countries that were helping to try and establish their own governments to be able to turn the government's back over to the people from their own land so they can govern themselves it's exactly what we're asking for we're not asking for any more or any less than we're providing to countries all over the world I find it interesting that with the 200-year commemoration of Lewis and Clark the amount of chunuk history that involved with the journey involving Lewis and Clark the millions of dollars that have been spent promoting this commemoration not just Nationwide but worldwide there's countries from all over the world that to have people coming here to follow this commemoration to see what's going on to follow the trail they want to walk in Lewis and Clark's footsteps they want to see where the camps were they want to see the different tribes that leis and CLK met up with the same government that is spending all of those dollars still refuses to acknowledge that the chinuk nation is here and deserves to be recognized it's kind of a very abbreviated story of of who we are and how we got to this point here obviously this is something that I could probably stand here for about 2 weeks and talk about it's very near and dear to us to all of our tribal members we want our recognition back we want to be acknowledged as to who we are we want to be able to go to our elders that we have today and say we have won this fight you can now go out in public again and stand up and say I am a chut that's been lacking from our ancestors for a long time I think it's time for that to be put back into place again but I would like to go ahead and open it up to questions if you have a question for Ray please raise your hand I'll bring the microphone around for everybody to hear your question we'll start right here could you please just repeat again the five tribes that make up the nation the clat the catham the wum the wiip and the lower CH I have a question about cultures coming together this is a f ask question if the chinuk people have been recognized as a nation with your own land and so on when when the Euro Americans first really started coming into this country in groups what technologies do you think the chinuk people would have adopted and are those Technologies which ones do you think the chinuk people would have probably further developed as being useful to them the Chinooks were always noted as being very industrious and being able to fine-tune their needs I I truly feel that that the Chinooks would have adopted strengths of any piece to enhance our culture uh carving patters obviously we would have gone from Stone ades ades to modern day technology so I don't think it would have changed our culture any I think we would have just have adapted to make our culture easier as far as land the in the Quest for recognition that Chinooks do want land back the land that we're looking at is owned by either the federal government or the state state of Washington and is on inhabited land I've had questions from mayors of actually these two towns right here saying if you get recognition are you going to come back after these towns it's a real easy answer for me to answer is no we will not go after land that's owned by other people because we do not want to be considered on the same level as what the federal government did does we won't go there how many people are in your nation now what is your population approximately 2500 I have two questions um how many times have you given this lecture and the second one is did you contact the newspaper about that um cartoon and what was their response we did contact the newspaper about the cartoon and asked if they would run a letter to the editor with our response would say agreed to but the only other response we got on that was well yeah the individual does kind of tend to print some things that are a little bit off color but we didn't think anybody would be offended by it on how many times have I given this presentation not very many we had the privilege of uh viewing the pank house at uh CLE and are wondering how the construction of that advanced our cause I think it's good that it's there I think it it does give us another Avenue of people knowing we exist if if people have not had a chance to view the plank house at capap poo which is in Richfield Washington I would highly recommend going there and seeing it it's a it's a wonderful structure it's would be small comparative to what we would have had the carvings that are in there would be more representative of a very large plank house but we wanted to get as much in there as we possibly could to talk about the chinuk story plank houses are are wonderful buildings very functional you could do anything in them the plank houses were one of the first houses that were ever found by tribes or anyone that actually have basements for storage we had storage areas under the floors multiple carvings did you get a chance to hear about the carvings no just just kind of very briefly the carving in the back of a plank house is to honor the owner of the house that's a carving that represents him in the plank house of calap polium mostly he has a belt of cougar cougar skins so he obviously would have been a person of great wealth that was dictated in the in the carving the next pole up has a carving on each side which is the honor the owner's mother and father the N pole up is painted it's it's red and black it has a design on it that's to honor the grandparents of the owner of the house the next poll up is plane it just has some ads marks on it but other than that there's no carvings there's no paint there's no anything from that post forward to the door was actually the area where we had slaves and any tribe that says they did not have slaves is not telling the truth because every tribe did it was very prevalent with all tribes that's the people that did the bulk of the work in the long house they were up front there were several reasons for that one is if an enemy did happen to come into the home they were the first person the enemy met not the family the traditional opening of a plank house is a Circle you have to bend down to come into a chin plank house the reason for that is there's actually a couple reasons one is as you're bending down to enter the home you're actually paying respect to the house you're bowing to the house the other is where they're small and you have to come in bend over one you're exposing the back of your neck NE so if you are coming in with hostile intentions you're very vulnerable and the fact it's small enough that when you're coming in it's very hard to have a weapon ready to come through the door so one of the things I with the plank house that actually concerned the tribe when they entered into negotiations with us to have us help them build the plank house this is we're going to have it athentic we want it the way it was well obviously the role of bleachers that they put in for having classes was not traditional the exit sign was not traditional I thought it was very interesting that the grand opening of the plank house they made us put in a second door right alongside of our traditional open they said people would not use our traditional opening and it also doesn't count as a door as far as the federal government concern so they made us put another door in right alongside of it there was probably in that first two days of the opening of the plank house there was probably 6 to 700 people came in and out of the plank house while I was there I saw two people use the record door obviously people were able to figure out that that was the entrance to the house long question your answer answer your question okay we have time I think for one more question R yeah as I looked at the maps a while ago showing the land as it existed when LS Park came West had a whole expansive area and how it was developed on both sides of the rivers by individuals and corporations I think the nation still owns owns the river and you guys wanted to be into trade tax it it's coming up and down the river all the time we we pretty much controlled that trade and both sides of the river like I say if you go into the historic documents that document where the chinuk nation was as far as we're concern still is would be up the river on both sides up to like say salila Falls and in South the seaside North to V's Harbor but trade was the whole emphasis of trying to take that off all right let's thank Ray Vice chairman of the ch ch thank you Ray for coming in and sharing your story your history and culture with us e