Canku Ota

(Many Paths)

An Online Newsletter Celebrating Native America

May 22, 2004 - Issue 113

Students Play, Learn at Annual River Honoring

by John Stromnes of the Missoulian

Likely only at a game of double-ball during this year's Flathead River Honoring.

Of course, there were some serious moments at the event, hosted each May along the banks of the lower Flathead River by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.

The first such River Honoring was held in 1986. It was organized by Clarence Woodcock, former director of the Salish-Pend d'Oreille Culture Committee in St. Ignatius, to bring attention to the river's importance within the tribal culture.

For the last several years, the tribal Natural Resources Department has put on the event, and it has expanded almost every year in the variety of its offerings.

The student-teacher-stick activity occurred during a game of double-ball, a traditional tribal competition that resembles both hockey and soccer. Other games included "shinny," a traditional tribal game resembling field hockey, and the fire-hose relay, a nontraditional game in which girls competed against boys to run from a wildland fire truck to the end of a fire hose, turn on the nozzle full blast, spray a target and run back to the truck.

The River Honoring is a way to introduce elementary students to one of the wonders of the Flathead Reservation - the river itself - and the importance tribal people pay to water quality and environmental conservation on their reservation homeland.

About 1,000 fourth- and fifth-graders from eight public schools on the Flathead Reservation attended the event Wednesday and Thursday, said this year's River Honoring coordinator Germaine White of the tribal Natural Resources Department.

After beating a pony-hide drum and singing an ancient tribal song or two, Pend d'Oreille elder Stephen Small Salmon stepped in front of a campfire above the riverbank and told a fourth-grade class from Charlo:

"Today we honor that river. If we didn't have no water, there wouldn't be no life, you know," he said. With this combination of good sense and informal English, he immediately engaged the students' attention. They edged forward a little toward the fire, feeling more confident that this odd-looking man with long black hair and a big cowboy hat had something important to share.

"Every year we come down here and tell people our stories," he said. "We used to have frogs and porcupines. We used to fish here, hunt in the mountains, stay a couple of months," he said.

Now, the river water is not safe to drink, he said, fish are scarcer, as are porcupines and frogs.

This year, workshops and activities included demonstrations of erosion, and a presentation on tobacco use, plus more than a dozen other presentations. Students in each class walked from tepee to tepee to attend the workshops and events.

Three people - tribal cultural leaders Inez Vanderburg and Harriet Whitworth, both of Valley Creek, and Dixon teacher David Clark - were given special recognition for their efforts in protecting the Flathead River as a cultural and environmental resource, during a barbecue at Tuesday evening's opening ceremonies.

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