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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (May 1, 2024)
E Coosh EEWA: The way it is Letters to the editor Elders movie nights Tuesdays The Elders Movie Night of the tribes’ Seniors pro- gram is on Tuesday eve- nings. Pick-ups start at 3 p.m. If you would like to at- tend, please call the Senior Wellness building at 541-553- 3313. Assistance VeggieRX is a free pro- duce prescription program for individuals experiencing food insecurity and diet-re- lated medical issues. Eligible participants are provided ten weeks of produce shares, one-on-one coach- ing, and nutrition education resources. Eligibility for en- rollment: Must be 18 years of age or older, and experiencing food insecurity. A commit- ment of ten weeks; and re- ceive a referral from a health care provider, includ- ing dietician, physician or nurse practioner. Send your referral to Kelly Moffatt, VeggieRX senior manager, High Desert Food and Farm Al- liance at 541-310-3111. Or email: kelly@hhdffa.org For more information see: hdffa.org/veggierx Good steelhead news this spring Fishers in the Pacific Northwest have reason for optimism after biologists re- corded the best return of sea- run rainbow trout to the Up- per Willamette Basin in two decades. The news comes just seven years after fishery managers counted the lowest run ever on the Willamette, with roughly 820 fish returning to spawn in 2017. Reports from earlier this month say that some 7,700 steelhead climbed a fish lad- der at the Willamette Falls near Oregon City this year, and that number has most likely grown since then. When steelhead runs reached an all-time low in 2017, with just 822 fish climbing the ladder at the falls in Oregon City, conser- vationists and biologists were worried that the spe- cies could become extinct from the Upper Willamette Basin altogether. Concerns grew from there after a herd of sea li- ons began targeting and preying on the fish as they gathered to migrate across the ladder. Forty-six sea li- ons were killed in 2018 to help the struggling fish re- bound. An Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife official said the federally-sanctioned sea lion culling program likely played a role in help- ing steelhead numbers bounce back to current lev- els. Museum permanent collection The Museum at Warm SpringsBoard of Directors last year discussed the re- newal of the Per manent Exhibit. The collecton has not been upgraded since the museum opened 31 years, ago in 1993. Now is time to begin fo- cusing on the exhibit, which remains the most popular at- traction for visitors, and is an important way that the Warm Springs people tell At the Cherry Festival Parade Page 4 Spilyay Tymoo May 1, 2024 Great success and services at April W.S. pet clinic T he First Nations Vet- erinary, Fences for Fido, Warm Springs Fire and Safety and volunteers in April combined to provide veterinarian services to many pet owners in Warm Springs. In all, 117 animals were spayed or neutered; 234 vaccines were distributed; and 1,404 doses of flea and tick treatments given to community member pets. This will last the animals for the rest of the year. The clinic team also pro- vided microchips for any family who requested them. This opportunity was a collaborative effort. Volun- teers who donated their valuable time and expertise included Pinky Beymer, Darnell Gorrosquieta and Aurolyn Stwyer. June clinic The next Warm Springs Spay and Neuter clinics will their story to the world. Now that our Thirtieth Anniversary year is over, we need to start planning for a new phase in the life of our museum that will include much-needed upgrades to our aging infrastructure and renewal of our Permanent Exhibit. Museum operations man- ager Sunmiet Maben has been appointed project man- ager of the Permanent Ex- hibit renewal project. Sunmiet managed the en- tirety of the museum’s new HVAC system installation. This was a complex project involving many moving parts, including fundraising, budgeting and invoicing; working with contractors and suppliers and, finally, to successfully overseeing the installation. A Permanent Exhibition Community Committee com- prised of board of directors and tribal members is now in place. The committee so far First Nations Veterinary The First Nations team and volunteers at April clinic. be on Saturday and Sunday, June 1 and 2. First Nations Veterinary, Fences for Fido, Greater Good Charities and the Bissell Pet Foundation will host the clinics at the Warm Springs Fire Agency. Free services include spay and neuter, vaccines, micro- chip, and f lea and tick preventatives. Registration is required any of three ways: Call 503-451-0765. Or go to: firstnationsvet.com/ warm-springs-nation Or point you phone cam- era at the square image in the flyer notice to open the reg- istration page. includes Ruth ‘Pinky’ Beymer, Olney Patt, Jr., Donald J. Stastny and Rain Circle. We will be bringing in more people in the future, especially elders, so there will be a strong sense of continuity, of staying true to the exhibit’s content and to what our elders did before us, what they continue to teach us, and what we need to carry into the future. We are in the process of talking with potential exhibit designers, looking at other museums to see what the trends are in terms of de- sign, technology, lighting, tone, colors and the list goes on. The museum will also be conducting surveys—a se- lection of focus questions, strategically placed through- out the Permanent Exhibit. We will ask that visitors take some time and complete these surveys for us so we can also get their ideas and opinions about the exhibit. The estimate for renewal of the Permanent Exhibit is approximately $1-2 million. Waiting for the vet... The museum received a $90,000 scoping and assess- ment grant for phase 1 of this project from Visit Cen- Some history and comments on the story of our tribal leadership by Rain Circle Courtesy photo The 2024 Wasco County Fair and Rodeo Queen Audriyona Gilbert, 15, also just won First Place in the Cherry Festival Parade in the Dalles. Spilyay Tymoo (Coyote News, Est. 1976) Publisher Emeritus in Memorium: Sid Miller Editor: Dave McMechan Spilyay Tymoo is published bi-weekly by the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. Our offices are located at 4174 Highway 3 in Warm Springs. Any written materials submitted to Spilyay Tymoo should be addressed to: Spilyay Tymoo, P.O. Box 489, Warm Springs, OR 97761. Phone: 541-553-2210 or 541-771-7521 E-Mail: david.mcmechan@wstribes.org. Annual Subscription rates: Within U.S.: $20.00 It’ukdi Wigwa, My Name is Rain Circle and it recently occurred to me that I am surprised at watch- ing people learn something, for the first time, informa- tion I have known for de- cades. Almost as immediately I realized that it shouldn’t be so ‘strange’ because, at on point I had to learn it for the first time too. Now, I am by no means presenting myself as some kind of Wasq’u Ishtamx expert but I am cer- tain there are a lot of other tribal members who would like to know some of the things I learned about Wasco Chief history. This article is meant to be informational not persuasive. I just want to share what I have learned about leadership and the Wasco Chief selection, then get more information to add to this, if you wish to give it. Recently the Wasco’s (Wasq’u idelxam) have had the dilemma of how to best choose their new Wasco Chief. I want to share what I have learned over my time on the Warm Springs Reser- vation, as Wasco tribal mem- ber, from oral histories, docu- ments available at Culture and Heritage, and the Internet. For the purpose of this article I will define ‘leader- ship’ as: “The process of influenc- ing people by providing them with purpose, direction, and motivation while you are op- erating to accomplish a task(s) and improve the organiza- tion.” Wasq’u Chiefs The Wasco had a three to four class system: The Chiefly classes and rich, common peoples, and slaves. The slaves were at the bottom of the system, and a big notch above them were the com- moners. Above those people were the rich and the Chiefly classes, could have been con- sidered another class. This class system and the common practice of keeping slaves were typical of the Northwest Coast. Native Americans in the Historical Record - John Day Fossil Beds National Monument (U.S. National Park Service. In the Kiksht language we can hear this classification in some prefixes for words. The prefix ‘Wi-’ and ‘Wa-’ at the beginning of words denotes importance or reverence. Good examples of this are the words ‘Wanaqsh’ which means ‘mother’ and ‘Winamsh,’ meaning ‘father.’ If we add those prefixes to ‘ik’ashkash,’ meaning ‘boy’ and ‘ak’ashkash, meaning ‘girl,’ we get ‘Wik’ashkash’ and ‘Wak’ashkash,’ and we know that those children are the children of important people in the tribe. That was a quick version of Wasco leadership and hi- erarchy prior to the Treaty of 1855, which only had the Warm Springs and Wasco in mind, after which many changes took place. Prior to the treaty, Wasco people had freedoms over their village sites, territories, economies, social and cultural norms, and ways of living. Families had the right to pass on knowledge and customs the way they saw best, in accor- dance with their indigenous history, but after the signing much was dictated to them by the U.S. government. The relocation from a home that had a river life of lush forest with ample water and quick travel by canoe eventually became the arid high desert environment we know today where permis- sion was required, from the federal government, to ac- cess traditional foods that were on lands and waterways that now belonged to the set- tling colonists. We can hear the effects of this life changing event in our language, such as ‘Aixtba Wigwa’ and ‘Makwshtba Wigwa’ are the words for Monday and Tuesday in Kiksht. In English Monday means ‘The moon’s day’ (from the Anglo-Saxon word Mônand’g) and Tuesday means ‘Tiw’s day’ and refers to an old Proto-Germanic god in Old Norse language. In Kiksht, Aixtba Wigwa roughly means ‘on day one’ and Makwshtba Wigwa, ‘day two.’ One can conclude dur- ing our assimilation that our ancestors organized their days around an Anglo-European schedule and instituted their own words. This subjugation is well seen in the word ‘igimak,’ which is a word for Saturday. From the Kiksht Dictionary - “i-gimak [n] gift, giving away, rations, Saturday Examples: Saturday is called by this name because it was the day when rations were given out.’ In the Kiksht ‘igiwaq’ means meat. In less than fifteen years after the treaty, with the ‘peace policy’ of 1869, the U.S. Indian boarding school policy was implemented and the cultural genocide of our people began. (Continues on page 9)
