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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 1, 2003)
6 AUGUST 1, 2003 Smoke Signals " -If A " A J 1-v"i it ' " -., w if 1 ftMiiiii Vmm i ruli. niV 1 in... ii flWlwftiw, ...ttww it frf nf n Marce Norwest Leads Veterans' Pow-wow For The Last Time Tribal member and Navy Veteran Gene LaBonte and his wife Billie will take over now. Mlb tfte mvjffl mm Htm tu&& miMwm Vfe By Ron Karten Together, Tribal Elder Marce Norwest and his wife, Sharon, built the Grand Ronde Veterans' Pow-wow from a dream. He did the groundwork and she did the books. Ten years ago, the event included about 10 vendors and maybe 300-400 people, said Norwest. This year marked the 11th annual of the event (though there were some less formal Veterans' Pow-wows going back to the 1980s), said Norwest, and it drew more than 30 vendors and Norwest esti mated as many as 2,500. At a compli mentary dinner Saturday afternoon, the Tribe fed about 1,000, according to Tribal member Betty Lambert, who was helping the cook, her sister, Tribal member Carol Nelson. At the end of this year's event, the Norwests passed the leadership responsibilities on to Tribal member Gene LaBonte and his wife, Billie. They handed over a Veterans' Pow-wow that has become an institution in Grand Ronde. "I want to take a rest for my wife, to be with her, even though she works as hard as I do," said Norwest, who carried a hammer across the pow-wow grounds as final preparations were un derway. "We're a little late getting the bleach ers in," he said, and with a power gen erator humming behind him and among dozens of people in various stages of work and talk, he asked a vendor how much space he needed. "Sixteen feet." He marked off a line in the dirt with the edge of his shoe. "OK," he said, "here's 20 feet." This pow-wow included grass dancers, who traditionally come out first to trample the grass down, ac cording to Norwest, and chase away snakes. "The older Elders like myself still have the traditional ways and have the culture," said Norwest. "Since termi nation, we have lost a lot of ground with the young .ones Now, we're teaching the young ones so they'll know." The round dance, hoop dance, jingle dress dance and butterfly dance were among the fancy and traditional dances of the weekend. Indians and Veterans from Tribes all over the United States come together for each year's event. Dancing in the owl dance was Tribal member Tonya Heslet, wanting to learn more about her roots. Heslet, raised in Kansas and now enrolled at Hunter College in New York City. Sponsored by the Northwest Indians Veterans Association (NIVA) with funds from the Tribe, this year's Vet- erans' Pow-wow offered more than the usual attractions. At any time, you could look over at the newly dedicated West Valley Veterans' Memorial and see people there looking for names on the black carved monoliths. "To me," said Norwest, "there is no one greater than another. We honor Veterans who paid a price and those fighting now and their families and kids." The Veterans' Color Guard intro duced the event each day and retired the flags after each session. "We're the last ones to leave," said Norwest. "It took two hours to do the grand entry Saturday morning," he added. "There must have been 140-150 Vet erans." Eighty three-year-old Art "Chief Shilo (Yakama), wearing a P.O.W. jacket, was attending his third Veter ans' Pow-wow here in Grand Ronde. As a ball turret gunner in the Army Air Corps, precursor to the Air Force, Shilo's plane was taken down during World War II on his first mission, somewhere between England and Remy, France. "Flak knocked us out," he said. Shilo was one of three survivors of a 10-man crew, and spent the next 18 months in Stalag 17B in Krems, Aus tria. He was a P.O.W. for nearly two years altogether. "We had roll call night or day. We'd stand for hours. We were hungry most of the time. We received a few Red Cross parcels, but a parcel for one would be divided to five or six people." Tribal member and Little Miss Grand Ronde Victoria Rios, 8, sat on a cement divider in the parking lot of the Social Services modulars as the line for dinner extended from the Commu nity Center doors out across the park ing lot. "I'm tired," Rios said. A pow-wow dancer since she was six, Rios had al ready partici pated this year in tiny tots, fancy shawl and three inter Tribal dances. "What's exciting to me is I have a lot of fun, I get to represent my place, and certainly, I get to dance." Preparations for this and the other summer events included a landscap ing improvement project. The grounds crew "hauled in 2,500 yards of fill dirt, dressed it with fine river sand, put in an underground sprinkler system. We hydro-seeded, and then we all crossed our fingers," said Eric Scott, the Tribal Engineer, who organized the effort. Gene and Billie LaBonte led an ef fort that raised $500 as a spur-of-the-moment send-off for the Norwests, who had not previously announced their re tirement. "I look for a lot of direction and I'll be begging for a lot of help," said Gene LaBonte of his new responsibilities. "Marce is going to be here. I'll be try ing to learn what all he's learned over the next couple of years. I'm not go ing to try to improve on it. How can you improve on what's already well done?" Asked what accounts for his suc cess, Norwest had one word: "Believ ing." "It is work, believe me," said Norwest, "but I wouldn't do it if I didn't enjoy it." 1 if I Gene & Billie LaBonte mil e jt . t Mm u , 1 ' .4. Of" , ' til I - 1 Veterans Color Guard 1 1 I II I " Deitrich Peters, Monte Herron . '; !.. w . ... ... In- - K. i,: I ml . i;.:':,f' .. ; ra ; - - Traditional Housing 2 f 1m A Q
