Smoke Signals
Tribal Elder A Leader And A Legendary Rebel
4 FEBRUARY 1, 2005
DEAN continued
from page 1
Editors' Note: Smoke
Sicjnals presents this extended
Elder Feature of Dean Merrier,
over the years one of Grand
Ronde B most colorful, influential
and outspoken Elders. We have
let Dean use his own language to
tell about his life and beliefs, and
while on one hand we caution our
readers that when it comes to
language, Dean has developed a
style of his own, we also believe
strongly that this language and
these experiences are invaluable
windows to our past. It has been
almost a year in the works. Let us
know what you think.
cover back on so the heat was up
but on the outside, when Hube
came back in, it still looked like it
was set on "low."
"Gram and Hubert loved to watch
wrestling," said Christina. "Re
member when we used to try to
trick them and say that wrestling
was not on tonight, so we could
watch a movie?"
Then Hubert would come over
and ask why they weren't watch
ing wrestling, and Christina would
say that it's not on, and Hubert
would say, "It's on on my TV."
And then, the story circled around
to include Tribal member Toby
McClary, also a Mercier and a
Smoke Signals staffer, who had
been over earlier in the day to take
photographs for this story, and tape
It is a sometimes swashbuckling
story of great successes and pain
ful setbacks, of life fully lived in a
world that Dean took on with a fa
mous stubborn streak that once re
sulted in a dentist pulling the
wrong tooth or Dean telling his dad
to hold on to the headboard while
he used brute force to pull a pain
ful catheter out of his father's body
- all set against the backdrop of
Tribes being yanked back and forth
by a federal government that
looked on its legal obligations to
Indians as matters of political ex
pediency, in a rural outpost more
or less on its own as a social entity.
He comes out of times when the
whole village really did raise the
children. "The Merciers were a big
family," said Dean's daughter,
make a symphony out of everyday
swear words and call out the
"Bhagwan wannabees" on the
Tribal Council at a moment's notice,
a man with a 70-plus year history
in town, and the battle scars to
prove it.
Dean Mercier has been a tough
guy his whole life.
Still, when cousin Jeff said that
he needed to be in the company of
Merciers that day, and among doz
ens of Merciers in town, he had cho
sen Dean's place, Dean's face
melted. Not a lot. Just enough to
see.
In the company of a Mercier.
This tradition of welcome is as old
as Indians and you see it or hear it
from one end of Grand Ronde to the
other. It's a point of pride. It goes
without saying.
"In the old days," said Jeff, in the
middle of reminiscences, "your mom
always had cinnamon apples cool
ing or something. I remember, but
I was just a little guy, five or six
years old, bringing dishes back and
forth."
Dean remembered the family's
radios and televisions in the same
context. Velma (Hudson Mercier,
Dean's mom) would cook for every
body when they came over to
watch." Mom. She loved to cook."
This day, Christina carried on the
tradition with food and drink for all
who enter. And Dean drove home
the point that it's an insult to turn
down an offering.
Then the conversation went to the
radio in the house, back in the day.
"The radio was one year younger
than me," said Dean.
"1931," he said.
They talked about the Sparkle oil
heater, Jeff saying how "Hube
(Tribal Elder Hubert Mercier,
Dean's uncle, who also had his
place in a rocker in Dean's and
Christina's living room) would keep
the heat down, and Gram would ask
Dean to turn the heat up," so Dean
would ask, "Where's Hubert?" and
somebody would say, "Outside," so
Dean would say, "OK, I'll come
over." With Hubert outside, Dean
would come over, take the cover off
and set the dial up, then put the
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nine, 10, 11. I was doing chores
when I was big enough to walk.
The damn old chickens," he said. "I
hated those chickens then, but they
showed me responsibility."
He drove a truck when he was
10, he said, working for his dad,
Harold Mercier, who always wore
a red hat, and uncle Hubert, now
93, who were partners in the log
ging business.
When Dean Mercier was a child,
he suffered with polio for a num
ber of years, though it never
crippled him in any physical way.
"A lot of people around that time
had it," he said. "It took around four
or five years getting over it."
But it opened the door to Dean's
famous temper. "A county nurse
took me in front of the class. She
was trying to take
credit for helping
me. I told her it was
B.S. I almost got
kicked out of that
class. I never took
bull shit from any
one." Even his aunt
Eula (Hudson Pe
tite) got her march
ing orders one day
when she was teach
ing a class Dean was
in. "She thumped
me on the head," he
said.
Somebody was
throwing spitballs at
her, he said, but
Dean wouldn't tell
who did it, which is
why he got
thumped.
Outspoken
TribalElderand
former Chairman Dean
Mercier has a lot to say
about the past, present
and future of the Grand
Ronde Tribe.
The front ofDean's
Running Bear dory with
the logo created by
Tribal Oder Allen
George. Pictured on
the boat is Dean's
grandson Doug Colt on.
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the conversation for the Tribal
record. His mom would drop in
later. Joann Mercier along with
her sister, Marion Mercier,
"adopted" Dean as a father after
their own father, Marion Mercier,
passed on.
McClary was remembered for the
time he got caught in the middle of
a professional wrestling match, one
that had exploded out into the au
dience. McClary, then 11 or 12, as
Jeff remembered it, had gone for
the popcorn but suddenly found
himself between two wrestling gi
ants about to pummel each other
to within an inch of their sorry
lives.
Dean's story is one of family in
good times and bad. It is a story of
community, in good times and bad.
Tribal member Jackie Whisler, a
Tribal pre-school Native language
specialist. "We had gatherings
where we were together a lot, and
no matter where you were or who
was around, if an Elder told you to
do something, you did it. Every
body took care of everybody's kids.
It was understood. It was a way to
feel really safe, too."
And it worked both ways.
"Dean took care of his parents
until the day they died," said Chris
tine. "I never could have taken care of
them without Chris," said Dean.
Dean Mercier remembered much
of his childhood through his work.
He was on the case since before he
hit double digits. "We started work
ing in the woods when we were
"I got mad and
went home," he
said. "Dad came in
and I really
hammed it up. He
went and told Eula,
'You don't want to
be thumping my
boy like that."'
Dean had a
younger sister,
Beverly Ann, with
Down Syndrome.
As a result, he said,
he'd always had a
compassionate
streak. He felt pro
tective of his sister and others.
In his early years, the local grade
school in concert with the Fairview
State Hospital, decided it would be
educational to take the kids to
Fairview, to get to know some of the
kids there.
Dean had become friends with a
boy named, Willie, at Fairview.
Willie had a disease that caused his
head to grow out of proportion to
his body. It was so large that he
needed supports to hold it up.
Dean turned up at Fairview one
time at a moment when Willie was
crying from the teasing and bully
ing of others in the room.
"He was as intelligent as anybody
See DEAN
on page 5