[or-roots] Aunt Charotte's book

[Steve & Ronda Howard]

Hi all,
I'm having a hard time figuring out what is so hurtful.  I think to most people a Brave was an Indian man who hunted and provided for his family, a Squaw was an Indian woman who gathered food for her family, a Papoose was a baby on a board on their Mother's backs.  I see no disrespect here.  I can see how some over generations could change the meanings of these words to be something hurtful.  Two generations ago our society was very different.  My Grandmother's Grandmother was full blood Mohawk Indian.  My Grandmother never breathed a word about it her entire life.  Her sister only said something about it when she was nearing 100 years old.  Our society didn't value those of different colors.  I however feel differently.  I have taught my kids that it doesn't matter what color someone's skin is, inside we all have the same red blood.  We are all people.  It doesn't matter what color the skin is, there are wonderful and evil men and women of every color.  I suspect it is the "bad guys" in every color category that change perception and word meanings.  Hopefully those who are taking offense can realize that many of us have much more respectable meanings attached to these words.

I attended a DNA seminar a few months ago.  One of the things that was interesting was that all human DNA was 99% the same.  All of our differences was in 1% of our DNA.

By the way, Walt's picture takes up very little room.  He found some way to make it very small.  There were a bunch of posts around 6 months ago on how to do this. It will be in the archives.
Ronda
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: DAVIESW739 at aol.com 
  To: or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us 
  Sent: Friday, February 11, 2005 11:05 PM
  Subject: [or-roots] Aunt Charotte's book


  Both of these boys stayed with us a great deal. One, whom we called Jack, hung around so persistently that Mother told him that he must stay away or else be washed and dressed decently and keep away from the Indian camps. So Jack came to live with us. He lived with us till he was a grown man. He was just a "Siwash" but a kindly, honest, gentle-souled fellow, with the Siwash mentality and the Siwash indolence.

    Siwash in Chinook means Indian, but we came to use it to differentiate between the coast Indians and the higher type from the interior.

    The coast Indians were peace-loving, indolent and sickly. They were not warriors and were even indifferent hunters, frequenting the clam beds where a living was easy. The squaws gathered nuts and berries and canas. Canas is a kind of lily bulb like an onion. They roasted it in pits and stored it away for winter use. I used to rather like it.

    Our Indians were not thrifty and they never seemed to take a lesson from the lean years. Their meager stores were always pitifully small and the winter usually found them starving. At such times they could be hired to work, but they were at best, indifferent helpers.Jack was a true Siwash, but he belonged to us and of course, always had enough to eat and wear.

    When he came to us, he wore an old blue soldiers cap. It sat well up from his head. One day Father noticed that it sat rather too high to look natural. He lifted it from Jack's head and an avalanche of salt poured down over his shoulders and spread around his feet. He had taken it from our storehouse and was on his way to his old, blind Mother's teepee.

    Father scolded him, and told him that he would  "Punish him severely if such a thing ever happened again." He made it quite clear that taking without asking was stealing. Father also made it clear to Jack that if he wanted anything for his Mother he was to ask for it, and if it were possible she could have it.

    Many a sack of meal, and other things were carried to the old, blind squaw, and never, to my knowledge, did the boy again touch a thing that was not strictly his own, and I kept track of him even after he had married and gone to live on the reservation with his own people.  He died quite young. Tuberculosis by that time was among them and was taking a heavy toll. The tribe to which Jack belonged, is almost, if not quite extinct.

    The Indians who camped near us were called, Yamhills. I do not know the origin of the name. They were friendly and very good to me. I spent a great deal of time at there camp and learned to speak the Chinook jargon with a fluency that in consideration of my dark eyes and skin, was not altogether flattering to my family.

    I have never forgotten it, few of the Indians that are now living, can even speak it. Now and then I meet one, who is very old, and the words come to me as readily as they did when I was a child. The true Indian accent with which I spoke it, always seems to mystify them.The Indians have a certain native delicacy and they would hesitate to question, but once or twice I've had them ask "Mika sitcom Siwash?" (are you half Indian) and my answer, "Wake" (no), causes them to glance at me skeptically. An embarrassed Indian always has immediate and pressing business elsewhere.



  Walt Davies
  Cooper Hollow Farm
  Monmouth, OR 97361
  503 623-0460 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://omls.oregon.gov/pipermail/or-roots/attachments/20050212/91528c5a/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 2892 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://omls.oregon.gov/pipermail/or-roots/attachments/20050212/91528c5a/attachment.jpe>