RED ROCK, Okla. – For more than a century the Otoe-Missouria people have been gathering the third week of July to dance, laugh, sing, cook, eat, pray, remember and celebrate their Otoe-Missouria ways.
For many tribal members, the gathering held July 15-18 calls them home to Red Rock to catch up with old friends and distant family.
Encampment Committee Chairman Hank Childs says that the most important part of the four day event is the people.
“I was told years ago that this encampment is the one time when the most Otoe people are located in one place,” Childs says. “It’s the time when we get together to enjoy the fellowship of each other. People plan their vacations to come home that weekend to be with family—to meet new nieces and nephews. I want to invite everyone to come home, dance and enjoy themselves.”
While the young people come to create new memories, the older ones treat their stories as cherished regalia. Each year they gently carry them to encampment carefully displaying them for those that show an interest.
If you ask an Otoe-Missouria elder, they will tell you about the camp crier. Every year at encampment the crier would walk amongst the camps and the people, telling of the day’s events and calling people to the arena in the old language.
“I remember,” Childs says. “I remember the crier that used to be there. If he knew your Indian name he would talk a little bit about you. The last man that did that – that had the right to do it, passed away before he could pass on the responsibility to his family.”
That is the way with so many traditions. They get lost over the years before they could be passed on correctly. And passing it on correctly and respecting the tradition is what matters most.
For his part, Childs was schooled on the ways of the Otoe-Missouria encampment by elders who wanted to ensure that practices and traditions were carried out. Today, he is the elder who must pass on the customs of his people to the next generation.
“I was taught by four older men,” Childs says. “They pulled me aside and taught me this is our way, our Otoe ways. Now those four men are gone and I have to remember what they told me. When I picked my committee I had to share those ways with the committee members. That’s why I picked older men who were more experienced in powwows and then two younger men who can take it on. I hope one day they will say ‘Hey, I think we can do this.’”
Being the caretaker of a people’s traditions can be a burden at times. Childs says that his teachers prepared him for the responsibility. They told him there would be times when he would have to be strong to help his people.
“In my time (as encampment committee chairman), I sometimes see things that are sad,” Childs says. “You feel the sadness. At the mourners dinner there are families that are mourning the loss of someone who was there with them last year at encampment. People are in pain. It is very sad. I was told I would see that and they (his teacher) were right.”
Childs says that as the days unfold, he is so filled with joy that those moments are the reward for him and the other members of the encampment committee who donated most of their free time in the last year to making the encampment a success. A wide range of events are scheduled for the four day encampment this year including art contests, games, turtle races, a horseshoe tournament, arts & craft vendors, dances and a 5K.
“Thursday night is for the young people,” Childs says. “Little girls get plumed and the little boys get their roach. This allows them to dance in the arena. To see the pride on their faces and the faces of their families – it is enough.”
Friday, Saturday and Sunday is Grand Entry. This is the time is when all the tribal members enter the arena. They dance as one, to one heartbeat echoing in the beat of the drum. The ribbon work and steps of the dancers recall those of their ancestors passed down from one generation to the next.
“Don’t forget what your parents and grandparents have taught you,” Childs says. “Come back. Dance. Meet your family. They say that when you dance in the arena that sometimes you will be walking in your parents and grandparents footsteps – that your foot will fall where theirs did. I think about that sometimes when I dance.”
Although the time of the camp crier may have ended, today it is the anticipation of joining their fellow Otoe-Missouria people in four days of celebration that draws the people home.
“This is something that we all look forward to,” Childs says. “It is handed down to us through all these years and we try to keep it our way. Sometimes you go to different powwows and see how other tribes do it and you wonder why Otoes do it differently. We do it our way. We do it the Otoe way.”
Come home Jiwere Nutache, come home.