The high school at Gold River is a unique place. For a school of just under 90 students, it’s been the site of great effort to build bridges of mutual understanding and respect between peoples.
Gold River, remote by some standards, sits near the terminus of the Muchalaht Inlet on Vancouver Island and only five kilometres from the First Nations community of Tsaxana.
Tsaxana is where the Mowachaht/Muchalaht peoples were relocated to in the 1990s, after industrial pollutions made their reserve at Ahaminaquus, nine miles downriver from the townsite, uninhabitable.
Before the relocation, said retired high school principal Arlene Fehr, the people of the town and the people of Ahaminaquus would share recreational facilities. They played ball together and developed relationships, but the move to Tsaxana, while only five kilometres away over a small bridge, seemed to strain those bonds somehow.
Fehr said she and her husband have worked hard over the years to keep the communities connected, and her efforts at the school have been focused on inclusiveness.
It started with 20 people, she said,—10 from Tsaxana and 10 from Gold River—and they talked a lot to get the communities together again. And the first step at Gold River Secondary School was the construction of the school sign in the communities’ two languages.
At the school, Fehr found a knowledgeable, steadfast and patient partner in Nuu-chah-nulth Education Worker Marg Amos. Over the years at the school, they have worked on many projects together, drawing in the communities and all of the students.
The school has learned to organize and host a potlatch. The students have designed and made their own regalia, learned Nuu-chah-nulth dances, painted a thliitsapilthim (ceremonial curtain), and put on a play written by late George Clutesi about Nuu-chah-nulth life before contact.
It was a particularly proud day on Nov. 6 at Gold River Secondary School as the school unveiled its latest effort—a 10 foot, four-figured, yellow cedar chii-nulth (totem pole). The school gymnasium was filled with elders and students, Mowachaht/Muchalaht people and town's folk for the event. They brought food for the celebration of the culmination of a plan that was five years in the making, though the seed of the idea was sown 22 years before.
When Amos was hired as a NEW almost 22 years ago, she was asked in her interview about how she would proceed on a challenge to get a cii-nulth at the school, so she remembered that time as she sat with Ha-Shilth-Sa to talk about the accomplishment.
During the last five years, the challenge of the chii-nulth was about overcoming some obstacles. For example, the first time they attempted a chii-nulth, they got the logs to the carving site, but someone over the weekend came by and cut them up for firewood.
And getting the right carvers was a concern. The students had to be involved with the pole in some way, insisted Fehr, and some carvers didn’t want the students to touch their work.
Then there was considerable effort involved in bringing the community to consensus through consultation on the chii-nulth.
“Aboriginal culture is very unique,” said Amos. “You have to have that support of the community, with the elders, with the Ha’wiih (hereditary leadership), with the full community to be on board. And they all have to know what is going to happen, what it’s for, why you are doing it.” And if discussions are not going well, you keep meeting and talk until disagreement is ironed out.
So Amos did a lot of visiting, talking to the elders over and over. She also talked with students to see what they thought about having a chii-nulth at the school.
One of the stumbling blocks, said Amos, was that totem poles in this area are really only for big Ha’wiih who had longhouses. The protocols around culture are very strict, she said. So the first issue to be resolved was why the school needed a chii-nulth at all.
Then discussions were held about the figures that would be carved on the pole. There was a lot of talk about chieftainship symbols and which belonged to each clan. It was decided that the pole should represent what students would see in their own territory, so the discussions became focused on the history of Gold River and the resources found there.
“I think the land, sea and air reflect all the things our students do when they leave our school,” said Fehr. “All their different careers are all reflected in the totem.”
On the top is the ?awatin (eagle) and in its claws is a hiisit (sockeye). Then there is a kakawin (killer whale). In this community there was a famous whale named Tsu'xiit (Luna). Late Tyee Ha-wilth Ambrose Maquinna said he would come back as a kakawin.
The bear, which plays a big part in potlatches, was put on the pole. It represents strength, and a sockeye is within its reach and represents the bounty of the Gold River. “We never forget how important it is to protect the fish,” Amos told the school assembly.
A sea serpent is on the back of the pole. It tells a story about shared power.
Student Involvement
Student Justin Blondeau was washing up the dishes after the lunchtime feast at the school when we talked to him about the chii-nulth. He likes to help out when he can. When he leaves school, he wants to be a fisherman, “Cause, I find it pretty nice, actually.”
He was part of the painting crew, and worked on parts of the bear and the killer whale. He feels happy to see the chii-nulth up now. His instruction from the carvers was to paint it three times. “It looks pretty nice. It’s our type of art,” Blondeau said.
Grade 9 student Brooke Johnson was involved in the painting as well. The bear was her favorite part. She helped to paint it. She said she likes the word for bear in Nuu-chah-nulth— chums in that dialect—and the way people say it, she told Ha-Shilth-Sa.
She said working on the pole was special to her “because I could tell my cousins that I helped paint the totem pole.”
Amos said the students were very excited about the pole. “I had a comment from a student from Grade 11. He said ‘In 20 years, if I become a father and have children, I’ll be able to say I was here when that was put up. I’ll be able to tell my kids this is what it is; this is what it means’.”
The many projects undertaken by Gold River Secondary School have changed minds and views, opinions and perspectives, said Amos, and they've created an atmosphere of respect for other cultures and “learning to listen with an open ear and your opinion in how you can grow with other cultures.
“That’s so important to pass on.”
Carving a yellow cedar chii-nulth
Larry Andrews is an elder advisor for the Mowachaht/Muchalaht. He helped secure the logs from Western Forest Products. He credits Fehr for her persistence to see the project through. He took carver Wilson George Jr. to the log sort to look over the logs Western Forest Products would contribute. There were two red cedar and two yellow cedar logs to choose from.
“The two red cedar were not really good for totems,” said George, whose traditional name is Chii-nii-aht. He got that name from his uncle Levi Martin at the passing of his dad Wilson George Sr.
In reviewing the red cedar logs, he found that one was rotten to the core and the other one was twisted badly. So they took a bold step and chose to work in yellow cedar, even though George had never heard of anyone carving a yellow cedar totem pole before.
“It’s more finicky carving yellow cedar than it is red cedar because the grains can meet each other, like in the weirdest places on the log,” George said. But the school invested in some new tools for the carvers. “The chisels were a God-send. The chisels worked way better than our traditional knives.”
George and second carver Vern Point arrived in Gold River on Sept. 13 and started the work Sept. 14. The log, tapered from 22 inches to 20 inches so it could be easily moved by one person, was carved on the school grounds right beside the woodshop.
After careful consideration, and with all the sharp tools, it was decided that George and Point would do all the carving, and the students would paint.
“Every day there were new students coming up and asking, ‘oh Wilson, can we paint?’... I outlined the design that I put on that totem. It was a big enough design. Then I asked them to paint inside those lines.” And for the most part, they did, he laughed. “There was a few times that we had to do some repair. It wasn’t nothing major. It wasn’t nothing that we couldn’t fix.”
George learned his carving skills from Nuu-chah-nulth artists Tim Paul and Patrick Amos, and for the last two years he has worked with Tony Hunt Jr. of Fort Rupert. It’s the second pole George has carved where he has been the lead, with his design inspired by the Mowachaht/Muchalaht elders’ desires and those of the school. He dedicated the pole to his late father. “I felt that he was there with us doing it.”
He asked his brother-in-law to help him. Point is from the Sts’ailes Nation and said he was thrilled to travel to Gold River to help with the pole. To be asked is quite an honor, he said. The yellow cedar carved nice, because the grain is tight. “The wood, you could carve great detail on it.”
During the six-and-a-half weeks the carving took place, Point said the students would come by to watch, as did the people from the village. They let the carvers know the work was important. It wasn’t just another totem pole that they were carving. They were carving something for the community.
“That’s important, to leave some kind of a legacy for the kids,” Point said.
He began carving about 35 years ago, learning first from his grandfather Ambrose Point, and then from Patrick Amos, who was best man at his wedding. Point still has his first set of three knives given to him three decades ago by Richard Patterson of Kyuquot, he said.
Point said he will take fond memories of his time in Gold River home with him.
“There’s a sense of community, and I kind of fell in love with the place. The people of Tsaxana and the community of Gold River are all friendly. It feels like a big family here who look out for each other. I admire that.”
That statement would be music to Arlene Fehr’s ears, no doubt. Asked why it was so important to her to spend years making sure the communities continue to work to understand one another, she said, “My children grew up in this community with First Nations. My youngest daughter’s best friend, they are joined at the hip…. It’s important for kids to understand the history of where they live, and because we are so isolated here it’s too easy not to see the rest of the world and that the cultures are getting together.”
Ha-Shilth-Sa asked Amos what she thought about the school’s newest accomplishment, finally getting their chii-nulth. She sat back and thought for a minute.
“I’m very honored and proud today. I’m honored from the presence of everyone that was here, for our students, for what we believe in as Quu?as (Native) people. I’m a very proud elder.”
