When it was all but over Friday afternoon, Annawon Weeden stood next to a dwindling fire and could only think of good fortune, and the work done by a community of family and friends old and new, toward a singular goal.
Over the past week, Weeden, of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, and Andre StrongBearHeart Gaines (No Loose Braids), of the Nipmuc Nation, have served as artists-in-residence at a 'mishoon burning' at the Westport Town Farm on Drift Road, guiding the construction of a traditional Wampanoag mishoon, or canoe, that would have been familiar to his ancestors here hundreds of years ago.
Their worksite was a stone-wall lined field overlooking tall grasses, cedar and sculpted trails leading down to the Westport River's east branch. Orioles flew overhead, venison, quahogs, salmon and trout graced the cooking fire, and the sun shone down on the workers every day.
The work was of a nature not often seen here in many years, but was guided by centuries of tradition and refinement. Working around the clock, Wampanoags, Nipmuc family and apprentices and guests patiently crafted the 12-foot mishoon out of a large pine log, carefully burning away its surface, scraping away the embers and coals and slowly revealing a vessel with graceful gunwales that tapered from a sharp edge down to a keel a foot or more thick.
It was slow work, but the goal of the week-long residency was as much about building community and common ground, and education, as it was creating the craft itself, Weeden said.
"You're not just gifted with the knowledge of how to do these things, you're gifted with the knowledge of to protect them," he said. "It made me really proud to be able to set up the drum right here, and just bless this land with these things that have been prevented, it seems, for hundreds of years at least."
Weeden is a co-founder of the Wampanoag Experience, an educational group that strives to teach Wampanoag traditions and ideology across the tribe's ancestral lands. This year, the Experience partnered with the Westport River Watershed Alliance and Westport Land Conservation Trust to make the project happen, along with organizer Peter Crawley, and was given permission from the Massachusetts Trustees of Reservations to camp and work at the farm for the duration. The Westport Cultural Council helped support the effort, as did private sponsors.
During the week-long event, the public was invited in daily for hands-on lessons in many indigenous traditions and philosophies, and Weeden said he was proud to have been able to share his knowledge, and that of his fellow artist-in-residency and the others who helped, with so many.
"I had to deal with a lot of folks to make this happen, so I'm glad that everybody got what I needed to see out of it," he said. "It was very powerful."
Alongside public visits, "we had Aquinnah (Wampanoags, from Martha's Vineyard), the Shinnecocks from Long Island, the Nipmuc family ... a lot of diversity."
To have such diversity was an important goal — to Weeden, the Wampanoag Experience is all about education, something that he says is needed more every year.
"We've done (these things) for thousands of years but over these last few hundreds of years, you can't even light a fire without a permit. You can't do a lot of things — I can't even beat a drum and sing, and that's my form of worship. And that is the Wampanoag experience. We have to walk it every day."
StrongBearHeart, who worked alongside Weeden to guide the project, said he was honored to collaborate with someone he has long considered a role model for indigenous people.
"If anybody here should be getting recognition, it's this man right here," he said of Weeden.
"He has been fighting this fight, doing this work for all these times since I was a little kid looking up to him and thinking, 'Wow, maybe I could do that someday.'"
"It took me a long time to come full circle. And I still appreciate the way he walks — he gives me inspiration to do what I do."
Though the mishoon burning is complete, there is still a chance for the public to witness the craft and learn about the Wampanoag culture.
In the near future the mishoon will be brought up-river to the Head of Westport, where it will be on display at the headquarters of the Westport River Watershed Alliance at 493 Old County Road. It will play a prominent role in this year's River Day, set for Saturday, June 24, and on that date, Wampanoag Experience members will host demonstrations, exhibits and native dance and cooking.
The mishoon is expected to stay at the site throughout the summer.
By Ted Hayes
East Bay Media Group
