Finding Čičməhán
How a day trip to the Peninsula, a Welcome Pole carving, and my obsession with Washington State Ferries clued me into the history of a great leader to the S'Klallam tribal people in Qatáy, JST lands
How a day trip to the Peninsula, a Welcome Pole carving, and my obsession with Washington State Ferries clued me into the history of a great leader to the S'Klallam tribal people in Qatáy (Port Townsend, WA), Jamestown S’Klallam Tribal homelands.
For my final trick, my final trick this year at least, I have been mulling over putting together a kind of ‘Michelin Tyres’ travel guide for the LIS 534 Indigenous Systems of Knowledge class at the UW iSchool. I have long believed that the proof that ‘we are still here’ is within the public art and public spaces dedicated to Native American Indigenous First Nations tribal history, language, and Indigenous Ways of Knowing. This term in 534 we’ve been discussing how walls, corners, and doors are really what make a museum, how can we turn Museum collections ‘inside out’ to make them more accessible to the public, and discussed examples such as the newly created First Americans Museum in Oklahoma and the refreshed Qaumajuq/ Winnipeg Art Gallery. Both examples presented in a recent Native American Indigenous First Nations art conference as places that have made a conscious choice to place Native knowledge, Native art, and Native people quite literally at the front of the building.
‘A Brand-New Museum in Oklahoma Honors Indigenous People at Every Turn’, Smithsonian Magazine. September 27, 2021. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/brand-new-museum-oklahoma-city-honors-indigenous-people-at-every-turn-180978742/
‘Undulating Inuit art centre Qaumajuq opens in Winnipeg’, Wallpaper*. 22 MAR 2021. https://www.wallpaper.com/architecture/qaumajuq-inuit-art-centre-michael-maltzan-winnipeg-canada
2021 Native American Arts Studies Association Conference. NAASAC.
https://nativearts.org/conferences-2/virtual-2021/
I was hoping I could do the same with public art sites around the Puget Sound and Seattle / King County areas. Last year, in my 508 class, I documented the only public installation of Vi Hilbert’s work on respecting and cultivating the Lushootseed language of the Puget Sound Region and presented it both in class and to the Ontario library conference.
’The Body Is The Document’, Moved By Words. December 2, 2020.
https://www.movedbywords.org/olasc2021
Because of the COVID shut-down, none of the resources available at any archive or special collection were available to me. Indeed, because of the increasing high-water mark of stress of duties related to COVID it would be some time before anyone that has worked in archives would be able to answer my calls. Therefore I did the only sensible thing someone could do, I took my camera and photographed a public-access botanical garden with Lushootseed markers and discussed how what we know is what people are willing to share, what is public, and what is available to us as Native Indigenous First Nations peoples.
That was the first on my list of places, followed by the Chinook tribal canoe journey paddles that welcome visitors to the Burke Museum, the collaboration between western tribal governments and King County to turn the Mulkiteo Ferry Terminal into a historic tribal welcoming arch, and other favorite places that I have seen public interfaces of Indigenous Ways of Knowing that both accurately portray Native culture but also make it accessible and interleaved with everyday life. I added them all to Google Maps. Carefully, one at a time, and then in typical Web 2.0 fashion it mixed them all up. Possibly by date of colonization. Who knows.
To this list, in a very zen ‘one-path-reveals-another’ moment, I added ‘Chetzemoka Park’ as ‘I bet this is historic’ in the old-timey part of the ‘they better make the whole place historic’ peninsula town of Port Townsend, WA. Then, as any good eats-shoots-and-leaves grad student does, I began to research what connection Chetzemoka Park may have to its namesake, the leader of the Jamestown S’Klallam tribal people.
Previously, as a fan of the Washington State ferry System, I’ve ridden the Chetzemoka-named MV Chetzemoka on trips around the sound. I’ve gawked at the portrait of the tribal leader in the galley of the ship, and I’ve definitely told anyone in earshot how I have loved riding a Native-named car yacht with Native-themed art like a stowaway on a steamer to a Victorian-era port town. And now, through the magic of this blog post and grad-school-a-vision, you can love and visit all of these things on the outer Peninsula too.
Port Townsend Ferry Overlook, Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe website
http://www.tribalmuseum.jamestowntribe.org/hsg/exhibits/chetzemokatrail/ptferry.php
”In 1927, the first MV Chetzemoka was built in Alameda, CA. In 2010, MV Chetzemoka was the name selected by Washington State Ferries for its newest Kwa-di Tabil-class ferry. Two years later, it was relocated to the Vashon Island run, but occasionally returns to service in Port Townsend.
It is fitting that ferries have been named for Pacific Northwest Native American Tribal leaders, as travel by water was the norm for the Tribes of the Salish Sea.
From the ferry overlook, you are looking across at Admiralty Inlet, a tiny part of the “Usual and Accustomed” land and adjacent fresh and salt waterways used by the S’Klallam people”
As it turns out, I am both lucky in both the dumb and luck sense. The ‘Chetzemoka Park’ is point 1 in a new trail system developed in part by long-distance cyclist Lys Burden, Jamestown S’Klallam tribal elder Celeste Kardonsky Dybeck, and the Port Townsend Maritime Center. Prior to Covid-times, they had been discussing how to arrange a proper collection of public sites to both decolonize Port Townsend history and enhance Indigenous Systems of Knowledge prosperity.
“With this trail honoring a S’Klallam leader, Port Townsend works toward decolonizing its history” Seattle Times, Nov. 26, 2020
https://www.seattletimes.com/life/outdoors/with-this-trail-honoring-a-sklallam-leader-port-townsend-works-toward-decolonizing-its-history/
“Since June 2019, this story and 17 others have been on permanent display in Port Townsend as markers along the čičməhán Trail, an interpretive route that chronicles the history of the S’Klallam people and Euro-American settlers as they worked to coexist. Over 21-plus miles designed to be traveled in 3-mile, 6-mile or 12-mile loops — on foot, by bike or in your car — the new trail more fully fleshes out the historical narrative of Port Townsend, a popular tourism destination for its reputation as a Victorian seaport first known as qatáy to the S’Klallam people.
[T]he trail project captured hearts and minds in Port Townsend. First conceived in 2017, the town and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, one of three bands of S’Klallam people who live on the west side of Puget Sound, inaugurated the trail just two years later on June 29, 2019, a remarkably quick gestation for a public works project.”
I must admit, I have spend an awful lot of my travelling time in Washington being attracted with childlike awe to the top of the Peninsula including Port Angeles, Hurricane Ridge, and (almost especially) Port Townsend. In full disclosure, I did give $25 to the Jamestown Historical Society, walked through the haunted jailhouse like every other yahoo, and have my membership card in my wallet next to me as I write this. Now I can add to the list of things I love without shame on the outer Peninsula:
* The Port Townsend Docks with eat-snacks-and-walk-on ferry terminal
* The End of the World bluff with its Éire-esque cliffsides
* Fort Worden, with its tongue-twister name and the gigantic hippy-and-concerned citizen converted military base that hosts writing workshops, musical theatre, and rock concerts
* Downtown Port Townsend shops with their 1990s-era pirate festival and wine-cheese-art fair vibe
* The Coupeville-Port Townsend sailing schedule that enjoys a 8:30pm sunset in summer, and a 4:30pm sunset in winter
and now this Indigenous Knowledge magic. A public walkway with S’Klallam signage connecting the dots between Chetzemoka, Native history, and pre-existing objects in the town of Port Townsend, WA telling the story of the S’Klallam in the area.
Conveniently (for both me and my winter break), both the local historical society and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe have presented a joint telling of this history for the benefit of the public. Including totem-splaining a Totem Pole outside of the Northwest Maritime Center that, upon my last trip, was so unique compared to others I’ve seen I couldn’t make out who or what it represented.
S’Klallam history of qatáy / Port Townsend, Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe
But, thanks to research and grad school, now I know in an almost Star Trek memory alpha retelling of local tribal knowledge that has been freely and publicly given (a theme of the LIS 534 conversations over the last three months).
Chetzemoka is on that Totem Pole, which the S’Klallam call The Welcome Pole. Chetzemoka is also called by another name:
Čičməhán (Cheech-ma-han).
Čičməhán. Known to the ‘Bostons’ (as the tribal members called the settlers) as Chetzemoka (Chet-se-mocha).
Čičməhán who sat under his blanket in Qatáy for days to avoid war with the Bostons, before throwing it off to declare a kind of parlay and lead the Jamestown S’Klallam to a treaty.
Čičməhán who is a prominent figure on the Welcome Pole outside of the Northwest Maritime Center en route to the park bearing his other name: Chetzemoka Park.
Totem Pole at the Northwest Maritime Center. Northwest Maritime Center.
https://nwmaritime.org/totem-pole/
(Content provided by the Jamestown S'Klallam Tribe)
“Port Townsend is well known for finely crafted wooden boats, and for the artisans who build them. This totem pole pays homage to both. The wooden boat building tradition began in this area long before the white settlers arrived. The S’Klallam People carved canoes from cedar logs that well served travelers, traders, fishermen, whalers, and warriors. […]
The bottom figure on the pole represents T’Chit-a-ma-hun, or as he was known locally, Chetzemoka. He was born in 1808, and he eventually became a high ranking S’Klallam chief. He was known as a peacemaker and friend to the early settlers. He felt everyone would prosper more through peace and trade than by fighting one another. [..] The small figure at the bottom of this pole on which the carved figure of Chetzemoka stands, represents Sentinel Rock, the place from where he signaled to the settlers. Today a park in Port Townsend and a Washington State Ferry are named in his honor.
Just as Chetzemoka welcomed the early settlers in the 1800’s, today he stands on this totem pole, with his hands raised in a traditional gesture, welcoming visitors to Port Townsend."
(Source: Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe. Credit: Mark Nowlin / The Seattle Times.)
So. Should you make it to the top of the hand and wish to honor our S’Klallam tribal friends, to follow the trail of Čičməhán and see Qatáy how he saw it, from Sentinel Rock to the MV Chetzemoka docks. To make it even easier to navigate from your Indigenous GPS, the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribal Museum has put together an interactive map documenting all 18 sites of the Čičməhán interpretive trail (as detailed in the Seattle Times infographic above):
Čičməhán Trail
http://www.tribalmuseum.jamestowntribe.org/hsg/exhibits/chetzemokatrail/ct_menu.php
There you will find a trail to Indigenous Ways of Knowing honoring one of the great leaders of the Pacific Northwest. With consent of the tribe, with support of the residents, and within reach.
Around The Sound — Public Native Art
And here is my original starting point—a collection of open access Indigenous Knowledge related sites that started from the Guests Of The Great River welcome canoe paddles at the Burke Museum, drove you across the new Mulkiteo Welcome Gate and ferry terminal, and gave you a reason to come back around to visit the Lushootseed name-garden of Vi Hilbert on Capitol Hill. Indigenous GPS to guide you along your journey around the Salish sea.
Should you have any other sites with public access Indigenous Knowledge or that document Indigenous art in a public setting, please comment below or e-mail your suggestions to my UW address somalwis@uw.edu
LIS 534 Google Maps Curated List of Public Facing Indigenous Knowledge Sites, ‘Around The Sound’
https://www.google.com/maps/@47.8403402,-122.8065101,10z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m3!11m2!2ssEPnT6N_sOipeAuaG5afmReNk-ozuQ!3e3