The BIA Made a White Man Out of Me.

The BIA Made A White Man Out of Me

22 minutes ago

I am Tracker Ginamarie Rangel Quiniones. Field Reporter, Journalist.

I'm Robert Lundahl, Filmmaker and Storyteller.?I stand up for human rights and the environment.

Tracker Ginamarie, Rangel Quinone

Good to be here. Welcome to Creative FRONTLINE.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:

Welcome to Creative FRONTLINE.

Tracker Ginamarie, Rangel Quinone

Stand up. Stand strong. Stand in. We are Creative FRONTLINE.?

_____

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

The BIA made a white man out of me. (Singing)

Sent me to boarding school, you see.

And it's true.

When I was game warden for the tribe. I remember stopping a fellow down here at the resort and checking for his license. And to me, he was a white man. He was a retired Los Angeles County sheriff. And to me, he was a white man. Slim did about 62. But I remember him saying well, if I was Indian, would you give me a cut?

What do you mean?

And he pulled out his card. He was a Cherokee, a registered Cherokee, but yet he wouldn't come out to all his friends and say, I'm a Cherokee because he was in his comfort zone. And that's happened all the way across our country. And that's what colonization and Westernization did to our people and took them away. And wanting to make them not want to go back.

And a lot of people got too ashamed to want to go back and learn, so they just melt into the melting pot. And that's the irony of Indian boarding schools, the consequence of that. You know, you're the, you know, songs like this, you know, cut my hair, took my shoes.

First thing they did was convert me by taking my shoes, by putting shoes on me and making my big toes come in, and now I have bunions. You know, by wearing pointed shoes.

That's the first thing they did. They. And I remember joking about this, and I said, I don't have a foot fetish, but I happen to look at people's feet and those people's feet and Indian people's feet to see what they look like, you know. And if their toes are straight or they bend in like this, you know, they're bent in, you know, they're colonized, they're westernized, they're, you know, they really changed them by just changing their feet.

Now, now I look at my feet and I have bunions on both feet. And it's caused from pointed shoes, gangster shoes. But you know, that cutting hair and all this other stuff that that they they made us do reminds me of a story. And this is a true story I'm sharing with the public, and I shared this with the Chairman Alumni Group at during the interview, because I can recall at Sherman, when the, the dormitory staff put a young Navajo boy?in my room.

And he was straight off the reservation. And what I mean, straight off the reservation, I mean, straight off the Navajo reservation. Living out 40 miles in the desert in a Hogan. No running water, you know, broken, broken English. And here I am, a senior, getting ready to graduate athlete, whatnot, jock, muscular and everything. And they put this guy in my room. And that's why I noticed this guy's not taking a shower.

And one day, I say, "man, you could take a bath". And he gave me a look and didn't say nothing because he's quiet. She gave me a look and see what you got. You know, he had a nice big footlocker and opened up his footlocker. All new clothes still folded. Everything. Everything was brand new.

But you got to think about our people and him and his culture, where they came from, you know, and his lifestyle. A Chemehuevi man may have maybe 1 or 2 good pair of pants. Levi's at that. One good pair of boots. Wouldn't have tennis shoes. No sneakers, one pair of boots, maybe two shirts, maybe 1 or 2 pants. That's it.

You know, you go and bathe. Go and bathe in the river and canal. Bathe at home. But, you know, take care of yourself, your hygiene. But being out in the remote area and the sand, they do what they do, you know, they take care of themselves, what they do. And it's nothing to them. But yet to come to Riverside, California, at a boarding school with all the amenities available to you, you wouldn't use them. And I got angry with him and I got mad, drug him to the to the shower with all his clothes. And they say, no, everybody in the house are coming, following and laughing, you know, and get on you, son.

And I was ashamed and embarrassed. I was pissed or something. And, you know, having to tell this guy how to take a bath. Think about this, 1971.

But it did happen. And, you know, after that, we started watching each other take care of each other and everything. Helping him out as much as we could, but helping him try to advance and speak and talk with us and everything. And we became friends and whatnot. But it wasn't a really good close friendship, you know, like that. But but we communicated and he was quiet and in his he had broken language, the Navajo language, you know. He didn't speak very well, but we were able to communicate. And he understood what I was trying to get across to him.

You got to change, you know you're here. You got to change. Can't be the way you are. You got to change.

And he did.

But I just wanted to share that with you about our culture. And, you know, the time frame, 1971. And this individual not wanting to do the things that we all take for granted because of where he came from. And, you know, that was a sad thing back in the day. It was a it wasn't only Navajo?that had really broken language, and some of some of the Pimas.?Papago?did also.

And, and because I had the ability to speak English pretty clearly, everybody thought I was pretty smart. I really wasn't, but I could communicate.

So that that helped me a lot as far as education goes. You know, and I never really liked things there at the school. When I first got there, when I looked at the academics and I never really took academics seriously when I went to school. But what I seen there, I was upset about because what they were doing is teaching remedial education.

And I felt really bad for all the Indian students who have been going through this in the 60s. You know, what type of education were they giving them? Well, that that was one of the driving forces behind my efforts to help change the school and improve the school. And in 1971, the senior class took part in '70 and '71 to help get the school accredited, and we did.

We were successful and Sherman Institute, became Sherman Indian High School, an accredited high school in the state of California thanks to our efforts. The senior class of 1971. So that's what I'm proud about bringing to Sherman and changing the academics and bringing up to the same level as any other high school across the state. So you're welcome.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:

Well, I was thinking of a photograph that I saw, you know, and we put into the film that I made, Who Are My People?,?And it was a classroom and it was a girl's classroom. But in this classroom there were probably 25 ironing boards?and about 25 women standing up there with irons. Right? So they were learning to iron people's clothes and learning how to be housekeepers.

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

Exactly.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:

In the in the boys classroom, there was like a brick wall. And the boys were taught to take the bricks, apply the mortar, put them in the wall.

It was also kind of a manipulation to say that your place in the world is over here. You know, you're you're the one with the iron. Exactly. And it took a long time, you know, I mean, it's really your generation. It's the 70s kids that, you know, things kind of broke open a little bit.

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. 70s generation was. As the movers and shakers back in the day and changing the dynamics of the school, you know, and even when we got into the CIF California Interscholastic Federation, that and and moved from one league to another, you know, we Sherman was never like, they never had the ability to play football in the league. For some time, I think they said 30 years or so and they wanted to start that team, and that's how I got recruited to Sherman. But back in the early days when they had teams, they were rough, tough football players, and they used to beat USC and UCLA. And back in the day, you know?

But when when the school got involved in football, you know, that was a whole new dynamic for the school and got us into the gridiron?and got me into being an all star. Riverside County, and and played the game of my life, which I was so proud to play in because I felt I was representing not only Sherman, but all Indians across the country in that game.

And I played the game of my life, and that was the last time. Yeah. Yeah. (Softly).

Well, life's been good. Life's been bad, you know. But, you know, we got to make the best of it. Keep on going forward. You know, this is my friend who had that prophecy about doomsday. Of all the people being kids being shipped out this way. You know, she taught me one thing, and I said, no matter what goes on, man, you know that things will go good, things will go bad. You'll have good times, bad times. You know, you gotta learn to roll with the punches. You gotta learn to roll with the punches. You know. So that's what I've done all my life.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:

This is the energy. It's like that. Let's move forward. Energy that, you know, I mean Kamala, Kamala's sister was talking about her mother from India and all these stories, it's like, let's move, let's do something,?you know?

And that was just. that was us. That wasn't the teachers and the parents allowing us to do that or saying, 'hey, you guys, why don't you just start a little revolution and be with your friends? And you really, you know, start something new.' But we did exactly how it happened.

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

Exactly. And that's why I felt about the Salt Song Trail Project, you know, just do it. Do it because, you know, it's been an intricate part of my, my life, you know, and and to see it fading away the way it was that was sad. But, you know, another big, big sad thing about going to a ceremony and back in the earlier days was hearing the language.

Tracker Ginamarie, Rangel Quinone:

When I was very young. I remember you what you mentioned about the Salt Songs. And I remember a story that someone had said that the Salt Songs. are all the way up into Canada with the Cree and the Anishinaabe, and that always was in my mind about that remembering the songs, remembering the people speaking about that and how they, with the trade route along from all the way south to the north, not only came the foods and the goods and the baskets and the songs and the stories. So those are things that they took with them besides all the other goods. And so it was kind of inspiring to know that, you know, the feathers, the macaw feathers from our brothers and sisters down south made it all the way up to Canada, just like our songs.

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

Everybody may know a word or two and whatnot. That's good. But, you know, learning how to communicate a language is another thing, because in order to learn the songs, you have to know the language. You have to learn the language to determine where you are in the song and what you're singing about, you know?

Now I understand a little (Speaks Chemehuevi language). I speak a little.

However, no one I know does know neither. I see, I hear, and I understand about the things that's going on in this world and what makes things work for the world and the creatures and the critters, you know. And that's why I made that, that statement in that video that Sean made about the Creator?knows me about the work I'm doing.

He blessed me to do these things. We communicate. He understands me. Where I'm going and why I'm doing these things is to help Mother Earth?and restore our land and get our people healthy again. But this is just one group of our people. There's all the general public out there, too, and all of us have the rest of our clans who need to be educated too.

Tracker Ginamarie, Rangel Quinone:

The cultural preservation, you know. Changed, I mean, stayed the same. But the traditions of the songs they are always changing. And so they adapted to the tribal people or the region because of the songs, how they you know, when they're found in Canada with the Anishinaabe?and the Cree?communities, they hold a deep cultural, spiritual significance and importance to them as well. And it's an expression of their region of where they're from. So it did change as the songs moved along up north.

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

But, you know the work that we're doing now is having far reaching effects because they see our successes here in Chemehuevi Valley and our land restoration efforts on this reservation, where there was nothing growing before, and now you can come up here and see a farm that's expanding and growing and doing some wonderful things to the ecosystem and the environment and wildlife.

You know, and creatures are coming here and flocking to our reservation. And that's what's beautiful is seeing the deer come back. You know, deer that have been absent for 60 or 70 years, you know, 80 years at the Parker Dam, you know, the deer left the area. And it's funny because I say deer. And my wife took me to Parker the other day, to the hospital, to the clinic, and we saw a dead deer laying on the side of the road by Vidal Junction between the Parker and on the north side of the road.

And two months ago I went down to the hospital. We saw two dead deer in the same area laying on the opposite side of the road. And I started saying, Why? Why are you being killed right here? And the reason why the deer are being killed right there is because there's only a small gap open along the Metropolitan Water District line at Vidal Junction that the deer can cross without having to scale the canal.

A concrete canal with chain link fence. You know, but yet they. They can't jump that fence. They can't swim that canal. So there's only one outlet that they know where to go. And it's like a funnel, but yet they have no place to go. So they're trying to go through the small channel. And there you got Highway 62 running east to Parker, and you got Highway 95 running north to Needles. And the deer have to go through this pass at the Metropolitan Water District has cut off.

Seeing this happening all up and down the river, that the migration routes have changed again and the deer aren't able to migrate freely, just like they along the freeways. They can't do that anymore. So they're going along the road and they're getting hit and killed. But there's only one little outlet opened available of the natural terrain where they can go to get to the next waterhole.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:

Can you give us a description of the Salt Songs?and the Salt Song Trails?and where Ash Meadows sits on the Salt Song trail?

Matthew Leivas, Sr. (Chemehuevi Hereditary Chief):

Yeah, those those songs up there around Ash Meadows are sung around the midnight time because after they leave the the Mount Charleston area, you know, the song meanders on down into the desert by the New York. Excuse me. New York mountains on down further towards Twentynine Palms area. But all that area up there that the song does a switchback in that area because there's a couple of different communities up there. And I mentioned that when the song comes down from Saint George area into the desert near Moapa and Pahranagat and on his way down to Indian Peak and around Mount Charleston, you know those songs sing about the mountain, about Mount Charleston?and all all the resources that are there for them.

Like I said, you know, that's the way you have in when our spirit passes, that's where it goes back to is Mount Charleston. Yeah. The Salt Song Trail. They they sing about all these different areas and, you know, it's a different route. I mean, a route that comes down to these different areas. And we think about the different communities that were the resided and where events took place, you know, sacred places?and things like this.

And Mount Charleston is one, like I said, Pahrump. There's been another Ironwood Valley?and Moapa?and Indian Peak in Ash Meadows, because those are really prominent songs in about Midnight and around the Midnight Song. And it's really sad because we call it the Parting of the Ways?after the midnight song, you know? And where we take a long break at midnight and the singers do, and we sing a song that's a Cry?song at midnight, and.

But what we're singing about the different areas and things that took place around all that area. And like I say, you know Pahranagat. Pahranagat, it was a place of abundance, of a lot of vegetation, a lot of food. So they went there to get resources and get water. And you go to the different springs and different mines to get different types of salt. Salt was used in prayer and medicine and healing.?

You know, the medicine men would use different qualities of salt from different areas in their prayers and ward off bad spirits, such as the pine pitch. I can share that with you because it was pretty common, but pine pitch is pretty much saved served the same purpose as copal that the indigenous people used in South America. It's a sap, and it's to ward off bad spirits. And when when we have ceremony, they usually burn up like that.

The sap to ward off bad spirits who try to come in to the to ceremony. Because when we start singing these songs in the evening time the leaders would sing in, in a low tone tone in order to humble themselves and ask permission from Creator, and to invite, has permission from Creator to sing the song, but to invite spirits to come, to join in in the celebration of life of this individual. But when we invite spirits to come, bad spirits try to come in to bad spirits will try to come in to bring harm and havoc to anybody else around there.

So we say, you know, when, when, when we have ceremony, you know if you don't feel you should be there, don't go. If you're angry, upset, don't go because you're taking medicine with you. You know, you had bad thoughts and things like this. Don't go. Just don't be around stuff like this. And especially with babies and children. They're prohibited from being around ceremony like us because they're susceptible to receiving anything.

Their minds are open, you know, and things can be received without even knowing it. And then the same with people, you know, you're if you're weak, sick, angry, vulnerable, these spirits will attach themselves to you and they can do things to you. They can even kill you. You know, it all depends how individuals are. But, you know, that's why we sing these songs.

We have to humble ourselves and get permission from the Creator. Sing songs and invite these spirits and then. And burn the XXXX to ward off the bad ones who try to come in bad spirits that try to come in. Keep them away. And this will burn all night, you know. And you have smudge spots around the area emitting this aroma, such as you do if you go down to the coastal. And you know, it's all your smell is around the whole area from all the different dancers burning, copal, keeping the bad spirits away. And that's what it is. But, you know, singing the songs, singing about the travels and remembering the different sites and especially the villages of our people. And that's why I mentioned.

And this hat I'm wearing the, the Quechan National Monument hat, you know, they're pursuing developing a National Monument down there to protect their sacred lands from Yuma all the way to the Salton Sea and stopping all that gold mining and lithium mining activity, but they're doing their due diligence and trying to protect Mother Earth. But, you know, our song travels right through that very same area and on on. It doesn't go around the Salton Sea, but in the front of the Salton Sea and all the way to the Colorado River.

And our salt song interconnects with the Quechan Dream Trail, which which is a trail that follows the entire Colorado River. And it runs right here, a mile from my house to the west. And we're protecting it here on our farm, because there's a segment of the trail that runs through here. And my son Daniel has annexed to that that trail as it goes across our farmlands. And we're not going to develop around it.

But, you know, that's our connection. And the one thing about the relationship between the Chemehuevi and the Quechan is the Quechan have always had a deep respect for the Chemehuevis, whereas they allowed the Chemehuevis to reside in their territory. They allowed the Chemehuevis to occupy all the areas up to the Yuma Proving Grounds, you know. That's all territory to the Kofa mountains. The Chemehuevis had free reign of that area qith the blessings of the Quechans. But you also had villages all the way down to Yuma along the Colorado River. And we also had name of all the different mountains from Yuma all the way up the Mojave Desert.

So, you know, we have a lot of respect for the that we support them in their all their efforts to develop a National Monument and help protect the sacred sites. But Salt Song Trail?covers all these areas, and we sing about these and all throughout the whole night, from sundown to sunup. And during the night. We have specific times when we do the cry songs where the men would actually stand up and sing and women stand up, and the dancers stop and face the singers and and accept the spirit and the power and energy that's in the sacred circle, which is between the men singers and the women singers opposite from them. So that's the holy ground where, you know, there shouldn't be any anything. Bad things, no shenanigans, no bad feelings or anything.

You know, you're there for a reason, and that is to cry. And the whole name of our ceremony is a cry in our language, a Yagap, a Yagap. So when they ask, where are you going? Yeah, yeah, I'm going over there to the cry, you know?

And that's what they go for. Men. Women go there to the cry to show you respect, love and appreciation for the individual or family, or to emit those tears, to let those tensions and anxiety go. Let all of it go.

Because we as individuals, we have things to do to the next day. We have families to take care of. We have work. We have our own obligations.

Tracker Ginamarie Rangel Quinone:?

Stand up. Stand in. We are Creative FRONTLINE.

Robert Thorp Lundahl:??

I'm Robert Lundahl. I stand up for human rights and the environment.

Tracker Ginamarie Rangel Quinone:?

I am Tracker Ginamarie Rangel Quinones.

Let us know whose voice you wanna hear on the front line. And we connect all people where they stand on the FRONTLINE.

? Copyright Agence-RLA, LLC, Robert Thorp Lundahl, Gina Quinones.

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