And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Tuesday, December 22, 1998 http://www.ndonline.com/TribWebPage/dec1998/12229864632.html Knife River ranger to be head interpreter at The Little Bighorn KEN ROGERS, Bismarck Tribune __________ STANTON -- The earth remembers the lodges of the Knife River Indian Villages with round depressions in the grass on the high ground above the Missouri River. For visitors to the historic site, Ken Woody remembers the ways and the stories of the Mandan and Hidatsa people who lived here. A National Park Service ranger and interpreter, he has built bull boats, tanned buffalo hide, planted Indian corn, recorded the Mandan language and crafted traditional Mandan and Hidatsa weapons, cloths and a cradle board. Lewis and Clark author Steven Ambrose says Woody is "the best interpreter I heard in a lifetime of listening." Woody will leave Knife River after Christmas for a new job, head interpreter at the Little Big Horn Battlefield National Monument an hour east of Billings, Mont. His wife and three children will be moving there before the new year. "That's the place I want to go," says Woody, tall, well-built, with an open face and easy smile. "I've been here seven years, and it finally came true. The job opened up." But it almost didn't. There's been a freeze in the National Park Service, with rangers laid off on both coasts getting the first crack at openings. "No one was interested," Woody said. "I redid my whole application. Sent it in. And waited. Then they started calling my references." Maybe what did it was the references, two former Little Bighorn superintendents, Gerard Baker and Barbara Booher, as well as Chas Cartwright, former Knife River superintendent, now top man at Devils Tower. Maybe it was Woody's knowledge of Plains Indians. His grandfather, a Mohawk, worked in wild west shows in the end of that era. "He worked with a lot of western Indians," Woody says. The older Woody would tell his grandson stories about Indians from the plains, illustrated with headdress, bustles and parfleches he had obtained during his wild west show days. "I was all bug-eyed," says Woody, who grew up in Pittsburgh and considers North Dakota the west. Two years ago, Woody traveled to the Peabody Museum at Harvard. That's where many of the artifacts collected by the Lewis and Clark Expedition are kept. In an nearly unprecedented move, the Peabody curators allowed Woody to trace designs from a Mandan buffalo robe that the explorers sent Jefferson before they left the Knife River for the Pacific in the spring of 1805. Once back at Stanton, Woody brain-tanned a buffalo hide and then retraced the design on to the robe. He also did the quill work. It now hangs in a large display case in the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center at Great Falls, Mont. The artwork on the robe tells the story of a battle with the Mandan and Hidatsa on one side and the Arikara and Sioux on the other. It took place in the 1790s. In preparation for work at the Little Bighorn, Wood says, "I've been doing a crash course in Custer, soldiers, soldiers' wives. I've visited Fort Lincoln, gone through the house, videotaped and had the rangers show me the equipment that the soldiers used. "Even though I have a good tribal customs background, I've been reading more about the Indian side of the story (Little Bighorn battle)," says Woody, who acknowledges that the soldiers' part in the battle is very important. "My goal is to tell a balanced story," he says. Meanwhile, Woody is working with Larry Belitu, the man who constructed the tepee displayed in the Heritage Center, on a book about buffalo hide tepees and how they were made. Woody says the move from Knife River to the Bighorn is a move from a slow park to a fast park, from 22,000 visitors a year to 400,000 visitors. One of the high points of Woody's stay at Knife River reflects the respect he earned from Indian people. One of the Mandan elders allowed Woody to see "but not touch" the sacred Mandan turtle drums. Woody said, "It was incredible to see the drums that (George) Catlin painted ... the Turtle drums used in the Okipa ceremony." <<<<=-=-=FREE LEONARD PELTIER=-=-=>>>> If you think you are too small to make a difference; try sleeping in a closed room with a mosquito.... African Proverb <<<<=-=http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/ =-=>>>> IF it says: "PASS THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW...." Please Check it before you send it at: http://urbanlegends.miningco.com/library/blhoax.htm
