January 05, 2003
By ROB CHANEY of the Missoulian
If the Blackfeet or Sioux or Arikara nations had as much warning of Lewis and Clark's expedition as Missoulians have about its bicentennial, how might history be different?
"We see this heroic journey to the Pacific and back," said Geoff Badenoch, one of the planners for the University of Montana's Confluence of Cultures Symposium. "They (American Indians) see 31 guys on a sales trip. You can find a million people who can tell you all about (Meriwether Lewis') dog collar. But what the native people lost - you won't find that on eBay. Everything they had, their language, their land, their culture, their understanding of how to do what they did, was taken away from them. And from us."
To probe that gap, the University of Montana is preparing a symposium, "Confluence of Cultures: Native Americans and the Expedition of Lewis and Clark," for May. It will be a time to present ideas about what happened when the Corps of Discovery passed through the Indian nations, and how they all got from then to now.
"Research is the alchemy that turns anger and frustration into dialogue and understanding," said David Purviance, director of the University of Montana's Core of Discovery office. He said one of his biggest chores is keeping the Lewis and Clark bicentennial from repeating mistakes made at the 500th anniversary of another famous explorer: Christopher Columbus.
"There was a lot of anger and frustration at the Quincentennial," Purviance said of the 1992 events. "There wasn't much thought about understanding another person's perspective there. Columbus' discovery of the New World may not be an event Native Americans feel is celebratory."
The symposium received at least 50 proposals for presentations. They range from scientific reviews of native and white land-use practices to workshops on the only common language among all those disparate cultures: hand gestures. Featured speakers are Piegan Institute founder Darrell Kipp, author Mary Clearman Blew and UM history professor Harry Fritz. The keynote speakers are David Wilkins, a Lumbee Indian and associate professor of American Indian Studies, law and political science at the University of Minnesota, and Fred Hoxie, director of the D'Arcy McNickle Center for the History of the American Indian in Chicago.
"It should not just be an academic experience," Purviance said. "It's not about leaving Indian Country and entering academia."
So there will also be dancers, singers, storytellers and banquets. There will be an encampment of tepees around the university Oval. Symposiums of this sort usually come with an entry fee of $300 or $400. UM set the ticket at $25 to encourage wide participation.
On another front, the university has commissioned a series of 50 paintings by Montana artist Charles Fritz, intended to re-create the landscapes Lewis and Clark saw as they came through Montana. The paintings will travel to museums and exhibits all along the explorers' trail over the next four years. One of Fritz's other paintings set a record for contemporary artists at a recent C.M. Russell art auction, bringing in $75,000.
"Will there be things for people to do and see when they come?" Purviance asked. "Absolutely. Are we ready? That's a large, problematic question. But we must not judge success by the number of Sacagawea statues, interpretative centers and road signs we put up. It will be in cultural understanding, in the opportunity to have a conversation about our past."