Black Hills Pow Wow numbers on the rise

By Bill Harlan, Journal Staff Writer | Sunday, October 12, 2003

Previous Page

Share

• del.icio.us
• Digg
• NewsVine
• Fark

Print

Email

RAPID CITY -- This year's 17th annual He Sapa Wacipi, or Black Hills Pow Wow, had drawn 445 registered dancers as of Saturday afternoon - almost 150 more dancers than last year, organizers say.

"We're definitely bigger," powwow office manager Gloria Eastman said.

He Sapa Wacipi runs through today at Rushmore Plaza Civic Center in Rapid City. (See the box for today's schedule.)

Twenty-seven drum groups also had registered by Saturday.

Many drum groups and more than 300 of the dancers are from South Dakota, but participants are also here from 17 states and Canada. They represent 56 tribes.

The main event of a powwow is the grand entry. All 445 dancers and all 17 drum groups participate at He Sapa Wacipi. On Friday night, Gov. Mike Rounds joined them. "We were quite pleased," powwow board member Chuck Drust said.

Quincy Afraid of Lightning, 27, of Rapid City is dancing at the powwow, and he also sings with a drum group called Pejuta Waste (pronounced "Puh-ZHOOTA wash-TAY). The lure of the powwow is simple for him. "Freedom and pride," he said. "There's no place like this in the whole world."

Afraid of Lightning was born and raised in Rapid City, but he is also a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. He grew up speaking the Lakota language at home. Now, he interprets Lakota culture for schools and for visitors to Kevin Costner's "Tatanka: The Story of the Bison," the buffalo sculpture exhibit in Deadwood.

"I'm really proud we're preserving the beauty of our culture," Afraid of Lightning said during a break Saturday afternoon.

He also said the powwow was a good way to demonstrate Indian culture to outsiders. He was especially pleased Gov. Rounds was there. "It was really cool," Afraid of Lightning said. "He said he was going to restore the reconciliation process."

The main theme of any powwow, however, remains the same: a gathering of extended families.

Darrell Zephier of Fort Thompson, on Crow Creek Reservation, is here with about a dozen members of the Bad Nation drum group, including his twin brother, Gerald Zephier. His father, Clark Zephier, is dancing.

"My family is a powwow family," Zephier said.

Bad Nation travels to a powwow almost every weekend, and Zephier said the circuit was a community in itself. "Everyone is considered family."

Bad Nation is the "host drum" at this year's He Sapa Wacipi. They will get paid for the honor, but they also forego prize money, which is an important part of most powwows - especially big ones such as He Sapa Wacipi. "It's almost like a sport," Zephier said.

There is a powwow economy, too, and on Saturday afternoon, it was thriving at He Sapa Wacipi. All 54 vendor booths were filled weeks in advance, Eastman said.

The line never seemed to let up at an Indian Taco booth.

Business was also brisk at the Rez Dog Clothing Company of Norman, Okla., which offered an assortment of T-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, bandanas and other items. Many featured slogans that reflected deadpan American Indian humor. Some offered slightly off-color or less than complimentary references to George Armstrong Custer. One T-shirt proclaimed "Does not assimilate well with other cultures."

At the other end of that row of vendors, Cece Baptiste and Niska Nighttraveller, both Crees from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, were selling instructional CDs in several American Indian languages, including Lakota, Dakota and Nakota. (They planned to leave Saturday evening, but you can find out more at www.solomonsunrisecreations.com.)

On the other side of the civic center, Anne White Hat and her grandmother, Marie Randall, both members of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, were running a booth for two enterprises.

Sicangu Lakota Herbal Cooperative is a nonprofit organization that markets traditional Lakota herbal medicines, including echinacea gathered in the Black Hills. "The roots and herbs we used a long time ago; we're teaching that now," Randall said.

White Hat said the for-profit He Sapa Coffee Co. offers "organic, fair-trade" coffee.

Indigenous growers in Mexico, Central America and South America sell beans to an American Indian enterprise in Minnesota "for a fair price," White Hat said. The Minnesota business grinds special blends for He Sapa Coffee.

Even the Republican Party had a powwow booth, operated by the Pennington County Republican Women. They registered voters, distributed campaign materials and offered free instant photos with a life-size cardboard cutout of President Bush. In fact, the powwow announcer told the crowd he had had his picture taken with the cardboard president. "I put my arms around his neck and ...." After a short pause, he added, "No, I'm not going to say anything."

Last year, He Sapa Wacipi operated in the black for the first time in a number of years, and organizers on Saturday said this year's turnout indicated the trend would continue.

Drust said many vendors already had promised to return next year. So did Gov. Rounds.

Contact Bill Harlan at 394-8424 or bill.harlan@rapidcityjournal.com