Wood's Words: Sticks (Part One)
Jim F. Wood ‘64
He slid out from beneath the bearskin slowly so as not to wake his brother or sister. Now thirteen years old, it was his responsibility to start the morning fire, and he reached for a handful of goose down and rabbit tuft in the cold darkness of the long house. The red sandstone hearth still radiated warmth, although the fire had gone out hours ago. He placed the starter over warm coals, cupped his hands and blew softly to add oxygen to the mixture. First a spark, then a short flame- and he reached for the birch chips and kindling. Finally two pieces of seasoned oak, the room brightened and shadows danced off the woven bark sidewalls and arched ceiling. Behind the red and brown blanket hung near the south end of the long house, he could hear his mother and father talking in muffled voices. The steam in his breath gradually disappeared as the fire grew.
In the large basket swinging from a roof timber, he found several pieces of trout jerky and put them in his pocket. He preferred the trout to deer because deer ate along the swamp making its meat smelly and you didn’t carry smelly meat into battle. He could bite off a piece of the hard trout and after a few minutes of chewing, the sweetness of the trout’s oil would coat his mouth and fill his body with energy.
He dressed lightly as there would be much running today and he wanted to be fast. His “rotiianen”, or chief made changes to her warrior attack after sunset last night at the end of yesterday’s inconclusive “baggattaway”. She told him he would move from the rear, from protecting her, to the front, to the attack. It was a great honor; at dinner he stood facing his father and proudly told the family members that he had been made a member of the attacking squad. The muffled voices behind the blanket the next morning spoke of that honor in ways they did not wish him to hear; the attack was the most dangerous position during a battle.
He left the family long house and proceeded through the darkness to the shore. Stars sparkled in the cold sky and danced in the water. In the shadows he saw many warriors carrying weapons on their shoulders. At the shore, he met his cousin and silently, they pushed the light boat into the water and paddled south toward Orion and the open river. It was late April in 1696, and the eastward current was strong. He could hear mallards and drakes quacking along the bank, startled by their early presence. He sat in the rear of the boat and was responsible for steering. Long powerful strokes from the front oarsman were countered by slight rotations in his right wrist, as he guided them toward the other bank.
He was tall for his age, almost six feet, and weighed almost 150 lbs. His chest and back were heavily muscled, and his upper arms bulged with each stroke. He could run all day. Before he was even ten years old, he had been selected as a messenger and sped from village to village bringing important news from one chief to another. It was during this time that he met the white man who called himself the Jesuit and whose name was Jean. Jean spoke some dialects of Iroquois and Mohawk, and was always trying to engage the youngsters in each village in conversations about a special Spirit-God that Jean claimed had lived on earth thousands of years ago, and in the concepts of Heaven and Hell. During these talks, he would listen to Jean also discuss things like numbers and weather and ask them a lot of questions about animal and plant life in the area and the attitude of the elders and trails that led south to other lands. Mostly, the talks were boring.
As darkness ebbed, they could pick out movement on the far shore. If they had studied numbers with Jean, they would have been able to figure accurately all the warriors on the mainland and fear may have added a different perspective to other expectations of the fight that lay ahead. Their chief only had been able to muster 203 for this battle; her enemy numbered 612.
They carried their boat out of the water to a safe place among other boats that had arrived earlier. They gathered their weapons and walked through the reeds- along a dry footpathtoward the rise of land ahead where their chief sat discussing plans with the elders. Everyone knew the importance of the outcome: the winner would have fishing and hunting rights from the mouth to the source in the high mountains far to the south on a river the Jesuit had taught them to call The Racquette.
At the top of the rise, and with the morning gray dissipating, he could see the large field where sheep, goats and horses fed in the summer. Its grassy covering was yellow now, and dead grass lay flat against the ground- a result of the heavy winter snows and ice that had covered the field for almost five months. In the long dimension, the field was nearly two miles from end to end, while on the narrow side the width varied from a half mile to a mile with a natural boundary formed by the river’s edge on one side and a dense evergreen forest along much of the far, or southern side where partridge hid in the summer. Behind the chief, he could see tens of warriors on their haunches talking about the impending battle and studying their weapons for any flaw or damage that might need repair. He had inspected his own weapons last night, replacing worn and frayed material, making sure there were no cracks and that each weapon had full integrity. He spent nearly one hour with his special moccasins. These had squirrel bones sewed into the soles to provide traction and leverage on the wet grass. He was the only warrior who had discovered this secret and kept these moccasins in a special pouch around his waist.
At the western edge of the long field, the older men had erected a large structure from oak poles, lashed together with a form of rawhide. A roof of woven twigs supported multiple layers of deerskin as protection against the weather. In this makeshift shelter, the elders would attend to any warriors who were hurt during the battle. He could see the large spit inside the building where fresh goat and pig were being roasted. Sweet smoke rose from the fire under the spit, then inverted and hung just above his head. He wandered over and accepted a large piece of succulent pork which he ate quickly as the elders directed him to the rear of the building where he saw many young warriors applying fresh war paint.
Two large clay pots had been filled with colored paste. The warriors were stripping off wet leggings and leather jackets leaving them in only loincloths and leather moccasins. Each took a handful of colored paste from one of the pots and began applying it to a fellow warrior. One paste evidently had been made from a dark green gelatinous substance, probably found in the surface scum along the river’s edge. It was applied on each warrior, and if you knew the code, you could tell the defensive warriors by the ↔ symbol and the attack warriors by the ⌠ symbol applied in the dark green paste on both back and chest.
After many Mohawk had separated from the Iroquois League in 1667, the Akwesasne Mohawks occupied land along the St. Lawrence River, especially near a location known today as Massena. It was still fifty years before the Akwesasne and other splinter Iroquois would form the “Tsiata Nihononwentsiake” or the Seven Nations. And with the Jesuits actively recruiting alliances for the French, splinter groups like the “Caughnawaga” or Praying Indians from St. Louis in Quebec, and the Akwesasne, occasionally clashed with each other over territorial issues. Such an issue was to be resolved in the battle today and would establish Akwesasne territorial rights for generations.
The young warrior and his cousin finger-painted each other with the green paste. He was proud of his⌠ marking and asked that it be painted in bold strokes. His cousin received the marks of a defensive warrior. They both walked over to the second, and larger, clay pot that was full of a thick paste made from corn meal and yellow flower dyes. From this pot each member, whether warrior or not, scooped a palm full of paste and apply markings to his or her face that indicated they were a member of the Akwesasne tribe. The markings consisted of a straight, horizontal line below each eye, a second line below each eyebrow and a ∀ on each forehead. It was here he changed moccasins, leaving his pouch, leggings, and heavily beaded jacket with an uncle in the shelter. The warriors thus marked in green and gold colors assembled near the chief to receive her benediction. She intoned the ancient words spoken before every baggattaway for as far back as any elder could remember: “We obtained this game from the Manitou. It was given to us long ago in the past. Our ancestors played it as the Manitou taught them in the same way we have always played it, and in the same way as all our people continue to play it. Play hard, but play fair.”
He looked at the serious expressions on each warrior then gazed toward the eastern end of the field where his eyes caught sight of the mass of Caughnawaga warriors that stretched from one side of the field to the other. On the hard packed grass, in freezing conditions, he began to sweat. As his chief finished her benediction, she stood and reached into a small bag that hung from her side. She walked over to him and handed him the leather covered hickory ball to be used in the battle. As a defense warrior, he had never seen the object, let alone touched it and he noticed it had a small hole through it. She explained to him the need for him to play hard, to carry the ball past the enemy’s defense and to eventually locate the other chief and hit her as hard as he could with the ball. This result would win them the contest and the territorial rights they sought along the Raquette River. She ignored the beads of sweat on his brow and noticed he was staring at the hole. “It’s the whistle hole’” she told him. “When you throw the ball, it will whistle so all warriors will know where it is.”
And with these instructions, 40 Akwesasne attack warriors walked onto the two square mile plain. Another 100 defense warriors stayed behind to guard their chief and the remaining 63 warriors placed themselves around the battle field in strategic locations in order to intercept passes or tackle warriors from the other tribe if they attempted to advance the ball toward the west end of the field, and their chief. Near the center of the field, 90-110 attack warriors from the Caughnawaga tribe stood together as a wet mist began to blow in from the river obscuring the east and west ends of the field. The warriors on both sides held their weapons straight up, as high as they could reach, in honor of the spirit who watched over them and in honor of the warriors on the opposing side with whom they were about to commence a long and arduous battle. A tall Caughnawaga warrior approached staring intently into his young face- a smile beginning to show from under heavy red and white war paint. He tried hard not to look away from the stare of a man who seemed twice his age and six inches taller. As was their custom, he handed the ball to the other warrior who inspected it, nodded his approval, and handed it back to him. They both looked around at the 150 warriors now crowded together in the center of the field, noting the placement of their own strongest and fastest men, and with all his strength, he threw the ball straight up as high as he could throw it into the St. Lawrence mist, and the two tribes began a contest with sticks and a ball that is the oldest played in North America, the national sport of Canada and a game we call lacrosse.
Please allow me to thank all the alumni who have written Steve Newkofsky, and others in the Clarkson community- including me {powerjim@aol.com}- to offer comments on The Egon Years and The Brotherhood. A wonderful surprise, too, when Joe called from California to reminisce about building the “Hump” room and our year together as roommates! Though we hadn’t spoken in over a decade, it was as if our last conversation had been but a day earlier. I know all alumni share strong common bonds woven from similar experiences- whatever decade we attended Clarkson. Steve has asked me to continue writing these short essays and it will be my pleasure to do so as long as the memories stay fresh and alumni enjoy reading them. The end of this piece will appear in Steve’s next newsletter, and I think you will enjoy its connections with Clarkson.
The Brotherhood encouraged several alumni to comment on their perceptions of the relationship between Clarkson administrations and changes in Greek life. I would like to offer some personal observations too: The fraternity system we knew in the 1950’s, 1960’s and 1970’s was economically unsustainable as Clarkson’s demographics shifted with the re-admission of women: some fraternities passed from the scene and were replaced by sororities and new fraternities with better economic structures, i.e. no house to maintain. That may be small comfort to alumni who lost a house, but we all still have The Brotherhood and every new generation will create its own traditions. The drinking age in New York State increased from 18 to 21, making the consumption of alcohol illegal for 75 percent of the college student population and putting Clarkson at great risk if it did not enforce state law. Clarkson always has and continues to value- and take pride in- the successes and contributions of its Greek alumni. Moreover, many administrations have been generous with governance policies in respect to on and off-campus behavioral disruptions- even some that included serious liability to Clarkson. As undergraduates, when we chose to live off campus, we realized independence had its own set of responsibilities and challenges- and that remains unchanged today. So, now as alumni, we must try to provide positive reinforcement to Clarkson undergraduates- most especially those who choose to live off campus in old Victorian houses badly in need of repair and maintenance. Last, you should know that every semester since fall 2004, the all-Greek average GPA has exceeded the all campus average between 0.08 to 0.14 points, and both Greek men and women have exceeded their respective gender allcampus averages since spring 2002. So, whatever else occurs off campus, Clarkson Greeks are studying and learning and setting a good example for the rest of Clarkson’s exceptional student body.