Tradition Keepers by Paty Jager #History #western #Native American

I attended an event today called, Tradition Keepers. It was held in the Harney County Community Center. My perception of the event and how it happened were two different things, but I thoroughly enjoyed my trip to town and talking with some of the Keepers of Tradition.

Juniper bark vessels

My assumption had been each person would have a time that they talked about the tradition they were keeping alive, but instead, they were set up at tables with samples of their talents. Some worked on the skill while sitting there talking to people and others told about their skills when someone asked them questions.

There was a Taiko drummer (Japanese). The music was rhythmic. She played with fat sticks that she beat on the stretched top of a barrel shaped drum. The different sounds were made by the musician also striking the sticks against the edge and sides of the drum barrel in different places.

A group of youngsters played fiddle music. They were led by a man I would say was in is 80's. He is passing along the art of fiddling to a new generation.

I chatted with my horse trimmer/shoer who is also a silver smith. His work was on display.

There was a husband and wife who trap. They had hides laid out and pamphlets on trapping.

Murph braids mecates, get downs, shu-flies, and cinches with horse hair. He's been around a while and does nice work. He said it's a lost art because many people now think a neoprene cinch is gentler on the horse when in fact it causes more problems. Hair from the mane is used to make the cinches.

While the cinch felt pokey from the ends of the hair, he claimed that those hairs capture the horse's hair and mats it up on the cinch, making the cinch actually more comfortable and less likely to slip than the cinches made of other materials. He also stated the horse hair cinches don't stretch. They were all winning points to this horse girl.

arrow head made by Cecil

I also visited with Steve McKay a saddle maker. I've been trying to discover if there was a flank or back cinch on saddle in 1890 for the story I'm currently writing. From all the photos I've studied, I don't see one. He said he wasn't sure but he gave me suggestions of western artists to check out and see if I could determine anything from those. Of course he mentioned Charles Russell and the other person was Eric Morris. He also pointed me back to Murph and suggested he might know. When I questioned him, he said he didn't think they became popular until the 50's and 60's and the rodeo cowboys started using them.

There was a father son duo, Cecil and Emory Coons who are proficient in the art of flintknapping or better known as arrow head chipping. It was interesting talking with them. The father preferred to use the original antler tools to make the arrowheads and the son used a short, fat stick with a copper end. They both had beautiful work, but I think the original antler tool made the arrow heads look more authentic. Cecil said he's fooled a few archeologists with his arrow heads. He travels clear to Canada giving talks and presentations on the art of flintknapping.

different types of rocks they use in flintknapping

Emory works on making art with his flintknapping. They had the various types of obsidian they use for making arrow heads and jewelry. I learned something about flintknapping I didn't know. Emory showed me the grain in the different rocks they had on display. He said you have to chip away at the rock in the direction the grain goes to get the shiny appearance you see in obsidian arrow heads. Visiting with them was fascinating. No doubt a bit of this will come up in a book down the road.

The long curved obsidian blade is a replica of one Emory made for the movie Riddick

My two favorite tradition keepers I met and visited with were Rena Beers and Sara Barton, women of the Paiute tribe in Harney County.

Rena is an elder who makes beautiful traditional cradleboards. She is 98 years
old. The tradition of making cradleboards was passed down by her parents and grandparents. To start the process for making the cradleboard she is given or purchases a hide. The hide is soaked in water for several days. She removes the hair with a draw knife. Rinses the hide and soaks it again, only this time in cow brain for two to three days. This is the process that softens the hide. The next step is wringing out the hide. It is white in color. The hide is then smoked, keeping a close eye on the hide so it doesn't burn. This process gives the hide a warm yellow tone. She gathers willow of uniform size for the bones of the cradle board.  After gathering she strips the bark from the willow.  When the hide is properly tanned and the willow is cut to size she begins building the cradleboard. When the board is finished she adds a decoration of colorful bead work. While her cradleboards look like collector pieces, they are used on the reservation for newborns.

Sara weaving a hood on a cradleboard

 Sara was wonderful to visit with. She gave me insights into more than just her basketry, cradleboards, and regalia. She had a wonderful spirit about her. Pointing out a photo of her regalia dress that she made, she said, "I don't know how to sew, but I wanted to make my regalia dress myself, from the sewing to the decorations. I prayed to the Creator to show me the way and it came to me in a dream, you know, how to do it." This gave me chills because it sounds so much like my character Shandra Higheagle in my mystery series. Not the praying to the Creator, Shandra doesn't believe in her heritage that strongly yet, but the dream fits so well with what I write. She also told me that she wanted the regalia dress not to dance at powwows but to dance for herself. She'd heard that the traditional dance of not just her people but people all over the world was being lost. And it has been passed down that everyone dancing all over the world brings balance. It keeps earth from tipping off it's axis. That is why she dances and teaches her daughter and grandchildren to dance. Dance is joyful and the world needs that joyfulness.

I'm teasing you with some of her work. You can see more and learn about the process of gathering willow and preparing it to make baskets and weave on cradleboards in a blog I'm writing for Sweethearts of the West blog. My post will be up April 24th.

It was a wonderful time spent with Tradition Keepers. May they pass on these traditions to young people and keep the traditions alive!

Notes from my Kindle World Book #Western #Writerslife

When I was asked to be part of a Kindle Worlds book project, I was honored to be asked then found myself struggling with several aspects of writing in another author's world.

When writing historical western romance books, a lot of my plot and story comes from research. What I learn about an area, how the people lived, and the occupations.  I struggled with writing the book because the originator of the world deals with emotions and characters. She does little in the way of research, making how I approached this book harder for me.

After some back and forth, she told me to go with my research on mining towns and I decided to set my characters in her town as little as I could, that way I could research what I needed and work with the historical information I had.  I used information I'd gathered from my spirit trilogy about how a woman deals with her menstrual cycle. I contacted the Helena, Montana assay office to discover if there would be markings on gold bouillon from their office and discovered the size of the bricks of gold to determine how much could be carried by one man and a horse or mule.

I needed to discover what would bring a woman to a mining town that had only ten women, two of which worked at the saloon. The town was crude and had few amenities. I decided she was coming because her father died without telling her where to find a gold mine he’d talked about in letters. The heroine started taking care of her ailing mother at a young age. After her mother’s death her father left and at the age of seventeen she took care of her three siblings. The letter Isaac sends her about their father’s death is her wings to freedom. She leaves the farm in her brother’s hands and heads to Montana to find the gold mine her father talked about and gain her financial freedom from family and hard work.

Isaac doesn’t want anything to do with her, making for a lot of butting head’s when she arrives in Sweetwater Springs. 

Isaac: Letters of Fate

Historical western filled with steamy romance and the rawness of a growing country.

Alamayda Wagner’s life has left her cynical, but also vigilant, and that’s what propels her to Morgan’s Crossing, Montana in order to uncover the secrets her father took to his grave. She quickly discovers her only hope includes trusting Isaac Corum. That soon proves to be expensive, and not just financially. 

The last thing Isaac Corum needs or wants is a snooty woman telling him he didn’t do enough to save her father, which is what her letter implied. He’d helped the man more than most people would have, and swears he won’t go out of his way like that again. He’ll meet her at the Sweetwater Springs train station, deliver her father’s belongings, and send her back the way she came.

But, dang it all, the woman doesn’t do a single blasted thing she’s told, and Isaac can’t just sit back and let her go traipsing off into the mountains alone…

Buy Link: http://amzn.com/B01BL0HKJQ

 

 Reader Review:

Review: Beautiful western romance! 4.5 stars
I really liked Paty Jager's, 2nd story in her Letters of Fate series. She didn't disappoint me with, Montana Sky: Isaac!
Her characters, Isaac and Alamayda, were charming! I like how their relationship evolved! Again, it's well written, and filled with romance, adventure and twists and turns.

Taming Jenna Video and Info

Charlene is visiting my blog as part of a blog tour. She will be giving 3 copies of Taming Jenna to random participants, and on the 15th she'll be giving a $30 gift card to the person who visits the most blogs and comments. 

PARTICIPANTS FOR CHARLENE’S COVER REVEAL

http://acrosstheplainofshiningbooks.blogspot.com/ 12^th

http://cathymansell.blogspot.com 12^th

http://www.laramsey.com/ 12th

http://wordwranglers.blogspot.com/ 11^th

http://www.charleneraddon.blogspot.com/ 12th

http://carolineclemmons.blogspot.com 12th

http://elizabethdelisi.blogspot.com/ 12th

http://susanhorsnell.com 12^th

^{http://peggylhenderson.blogspot.com/}

http://writingdreams.net/?p=1360  12th

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^{http://sheiladeeth.blogspot.com  12th}

http://alisonhenderson.blogspot.com  12^th

http://lisaday.weebly.com/now-blogging.html 

http://vintagevonnie.blogspot.com/ 14th

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Taming Jenna Blurb:

THE WRONG MAN  

Deserted by her father at the tender age of seven, Jenna Leigh-Whittington had taught herself to ride, shoot, brawl…and steer clear of the opposite sex. But now, in a lonely Utah canyon, the Pinkerton agent has drawn her gun on a rugged stranger—only to discover that, far from the dangerous outlaw she’d been tracking, he is Branch McCauley, hired gun…and the most irresistible rascal ever to tempt and torment a woman!

THE RIGHT WOMAN          

If there’s one thing McCauley trusts less than a female, it’s a female who packs a six-gun. But what a woman! Vowing to bring the sensuous hellcat to heel, McCauley has no inkling that their passionate battle of wills has just begun. Taming Jenna will be the most seductive—and satisfying—job he’s ever taken on.

Taming Jenna Excerpt: 

Jenna scowled as she studied the man by the flickering glare of his campfire. He had the right build and appeared close to thirty, Mendoza's age. But something didn't fit.

The Denver police chief had described her quarry as a spoiled aristocrat, too busy wooing Lady Luck and every other female to be much of a train robber, let alone a killer. But the rogue in front of Jenna looked too lean and hard to be spoiled, too wary and aloof to be a ladies' man.

To Jenna he seemed the perfect gunslinger: cold, tough, and ready to spring. Like a big yellow cougar perched on a ledge. Or a rattler, tightly coiled. Either way, his bite would be deadly.

In spite of the cool night breeze, sweat oozed from her pores. She couldn't forget that lightning draw. Why had she come here? How had she expected to take an outlaw Pinkerton's other agents had failed to bring in? No, she refused to think that way. She was every bit as capable as any man to capture Mendoza. She had to believe that, the same way she had to do what she'd set out to do. Only one question remained: Was this Mendoza or not?

"Who are you, mister?"

"Who am I? Hell, who are you? "

Blast! Did no male exist in this empty wilderness who wasn't so taken with himself that he couldn't cooperate for a change?

She took a calming breath. A body could catch more flies with honey than vinegar, old Charley Long Bow used to say. Jenna figured flies might fancy the hairy creature facing her, so she decided to try being friendly. "Listen, I smelled your coffee and hoped you might spare a cup, is all. You can understand me being a mite leery of walking into a stranger's camp without knowing who I'm hooking up with."

Firelight glinted on the man's straight white teeth as his whiskers parted in a cold smile. "Don't recall inviting company, but I'll play your game. Name's Branch McCauley. Now it's your turn."

His smile unnerved her. It held no humor, only a lethal sort of grimness that cannoned her stomach into her throat and made her wish she'd wired William Pinkerton for instructions instead of going off half-cocked this way. "I'm Jim...Jim White," she lied.

"All right, Jim, how about some honesty? You come here looking for me?"

"I'm not looking for anyone named Branch McCauley. If that's who you are, you've nothing to worry about."

The wide, innocent eyes McCauley studied held honesty. He relaxed. "In that case...be glad to pour you some coffee." He reached for the battered graniteware pot. His visitor's next words froze him in a half-stoop: "I'd feel more welcome if you'd set aside your gun first."

Cool as Montana sleet, McCauley straightened, hand poised above his holster. "Reckon you would. Wouldn't do much for my sense of well-being, though."

So much for trying to be friendly, Jenna thought. What now? She clenched her knees together to still their shaking and swallowed the fear knotted in her throat.

"Look." McCauley shifted his weight to one leg. "Why don't you put your gun away and have a sit? Could be I might know something about the hombre you're hunting.

Hombre. Sounded Spanish. Like Mendoza. It must be him. She had to get his gun away from him. Surprise seemed the best means. She squeezed the trigger of the .44 Starr. The bullet kicked dirt onto the man's scuffed boots. He jumped and let out a yelp as though she'd set his feet afire.

"Dammit, kid, going up against me won't get you anything but a six-foot hole in the ground."

"Shut up and toss over your gun or I'll turn them boots into sieves. 'Course, my sights might be a bit off." She raised the muzzle toward his groin.

"You made your point," he growled as he unbuckled his gun belt and tossed it over.

Instead of the fancy weapon she had expected a gunslinger to own, an ordinary, six-gun lay at her feet. No ivory handle or engraved barrel. Only an ordinary .44 Peacemaker, crafted and worn for one reason—to kill. The thought did funny things to her innards.

"All right," she said, getting back to business. "You aren't going to like this, mister, but I don't know any other way to be sure who you are. Drop them trousers to your ankles."

"Do what?"

All about Charlene Raddon

Charlene Raddon began her fiction career in the third grade when she announced in Show & Tell that a baby sister she never had was killed by a black widow spider. She often penned stories featuring mistreated young girls whose mother accused of crimes her sister had actually committed. Her first serious attempt at writing fiction came in 1980 when she woke up from a vivid dream that compelled her to drag out a portable typewriter and begin writing. She’s been at it ever since. An early love for romance novels and the Wild West led her to choose the historical romance genre but she also writes contemporary romance. At present, she has five books published in paperback by Kensington Books (one under the pseudonym Rachel Summers), and four eBooks published by Tirgearr Publishing. 

Charlene’s awards include: RWA Golden Heart Finalist, Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice Award Nomination, Affair de Coeur Magazine Reader/Writer Poll for Best Historical of the Year. Her books have won or place in several contests.

Currently, Charlene is working on her next release. 

Links:

htp://www.charleneraddon.com/

http://www.charleneraddon.blogspot.com/

https://www.facebook.com/CharleneRaddon
http://www.twitter.com/CRaddon

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1232154.Charlene_Raddon

http://www.amazon.com/Charlene-Raddon/e/B000APG1P8/