Trip to the Delaware Water Gap National Park

by CeCe Biggoose

A trip to the Delaware Water Gap National Park came to life in July when five Delaware teens, ages 14 to 17, embarked on a 12-day journey of their lifetimes. The trip made possible by the tribal leaders of the Delaware Tribe of Indians, including the help of Greg Brown and Brice Obermeyer, Delaware Nation of Anadarko, Stockbridge Munsee of Wisconsin, the National Park Service, Cultural Preservation committees, archeologists, professors, many elders, leaders, volunteers and so many people behind the scenes who envisioned, discussed, planned, set aside funds, wrote grants for this special event. The vision of this event spanned a decade or more.

This Summer Youth camp made it possible for our future generation of tribal leaders to see through their eyes, learn through their hearts and minds, experience hiking through their original homelands. An experience the youth never envisioned possible, none of the youth groups had ever flew on a plane or traveled so far from home!

The trip attendees from our tribe included Cece Biggoose as the chaperone. Youth ambassadors were Tiana Long, Shu-Day Johnson-Biggoose, Hopie Thicknail, Kamren Pisachubbe, and Michaela Provence. They were joined by the Delaware Nation and the Stockbridge Munsee youth groups at the Pocono Environmental Education Center, where the groups were provided yurts to stay in and daily meals and snacks. PEEC and their staff provided the youth with educational environmental hikes throughout the trails surrounding their youth camp facilities. It was a very busy place! Check out the Facebook pages and websites for both the PEEC and Delaware Water Gap National Park (www.peec.org and www.nps.gov/dewa/).

Linda Poolaw, an elder of Delaware Nation, flew up for the first day to pray and smudge all with our sacred cedar. She explained the importance of this trip to everyone who participated. She provided us with spiritual guidance. She was one of many elders, including our own leaders, who envisioned this event. She explained to us why we were there. She took us to the reburial site and we prayed.

National Park Service (NPS) employees were our personal guides throughout entire the visit. We were treated like royalty and given the red carpet treatment. More than once we were told, “You are the very reason we love the jobs we do to preserve and protect your history.” The NPS employees were so enthused to share their experiences with us and learned from our youth as well. The youth groups said it made them very proud to hear how much our visit meant to the NPS. Our youth presented the Superintendant of NPS at Delaware Water Gap a gift, our Tribal Flag.

A castle called Grey Towers was an impressive visit due to the origins and history of National Parks. We were the honored guests at an ice cream social, set up like an extravagant affair, specially prepared for the youth on the first day touring the area in a chartered bus!

The groups camped on the river, canoed 18 miles over a two-day journey down the beautiful Delaware River, stopping along the way at various important sites where our ancestors lived many, many years before anyone else inhabited the area, rich in natural beauty, plentiful in food and water. Understanding, sadly, that was the very reason we were killed, forcibly removed or fled our homelands.

So many learning experiences made possible, including a field trip to an important archeological dig site conducted by Temple University students and archeologists. The youth received hands on experience. The teens actually found arrowheads, tools, points, and items! They were so focused, to see them was amazing. All finds were logged and placed in bags with other archeological finds, tools our ancestors made by hand hundreds and hundreds of years before any other people invaded our original homelands. They learned the basics of pottery making and shown pottery our ancestors made. They will ship the pottery the teens made back soon.

The groups swam and fished thanks to the NPS guides. They visited the Historic Preservation archives and viewed items donated, found, protected in climate controlled buildings, not available to the public for viewing. A night hike to a beautiful waterfall and viewed stars through telescopes was fun. They hiked a portion of the Appalachian Trail to an overlook. They met with biologists researching turtles affected by disturbed natural habitat due to the huge power lines overhead.

NPS set up a Career Day to show all the different roles they have in protecting our natural resources and the wildlife and the many people who visit the area. They encouraged our youth to check out opportunities such as internships for youth in the park. They want Delaware youth to return and work in their original homelands for the National Park Service.

In return, the youth took pictures of all their experiences with GoPro cameras provided to each groups by NPS. The youth collaborated together and made a short picture presentation of their own for the NPS. Tiana Long brought her Delaware clothes to wear during the presentation. The trip ended with a smudging and prayer ceremony conducted by Cece Biggoose, Shuday and WeeKah, who built the fire, burned cedar and fanned all who attended before our journey home. Many good words, handshakes, hugs, feelings expressed, a special prayer by Larry Hilaire, tears flowed from youth and adults alike. That is how awesome this trip was. Lifetime friends were made and history was made once again. We brought back gifts of heirloom Indian corn, tobacco seeds, beans and earth from our homelands.The youth presented items at Tribal Council and shook hands with their Delaware leaders thanking them for this wonderful experience.

A planning committee is working together with the chaperones to plan and prepare for next summer’s Youth Camp. I hope this event is the first of many for our future, our Delaware youth.

Wanishi!!
CeCe Biggose
cbiggoose@delawaretribe.org

Great group of Delaware youth headed out to the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area with their fearless Leader, Cece Runnels. (l-r) Cece, Hopie Thicknail, Kamren Pisachubbe, Kayla Provence, ShuDay Johnson Biggoose, Tiana Long.