Life of Oronhyatekha coming to the ROM

Page 10

A unique 19th century man who embodied social change while adhering to the status quo amid the strictures of a class-ridden social pecking order in Eastern Canada, used his influence to challenge the limits of conventional Victorian values to an extent that was viewed as exceptional well into the 20th century.

His life is the focus of a living history exhibit that will open at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto on March 2 and will run until Aug. 2.

Named Mohawk Ideals, Victorian Values: Oronhyatekha, M.D. contains artifacts and memorabilia that reflect the complex nature of this great scholar, entrepreneur and Indian rights advocate. It's living history because Oronhyatekha has descendants who can still share oral tradition on the nature of his life and his possessions.

The exhibit is being showcased in co-operation with the Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford, Ont., which sent some of its own 220-piece collection to the ROM.

Oronhyatekha, a name this great Mohawk preferred over his baptismal name of Peter Martin, was born on the Six Nations of the Grand River in 1841. After he married Ellen Hill, he lived at Tyendinaga. He died in 1907 of heart disease related to diabetes.

In an era when women, children and minorities had few legal rights, when Indian culture was considered to be dying out and assimilation was considered the better way to go, when only wealthy or well-placed people got a higher education, the Mohawk doctor Oronhyatekha went against the grain. First he got an elite education, then he became a teacher and a successful businessman who was sought out by high society, and he lobbied for social and legislative change where he saw people oppressed.

Oronhyatekha is believed to have been the first Native medical doctor in Canada, and certainly when he graduated from the University of Toronto's medical school in 1867, he was one of the first Native people to do so. He obtained part of his education in two colleges in the United States before that and he taught for a while at Tyendinaga. When Oronhyatekha was 19, at the request of the Six Nations leaders, he gave the welcoming address to the Prince of Wales when he visited Canada.

He never seemed to miss an opportunity to advance himself. As a result of meeting and impressing the prince's physician, Henry Wentworth Auckland, Oronhyatekha was introduced into the circles that allowed him to study for a time at Oxford University.

The young doctor opened his first medical practice in Napanee in 1867 and five years later he became chairman of the Grand Indian Council, which brought in reserves from Ontario and Quebec.

In 1878 he also joined the Ancient Order of Foresters, which was a fraternal life insurance company run a bit like a secret society with Masonic overtones, sources say. Oronhyatekha became part of the group that established the Independent Order of Foresters (IOF), as it is known today. In 1881 Oronhyatekha became the first elected Supreme Chief Ranger and remained head of the organization for 26 ears. During his tenure, the IOF expanded throughout Europe, Australia and the United States.

Oronhyatekha conducted himself throughout in accordance with Mohawk values, which stress reciprocity in all facets of life. He remained in close association with his own people and elevated his Native heritage rather than downplayed it as so many others have done. Oronhyatekha was so far out in front that he seems not to have had to concern himself with fitting in. People wanted to be in his company and they respected his ideas.

Keith Jamieson from the Six Nations spoke about his role in selecting things to go in the exhibit.

"That took me five years of my life to do that.

"It actually didn't start as an exhibit. It was actually sort of an inventory. Dr. O had a major, major, huge collection that he collected over his lifetime and most of it went to the IOF, and when he died they gifted it to the ROM. That was in 1911. There was 800 or 900 piecesin this collection."

Jamieson said the ROM dispersed the pieces throughout the museum. Because the doctor had travelled all over the world, the pieces he brought back went into collections affiliated with those countries, including the Far East, Africa, Australia and New Zealand. In 1996, Jamieson's job was to find the pieces in about eight different departments. Only the ethnology/anthropology department, which is now curator Trudy Nicks' purview, had catalogued the pieces that had been Oronhyatekha's as his own. Ultimately, Jamieson said they located 240 to 250 pieces they could identify as belonging to Oronhyatekha.

The exhibit will feature about 115 pieces from the ROM; the remainder will come from the communities Oronhyatekha was associated with, Tyendinaga and Six Nations of the Grand River.

Jamieson found that some pieces that had not been deemed very valuable had been discarded. The Ontario College of Art got some, and so did Oronhyatekha's descendants. Dr. Oronhyatekha had family at the Six Nations reserve and at Tyendinaga near Belleville, Ont. Some of his estate was bequeathed to them; some was auctioned off.

On the other hand, an item of rare worth was found in a vault in the Los Angeles County Museum in California, which had purchased it in the 1920s.

It is the traditional suit of clothing Oronhyatekha had made for his 6-foot, 3-inch frame when he was 19, and which he wore when he made his address to the son of the "Great Mother." That will be part of the exhibit.

Another thing the ROM has found in quantity are medals that Oronhyatekha had struck for distribution to people who joined the fraternal society IOF when he was part of that.

Jamieson said although it can often be difficult to identify items in private collections, in this case, people often had stories connected to the objects, which had been told by Dr. Oronhyatekha.

"He had enormous strength of character; he was intelligent and determined," is how curator Trudy Nicks describes Oronhytekha.

Nicks said this collection does a great deal to explain the relationship of Native people to the British of the 19th century. For instance, among the pieces is a small wampum belt relating to the agreement between William Penn and the Delaware Nation in the United States. They also have a replica of the coronation chair from Westminster Abbey; the adventuresome doctor attended the coronation of Edward VII.

As a result of his marriage to Ellen Hill, her father J. W. Hill gave Oronhyatekha an island in the Bay of Quinte. It was there in 1904, with the backing of the IOF, that Oronhyatekha established an orphanage. It opened in 1906 and closed a year later, but the doctor considered it his major achievement.