Yuquot history on display

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Along some of the most isolated and harsh coastal areas of the Pacific Ocean, there lived Aboriginal people who were caught in the midst of a European power struggle during the colonial era.

The Yuquot were protected from the winds and elements by living in Nootka Sound, one of the few areas secure enough to withstand the direct pounding of the Pacific. This isolation, however, wasn't enough to prevent the English and Spanish landing in the late 18th Century.

The history of this tribe is now on display at the Vancouver Museum. Along with artifacts dating back at least a century, there are excerpts of the tribe's agenda paper on display that detail an almost forgotten part of First Nations and Canadian history.

The Yuquot were adept at both the skills needed to make a living at sea and from the land. The tribe fished for whale and salmon, but it also hunted deer and foraged for berries inland.

Their territory, located over half the west coast of Vancouver Island, also became a centre of diplomacy among all Aboriginal travellers in the area. Other tribes passing through would present gifts to the chief in order to request a safe passage.

With European exploration of the Pacific, significant changes were in store.

Curator of anthropology at the museum, Lynn Maranda, believes the Yuquot were important in the scheme not only of Aboriginal history, but Canada's history as well.

"They were the first people in contact with early European explorers here (on the Pacific Northwest coast). It's where (England's) James Cook docked in 1778 in Nootka Sound, and that was Yuquot territory," said Maranda.

The Spanish followed, and built their only fort on Canadian soil in 1789. Tension between these colonial powers rose, almost to the point of war, until the Spanish withdrew six years later.

Although there was no threat of a European war in Nootka Sound, the Yuquot were no better off. Their pre-colonization population of 3,000 was decimated by diseases to one-tenth by the late 19th Century.

The greatest cultural slight occurred in 1906 when the tribe's Whalers' Washing House was removed by famed anthropologist Franz Boas and sent to the American Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. It has been noted the spirit of the Yuquot has become uneasy since the theft.

Director of cultural and heritage resources for the Mowachaht-Muchalaht First Nations, Margarita James said the Yuquot were misunderstood by the colonists and later historians.

"When the Spanish government presented our community with two stained glass windows for our church (in 1956), our people were in the background while captains Vancouver and Quadra were in the foreground," James said.

Continued misfortune has plagued the Yuquot since the removal of the Whaling House. Relocated by the federal government from Nootka Sound in 1966 to the Ahaminaquus reserve near Gold River, that site was less than four hectares. Only one family, out of a tribal population of 300, lives on the original site of the Yuquot people, while the rest live on a one square kilometre reserve at Tsaxana.

To try to change the fortunes of this almost forgotten tribe, James described the efforts towards repatriating the Whaling House back to its home on the Pacific. At the request of the Historic Site Board of Canada, the tribe wrote an agenda paper in 1997 that was presented to Parks Canada.

According to James, the American Museum doesn't recognize foreign laws when dealing with its cultural objects. However, there are steps to repatriate the House to the Makah tribe in Neah Bay, Washington, which has blood relations with the Yuquot, before the artifacts return to their rightful home.

"If we're going to return it to whence the shed came, then it will be encased in a crypt-like structure," said James, pointing out there's no point putting the building in the Gold River area, even though that's where most of the tribe resides now.

The history of the Yuquot will remain on display a the Vancouver Museum at least through the end of September. For more information, call (604) 736-4431.