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Olden Days
As told by
Barbara Norman to Jeff McMullen |
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I was born in We had a big tent that we lived in.
then, when I was two or three years old my dad built a house himself. I lived
there as long as I can remember. We used to go back and forth between here
and Willie,
Ephim, and Jennie, the three of them they were born here in Port Graham, and
I and Melanie, we were born in My dad was a fisherman in Kenai, he
and a fisherman in Kenai, he and my two uncles, they did not use skiffs with
machines. They never had an outboard when we needed grub, they would go and
buy it from Seldovia. And when they used to go hunting out on the bidarkas
from here to Port lock and onto Port Dick.
The bidarkas are a kayak made out of seal skins. They used to go down
in fall and come back with seal and ducks. They used to go down and get the
ducks and duck eggs. They used to bring lots of seal. That’s what we used to
live on. We live on the wild stuff in the woods, berries, wild turnips, and
wild rice. Wild turnips are just like beans. Under the fern, there they used to dig them
up and cut them up and cook them, just like beans. Wild rice,
they used to dig them and put them away for winter. We got
most of our stuff from the woods and the only stuff we buy is sugar, flour,
tea, and dry fruit. There wasn’t much stuff. We
never used to use cough medicine. Dad and Mom used to go on the woods and get
some tree gum and make us chew it, and skin these trees and take that white
stuff inside and boil them, then make us drink it. And these goose tongues
they used to eat. Wild celery, (kangkaag), people used to eat them and
there’s wild rhubarb all over around here.
They used to make jam out of them. They used
to dry fish, smoke them salt them for the winter and bear meat too. Seal meat
too. Seal meat they used to salt to salt and put away in barrels. Many years
ago they used spears. The old man (90 years old), he used to tell us, but
they quit that stuff and now they use guns. Lots of
poor people used to live on Barbara. They had on house like us. We had on
houses like us. We had a house in English Bay and here in Port Graham. And
these people, they had hardly anything, they just live on the Barbara. Most of the old people was using them
skin kayaks, but my dad and my uncle, they had big dories to go fishing. They
had no outboards, just muscles. You should see Grandpa, our dad, a big guy,
way taller than Marvin, nothing but muscle. He used to start out five in the
morning and come back at four in the evening with grub. People used to be
strong in them days. Now they don’t exercise enough. That’s all they did, cut
wood with the cross cut saws. That’s why they were so strong. They wasn’t
like these boys now, they were big, husky people.
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Copyright 1981, Volume 1 |
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