Virtual museum brings artifacts closer to home

May 12, 2013 - By Alejandra Silva, Staff Writer

Lost artifacts of the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes have made a special trip back home from Chicago to be displayed in a kiosk at Central Wyoming College. Lived History-The Wind River Virtual Museum was revealed Saturday to tribe members from the Wind River Indian Reservation, CWC faculty, and other community members.

A collaboration between Wyoming PBS, Alpheus Media and Lord Cultural Resources took Eastern Shoshone elders Ralphaelita Stump and Philbert Mcloud, Northern Arapaho elders Robert Goggles and William C'Hair, Shoshone and Arapaho tribe member Jordan Dresser, and Northern Arapaho tribe member Mikala Sun Rhodes to the Chicago Field Museum where they were able to see artifacts that are more than 100 years old.

The artifacts, ranging from tools to weapons and clothing were gathered by collectors after they were lost by or stolen or taken from their rightful owners years ago. The items ended up at the museum and were boxed away for many decades. The group's journey was filmed and culminated in a 30-minute documentary that was shown Saturday after the unveiling of the virtual museum kiosk.

Making the trip

Before filming began, councils from each of the tribes met with producer Mat Hames to discuss the project and give him the OK.

Hames said he visited the county many times and gradually started to learn more about the reservation and its people. He realized that the descriptions he came across many times from online stories of the reservation were false, and the rumored tension between both tribes was not present with the group. He added that many people told him the tribe members would not travel together in the same bus to the airport.

So when the time came to meet at one location, Hames said he was nervous as he waited for the group, and he was relieved to see everyone arrive and get along well. The group expressed some hesitation about boarding an airplane and flying to Chicago, but most of their fear was set aside as they came together for their history and culture.

Hames's initial goal was to build a virtual museum, but he said he found out it was going to be more than that.

"In the process of working with the elders, they started to make me aware that there was a much bigger story that they wanted told," Hames said.

Hames and his film crew followed the group and captured the emotions of the tribe members as they watched museum staff open the boxes for the first time in many years.

"You gain a deeper appreciation of objects," Sun Rhodes said in the film. "Maybe the younger people can see it and take pride in where they came from. ... It motivates me to learn more about it."

"What I saw right away was something good," Mcloud said when describing his initial reaction as the artifacts were carefully taken out of the boxes.

One artifact that impressed Mcloud was the "Roach" that he described as the "Shoshone hat." He said it was worn by American Indian men, especially as camouflage pieces during wartime. The Arapaho Eagle Wing Fan was described by C'Hair as being used in ceremonies and during prayers.

"It allowed them to hold on when so much was going on around them," Sun Rhodes said in the film about the meaning the artifacts had for his tribal ancestors.

Museum staff were amazed at the knowledge the tribal members shared with them. Some artifacts, per request of the elders, were not filmed because of their sacred values.

"It's not all right with me ... I have mixed emotions," Goggles said in the film after his visit to the museum. "It doesn't belong here."

After the film was shown, Mcloud, Dresser, C'Hair and Hames answered questions and shared their thoughts on the project and journey with the attendees at CWC. Mcloud suggested that historical artifacts from the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes be in one museum on the reservation. Hames said Mcloud had mentioned that same idea earlier in the day.

"He must really mean it, I was surprised. ... I think it's been an evolution for him," Hames said. "I don't think he would've said that a year ago."

Community enjoyed trip to the past

Northern Arapaho tribe member Mary Rose Goggles of Ethete thanked the group for putting together something that would benefit the younger people from the reservation.

"I'm hoping it's going to touch our children and remind them of who they are," she said. "They tend to forget who they are."

She recommended that the stories of more elders be recorded so the memories and history could be remembered long after they're gone. She recalled the stories her grandfathers told her when she was a little girl.

Sun Rhodes's father, Virgil Sun Rhodes, said he enjoyed the film and was happy his daughter was a part of it. He also was glad the film was dedicated to Goggles, who passed away before the completion of the project.

"The knowledge from him is greatly missed," he said, adding that initially Goggles hesitated going on the trip. "But he wanted to let people know."

Rajonna Vega, 29, of Ethete, said she could feel the emotions that the tribe members had felt in their journey.

"It really hits home, you can feel it, you can feel the emotion that comes from it," Vega said. "We have to do our part to teach future generations."

"The screening really adds texture to our understanding of local Native American history," CWC president Jo Anne McFarland said.

Hames is currently working on a longer documentary with some members of the reservation.

"I'll be able to go into the issue of the artifacts more in depth and how they ended so far away from Wind River and some of the different views on bringing them back versus not bringing them back," Hames said, adding that what he enjoyed most during the kiosk project was meeting many friendly tribe members.

The virtual museum can be seen online at or at the Intertribal Education and Community Center at CWC, and the short film will air at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday on Wyoming PBS.

Busy Bees

May 5, 2013 - By Alejandra Silva, Staff Writer

A large shipment from Paradise, Calif., arrived April 27 at the Riverton residence of Doug Newlin. He's a beekeeper, among other things.

Several bee colonies enclosed in two special glass-sided crates had traveled hundreds of miles to arrive at their new home just in time for the start of growing season.

The production of one of America's original sweeteners remains a difficult job for Newlin and another local beekeeper, Arlie Colva. They are the caretakers of thousands of bees, responsible for the production, the lives and the maintenance of the bee communities.

They take their job seriously. Bee stings seem trivial when compared to the more serious challenges beekeepers face, such as the destruction of a complete colony by parasites or the migration of colonies due to a lack of room in their honeycombs.

Honey production

Each year is a new opportunity for the beekeepers to give bees the time to do what they do best -- make honey. The season begins when the flowers bloom. The bees start the process by gathering nectar and pollen from any nearby flowers or in Wyoming's case, the abundant alfalfa. Many rate honey from the Wind River Basin among the best in the nation.

"The thing about Wyoming is we grow a lot of alfalfa, and alfalfa produces a lot of nectar," Newlin said. "That makes mild and light colored honey -- which is the best honey."

Once they either consume the nectar or attach the pollen to their legs, the worker bees return to their honeycombs.

"They're attracted to their queen bee, and it's a miracle how these bees gather and convert it to honey within their bodies," Colva said. "Once they consume the nectar, they deposit it back into the honeycomb -- some people call that 'bee barf.'"

The bees store the nectar or pollen in their honeycomb cells, located in the brood boxes. The brood box -- or the nest -- measures about 12 inches tall and 20 inches long and is made of timber.

A small gap is left open at the bottom of the box and acts as the entrance and exit for the bees. Several worker bees also hang around here to protect their hives and the queen bee.

The boxes can be built in different sizes or out of different material, so long as enough room is left inside to fit the thousands of offspring that can be produced each day by the queen bee. Newlin estimated that roughly 3,000 eggs are laid a day, and he said it takes about 21 days for the eggs to turn into bees.

The boxes hold 10 rectangular frames that sit about an inch or less apart from each other. Each frame is supplied with a thin sheet of beeswax and has hundreds of tiny hexagon shapes across the sheet called "cells."

The sheet is slid into the frame and serves as the foundation that tells the worker bees this is the spot for their honeycombs.

Bees overproduce honey to help them survive through the winter and seasons when no flowers bloom. That surplus honey is what Newlin and Colva take to package. The hives produce more than 60 to 80 pounds of surplus honey in a season.

"Honey bees are just incredible overproducers," Newlin said. "We make sure we leave them enough."

Colva owns Colva Honey Works in Riverton, a business that provides the honey to distribution companies in other states. Newlin likes to give his away to friends.

For Colva, the bees are his career. For Newlin, it's a hobby.

Wind River Honey is another high-volume local producer of honey, packaging and marketing its brand around Wyoming and neighboring states.

Harvesting the honey

As the months go by and the worker bees multiply, Newlin and Colva stack the brood boxes to keep up with the surplus honey. Once the honeycombs are filled to the top, the worker bees create a final layer of wax. When the entire frame is covered with that layer, Newlin and Colva know it is time to extract the honey. They remove the sheet from the frame, take a heated knife and carefully scrape the top layer off. Then they place the frame in a machine that spins and sucks out the honey. After the frame is put back in the box, the bees know to repair those empty combs and get back to work.

Newlin said it is important to keep up with the bees and their honey production.

"If they run out of room, some of them will take off," Newlin said. "It's bad news for beekeepers to have them swarm."

Newlin said if the bees leave, they will create the round bee hive often seen hanging from trees. As a result, the hives become weak and no extra honey is created.

"We try to prevent that by managing the hives so they have enough room, and it doesn't get overcrowded," Colva said.

Beekeeping beginnings

Newlin was a Peace Corps volunteer in Latin America in the 1960s. While there, he built his first brood box for the hives.

"I built a bee hive down there," he said. "I did it all with a saw."

The box, Newlin said, made the extraction of honey safer and more efficient as opposed to harvesting the honey from a tree or logs -- as was the original method.

"You can harvest a hundred without destroying a colony," Newlin said.

Colva's interest in bees began when he watched his father, also a beekeeper, handle bees. Colva now has taught his daughter to manage the hives. His brother also is a beekeeper in Casper.

Bee stings are part of the job. Newlin recalled being stung by five bees who flew into his veil mask at the same time. He said it made him feel light-headed and itchy, and he had to go to the emergency room. But he said the bees are not interested in stinging because they'll die afterward, but if they think a person is threatening their hives, they become aggressive and will sting.

Colva recalled getting stung by up to 100 bees when he was younger. Even so, he still doesn't wear any protective gear when handling the hives. Newlin jokes that it is the "venom" inside Colva's body from over the years that keeps him immune and safe from bee stings. A fearless Colva, equipped with only his denim overalls, agreed with a smile and claimed an additional secret weapon.

"I'm sweet," he said.

Newlin said anyone else approaching the boxes later in the season would have to wear protective gear because the bees are working harder, there are many more bees, and the activity around the boxes increases.

'A very special culture'

Thousands of year ago, honey was used not only to sweeten dishes but was also packaged to take to the afterlife. Ancient Egyptian and Middle Eastern cultures used honey to embalm the dead. For the Mayans, the bee was sacred, and many other cultures used honey for healing purposes as ointment for burns or rashes. In the Jewish tradition, honey is a symbol of the new year. During the Rosh Hashanah celebration, apple slices are dipped into honey in hopes of bringing in a sweet new year.

For Newlin and Colva, caring for the bees also has great meaning. Newlin described the hobby of beekeeping as "good natured, helpful and rewarding."

"It's not everybody's thing, but the people who really get into it enjoy it," Colva said.

"It's actually hard to describe ... there's a goodness to it, you're working with live things," Newlin said. "There's a bit of a culture that goes along with beekeeping - they have a very special culture."

At one point in last year's season, Newlin said the bees harvested about 500 pounds of honey, and then his entire population was wiped out, possibly because of a dangerous parasitic mite that has devastated bees nationwide.

A solution was used to fight the mites, but Newlin said it was not enough to save his colonies. He added that the mites can build up a resistance to the solution.

"We discovered that they were all dead," Newlin said. "You just have to mourn a little bit."

That feeling of mourning, Newlin and Colva said, is a feeling many beekeepers have learned to deal with because survival factors often are out of their control.

Both Newlin and Colva have been friends for a long time and watch out for each other's beehives. Despite the challenges and dangers they face, both agree that bees are essential to the gardens and fields of Riverton.

Class sends care packages

May 5, 2013 - By Alejandra Silva, Staff Writer

A local soldier stationed in Kabul, Afghanistan, will be receiving several care packages soon from Becky Dechert's Riverton High School sophomore English class.

Shoshoni High School graduate Sgt. Michael Dye is a chief warrant officer and counterintelligence technician on assignment for six months in the U.S. Forces-Afghanistan, a subordinate command of the International Security Assistance Force.

"I'm currently the operations officer for a small unit comprised of Army, Navy and Air Force service members, civilians and contractors that work at several locations around Afghanistan," Dye wrote in an e-mail. "Our efforts are part of a much larger program to help promote stability here in Afghanistan."

The students decided to send books, snacks, gum and letters after reading "All Quiet On the Western Front" by Erich Maria Remarque. The book tells the story of a German soldier in World War I who describes the stress of being away from home, finding the courage to fight in battle and the feelings encountered upon returning home.

"I really wanted them to make that connection," Dechert said about encouraging the students to write to the soldiers. "(The soldiers are) disconnected from their civilian lives."

Student Tayln Jones said she wrote about herself and the book in the letter she wrote.

"Not a lot of them receive stuff from home," Jones said. "I wrote that I'm thankful, and I appreciate what they're doing."

She included a small stuffed animal with the other items and asked in the letter that it be given to a little girl in Afghanistan.

Manuel Contreras, a foreign exchange student from Argentina, said that although he is against war, the idea of sending items from home is a kind gesture that will surely bring joy to the soldiers.

"I appreciate the efforts by the students at RHS to think of the more than 60,000 soldiers, airmen, Marines and civilians currently deployed throughout Afghanistan," Dye said. "As a longtime resident of Shoshoni and Fremont County, it's always nice to hear the folks back home remember and think about us."

Dechert said the students will write to Dye and his fellow soldiers once more before the semester ends.

Dye hoisted a US Flag in honor of the RHS Students.  As a surprise for them and Dechert, he's sending the flag back to them with a certificate to show his gratitude.