Little Egypt Heritage Articles (c) Bill Oliver 27 June 2004 Vol 3 Issue: #24 ISBN: pending Osiyo, Good Evening Ladies and Gentlemen of Little Egypt, [Continued from Vol 3 #23, 20 June 2004] There is nothing quite so terrible as disappointment to an eight year old. When you have your heart set on digging for dinosaur bones and your find out that that activity isn't going to take place as advertise it can be earth shattering. Our grandson let his disappointment be known in loud bursts of guttural noises that could be heard in any county surrounding us. From in front of us was a young paleontologist, Chris Ott, who offered to, as a substitute, take us all on a behind the scenes tour of the museum where he worked. And, what a grand tour it was. We got to peak at rows and rows of specimens, all "neatly" packaged and stored in drawers or on shelves. It could be compared to the Catacombs in Rome, Italy. No, this was more exciting, for we saw bones in many stages of being restored to the "light of day". Fossils of dinosaurs, some of which we had never heard about, and some even that as yet do not have a name. Setting at the kitchen table of our cottage while writing these words, I gaze out the window and look up the steep hill behind. It reminds me of a similar hill in Falls Church, Virginia. Up at the top of this hill was an outcrop of boulders arranged in such a way that I could sit in solitude and enjoy long periods of "day dreaming" or reading. I see our grandson up this hill leaping from one boulder to another, lost in his own world, reciting information about dinosaurs and dinosaur bones. He may not have been able to "dig" for bones, but he got to touch rare and extinct remains of some mighty giants. I wonder what he will tell his class when he returns to school and the teacher asks him to tell his class what he did during his "summer". Later in the day, after visiting Mount Rushmore for "a few minutes", we visited the Crazy Horse Memorial site. There we spent hours looking at pictures of the Black Hills culture and observing artisans making jewelry, painting pictures, and other symbols of the culture. This included demonstrations of dancing. Our granddaughter is most precocious and is able to walk up to anyone and start a conversation, either by asking a question or making comment. She had some of these artisans telling her the wonderful stories of how things came to be. Her fascination with one young man [Mose J Brings Plenty] was intense, for he sat and told the stories with captivating elocution. She particularly enjoyed the story of how the prairie chicken taught the Lakota how to dance. This story teller sure enjoyed listening to that story teller. <smile> His analogy was nigh perfect and when I next see a Sioux dance I will remember Mr Brings Plenty's story of how it all began. While there I had the distinct pleasure of some in-depth conversation with Mr Del Iron Cloud, a Hunkpapa Sioux. Mr Iron Cloud is an artist of talent. He has a fascinating ability to illustrate several concepts in his works. One particular painting titled "Forget Not The Past" has some notoriety. It portrays a Viet Nam Veteran and his little girl at the Viet Nam Memorial in Washington, D.C. The little girl touches fingers with a shadow youngster of the past. Surrounded by other shadow figures, an Elder offers a bundle of sage through the wall to the veteran, passing the torch as it were, to the modern generation to remember the heritage and forget not all the reasons for maintaining freedoms. What great sensitivity. I understand that Mr Iron Cloud has a web biography. The biography is at: www.lionscampco.org/cloud.html. Many paintings by Mr Iron Cloud can be located by a google search of Del Iron Cloud. On the aluminum siding to the garage of our grandchildren are the remains of the artistic attempts by these recently six and eight year olds. The siding had to be "cleaned" by these two. Mr Iron Cloud related that that paralleled one of his early experiences. He was about five when he used crayons to create his first pictures on the kitchen door. He was also given a bucket of water and a sponge. <grin> [To be continuted] [Continued] e-la-di-e-das-di ha-wi nv-wa-do-hi-ya nv-wa-to-hi-ya-da. (May you walk in peace and harmony) Wado, Bill -=- PostScript: = = = = http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index/SOIL http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index/ILMASSAC http://www.usgennet.org/usa/ne/state/BillsArticles/LittleEgypt/intro.html