Slices of 17th century life on display at Mashantucket museum
Mashantucket — Leah Hopkins, a member of the Narragansett Tribe, sat beneath a shade arbor outside the Mashantucket Pequot Museum & Research Center Saturday morning, preparing to make a traditional native dish called "nasamp" out of corn meal, strawberries and maple syrup.
The smoke from two ducks roasting on a stick-built spit wafted by on the breeze as Hopkins' husband, Jonathan Perry of the Wampanoag tribe of Aquinnah, deftly trimmed the greenery off a branch and added it to the arbor to shield "the kitchen" from the heat of the afternoon.
The couple were taking part in a 17th century encampment hosted by the Pequots, but Hopkins said that, unlike some of the other demonstrators, who were re-enactors dressed up in reproductions of the period clothing and carrying replica weapons or other trappings of the time, the native ways are a part of life for her family.
"We love doing this event," she said. "We do it every year. It's nice to represent ourselves as native people. This is part of our lives, as opposed to re-enacting."
She wore deerskin moccasins she had made as a teen — a skill that was passed down by her parents, she said — and said she would soon be making a skirt out of three beaver pelts that were serving as a table cloth of sorts.
She said that at home in North Providence, R.I., she and her husband would roast a duck in their fire pit, which she admitted was purchased at a big box store.
Nearby, Mashantucket Pequot Tribal member David Fire Arrow sat cross-legged inside a lean-to and used a hammer-shaped stone to chip away at a quahog shell.
For the past 27 years, he said, he has been making wampum jewelry from the clam shells in the traditional way, a craft not practiced by many.
Using a thick, square slab of granite as a work bench, he held the shell with his feet and used a stick with a flint on the end to begin the hourslong process of drilling a hole for a string or chain.
Next he would use a smooth stone from the river to shape the shell and eventually polish it with a basalt stone, which he said is found only in Maine.
The quahogs in the Long Island Sound area have the best coloring and natural gloss, according to Fire Arrow.
Traditionally, he said wampum was given to a child upon his acceptance into the tribe, as well as during marriage ceremonies and other sacred events.
"We wore it as decoration," he said. "It was hard to make. We wore it as a prized possession."
After contact with the Europeans, strings of wampum were used for trade, he said.
Elsewhere, visitors watched basket making, pottery, weaving and archery demonstrations, and a group followed the museum's research director, Kevin McBride, into the woods for a short hike to a King Philip's War-era Pequot fort located on the reservation.
The Salem Trayned Band, colonial militia re-enactors, demonstrated their skills with long thrusting spears called pikes.
Marina Gil of Wellesley, Mass., and her daughter, 11-year-old history lover Rebeca Kamens-Gil, lingered at many of the stations to chat with the presenters.
"The explanations were very detailed," the daughter said.
"The preparation and knowledge is impressive," said the mother. "It was nice to actually speak with a Native American."
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