The photo above shows the Arnot Forest Totem Pole around 1940.
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) once had a camp in the
Arnot Forest near Cayuta during the Great Depression. The camp belonged to Cornell University and the
university allowed the CCC to make use of the site. Located within the camp was a totem pole from
an Alaskan native village, and the young men in the CCC camp created a strange ritual
involving the totem pole.
In 1899, a wealthy railroad magnate named Edward Harriman took
his family and a number of scientists on a cruise along southeastern Alaska. On board were two Cornell professors, Louis
Feurtes, an ornithological artist, and Bernard Fernow, a forester. The Harriman expedition heard of an abandoned
Tlingit village and decided to investigate it.
The party did not realize that abandonment of the village was only a
temporary measure by the indigenous people, so they decided to help themselves
to the “abandoned” souvenirs. They
grabbed blankets, tools, and masks found in the village. There were also several totem poles. Some of the passengers balked at taking
something as large as a totem pole, but Fernow showed them how to do it, and soon
they were cruising away with most of the totem poles on the deck of their ship.
One of the totem poles ended up at Cornell University. After being displayed in a couple different locations
on campus it ended up at the Arnot Forest location. The Arnot Forest area was gifted to Cornell
in 1927. A lodge was built there and the
totem pole was installed in front of it.
When the site became a CCC camp, the CCC workers spruced up the aging
totem pole by painting it. They eventually
created a ritual around the totem pole as a means to haze new recruits. The new recruits would be awakened at three
in the morning, given a lighted candle to carry, and marched to the totem
pole. There they were instructed to
knell down around it and bump their foreheads on the ground.
The totem pole remained at the site until the 1970s. Over the years the weather and wind took its
toll on the decaying relic. A windstorm
in the late 1970s toppled the totem pole and it broke into pieces. The remnants were gathered up and stored in a
warehouse at Cornell. In 2001, the
fragmented totem pole finally went home again when it was returned to the Tlingits in
Alaska. It is unfortunate that the totem
pole had to be reduced to a crumbling mess before the right thing was finally
done. I don’t imagine that the Tlingits
knell around it and bump their heads on the ground, but I am sure they are glad
to have it back.
For a more thorough telling of the story of the totem pole
check out this website:
