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Over these past couple of years while we have all been having to deal with Covid-19, we have missed being able to share our mother Alice “Wətanmy” Sampson's culture with you all. As many of you know each year we gather to honour the teachings of our ancestors on the Nez Perce side of our heritage. Alice “Wətanmy” Sampson was born into the Nez Perce Nation in Ahsahka, Idaho.
She was very proud of her heritage, but when she came to marry our Father Francis Sampson, she let go of the teachings of the Nez Perce ways and lived our Father’s cultural practices & way of life (Coast Salish). When our Father passed away our Mother began visiting our family in Idaho and returned to the powwow. She passed on her teachings of the powwow to her children, and today we carry on those traditions, and we teach them to our children and grandchildren. Throughout this weekend we will share just a little of Mother's cultural ways.
Our Mother always put an emphasis on education for all of us and she had a passion for supporting children in sports. She supported all of us in whatever sport we wanted to play. She supported us in soccer, basketball, lacrosse, the war canoe races, volleyball, track and field, swimming, and the longhouse teachings. She was our greatest advocate with our education, in our sports and of course our culture. She was always there for each of us.
Today as we welcome you into our WSÁNEĆ First Nation’s territory and into our powwow circle we will share just a small portion of what our Mother passed on to us. It is our hope that you enjoy all that witness and participate in, and that you come away with a little understanding of our way of life and our cultural practices. We thank you for taking the time to come to our powwow, and we hope that you have fun making new friends and greeting your old ones.
If this is the first time you have been to our family's powwow, we welcome you to participate in the intertribal dancing & encourage you to check out all of the vendor’s wares, as there is so much to see and buy. If there is something, you do not understand please make your way to the Emcee stand and he will help you familiarize yourself with the protocol of the powwow circle. There are specific rules and traditional practices around the powwow circle, and we encourage you to ask for clarification around powwow protocol.
More than anything we hope that you are treated with kindness and respect and in the spirit of friendship, we hope that you will want to return to our family's powwow next year.
In friendship,
Wətanmy’s children, grandchildren, great grandchildren & great, great grandchildren.
"[The Honouring Wətanmy Powwow] has grown into one of the largest cultural events on the Saanich Peninsula, drawing about 5,000 visitors every year from Western Canadian provinces as well as Washington state, Idaho, Oregon and Montana.
The event is flush with performances by drummers, competitive powwow dancers and vendors from across the Pacific Northwest; it honours and celebrates important traditions of generations past.
This weekend’s powwow originates in Idaho through Sampson’s mother, whose traditional name is Wutawnty [Wətanmy].
[Angel] Sampson said that her grandmother was part of the Nez Perce nation’s now-legendary attempted flight to Canada led by Chief Joseph in 1877, a 1,900-kilometre fighting retreat that was stopped by the U.S. Army just before the border in Montana.
“She was a little girl when her mom said to her, ‘pretend you got hit by the soldier’s bullets and fall to the ground. The horses will jump over us, and when they get far enough away, we can go and hide in the woods and make our way back home,’ ” she said."
From Times Colonist Article "A second generation steps up for intertribal powwow that brings out thousands" by Michael John Lo
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