A submission by the now late Tseshaht artist and cultural crusader Dr. George Clutesi to the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences has now been uncovered amidst a mountain of testimony collected from other First Nations agencies.
Tseshaht research and planning associate Darrell Ross said the details of Clutesi’s journey to Victoria to make the case for preserving First Nations ceremonies and culture are well known.
On Oct. 28, 1949, Clutesi was scheduled to speak before Governor General Vincent Massey, but things didn’t go entirely according to plan.
“He hitchhiked to Victoria. He said he had to be there by 10 [a.m.], but he didn’t make it till 2 [p.m.],” Ross said.
Clutesi might have missed out on testifying entirely, but for the intervention of Massey, whose brother Raymond was a well-known film star. Already a noted painter of First Nations cultural life, Clutesi had made regular appearances on the CBC since 1947 sharing traditional Nuu-chah-nulth stories, and the Governor General had looked forward to his testimony.
“Massey saw him come in and said, ‘You must be George Clutesi. We’ll fit you in this afternoon,’” Ross said.
Officially, Clutesi spoke as a delegate from the Fraser Canyon Indian Arts & Crafts Society, sandwiched between the Citizens of Greater Victoria and the B.C. Indian Arts and Welfare Society. The testimonies were archived in typed form, with no cross-referencing to allow the searcher to locate individual submissions.
“When I looked, there was 10,000 pages of testimony, so I couldn’t find it,” Ross said, adding that he only recently discovered the Fraser Canyon Indian Arts connection.
In his testimony, Clutesi got right to the point, telling the committee that he had devoted his life to reviving the cultural and spiritual life of the Nuu-chah-nulth people.
“I have tried to put on canvas what my people lived for, what they accomplished, the dances they created and so forth. It is an art that has been almost entirely forgotten, and if it isn’t revived or preserved, it will be forgotten altogether,” Clutesi testified.
He made the case that “the Art of the Indians of British Columbia, including the natives of the West Coast of Vancouver Island,” was “100 per cent Canadian,” and worthy of preservation all through the Dominion.
“In other words, it should be taught again to the Indian himself by the proper authorities,” Clutesi said.
Upping the ante, Clutesi blasted the efforts to date “to educate the Indian,” at great expense.
“To educate him on what?” he demanded. “Up until today, in a way of speaking, it has been just to say ‘hello,’ ‘yes sir.’ It has been just the rudiments of English.”
Clutesi said First Nations people had already proven they could stand on equal footing with Europeans in the forest and fishing industries, and made the case that Ottawa must help “prepare the Indian to stand on equal terms in the realm of social life, not just in labour.”
He reminded the commissioners that provincial laws prohibited aboriginal people from expressing their true selves.
“Without that feeling in our hearts, we are going to be a lost race for the rest of our lives,” Clutesi warned.
While not rejecting the concept of residential schools entirely, Clutesi urged the commissioners to promote the introduction of more day schools to serve First Nations communities, and wherever possible, to integrate aboriginal children into the mainstream school system, to allow them to study side by side with their “white brethren.”
“That experiment is taking place now in my home-town of Alberni, and the white child and the Indian child get along tremendously well and I think they have, in both instances, a world to learn from the other,” he said.
Ross said that, while Clutesi didn’t specifically address the provincial potlatch laws to the federal commission, his demand for recognition and support for First Nations culture helped put the repeal of the laws in motion.
“He said Massey told him to ‘go home and dance.’” Ross said.
Clutesi did just that, putting together a group that included Nina Peters, Jimmy Gallic, Gus Tuutiismus, Mrs. Tommy Bill and Mabel Yokum, to name a few.
“They called the group the Somass Native Echoes,” Ross said.
The group began practicing, learning everything from scratch, and when Clutesi heard about an opportunity to perform before Princess Elizabeth during a visit to Victoria, he jumped on it.
“A group from the Cowichan Tribes was scheduled to perform, but they weren’t ready,” Ross said.
Clutesi promised his dancers would be ready, and in October 1951, with CBC cameras capturing the scene in colour, the Tseshaht dancers delivered a polished performance, to the obvious delight of the Princess.
That 1951 Technicolour footage represents a significant milestone. It is the moment a future queen witnessed cultural acts that, short years earlier, had been prohibited by law, and she saw that they were good.
Ross said one of Clutesi’s great gifts was the ability to recognize the right moment to act. He would go on to great personal renown for his painting, his writings and his acting, but the common thread running through his life was the drive to make First Nations art and culture part of the consciousness of every Canadian.
“George Clutesi was a visionary; one of the founders of the re-establishment of Tseshaht culture and identity,” Ross said. “There was a part of our culture that our people felt shouldn’t be shared. He stuck his neck out and put it out there for the world to see, because for a long time, there were risks to revealing culture. He had the courage to say, ‘We have to get our culture out there.’”
As the Truth and Reconciliation hearings at Maht Mahs Gym on March 12 and 13 revealed, the abuses and the discrimination against First Nations people and culture continued well after Clutesi made his case to Canada’s representative of the Queen. Now, 63 years after being told to “go home and dance,” there are clear signs that his message of cultural and spiritual renewal is being taken seriously.
