"This is who we are": Native dancers, storytellers share traditions with visitors

Jul. 23—CHEYENNE — Two days before the opening of this year's "Daddy of 'em All," Sandra Iron Cloud said she was running around trying to get everything ready. Specifically, she was "like a chicken with my head cut off," she said with a laugh.

Iron Cloud is co-coordinator of the Little Sun Drum and Dance Group, which provides dance presentations and educational storytelling within the Indian Village at Cheyenne Frontier Days. Iron Cloud herself has been a storyteller at this CFD event for 15 years.

"We have high expectations of our dancers, because we're representing our people, and we want to do it in a positive way," she said in an interview. "And we want (the dancers) to enjoy it, as well, not be doing it just to be doing it — to live in the moment ... and to show what we are as powwow people with song and dance."

This year, Iron Cloud said, her group is leaning more into in-depth educational displays and presentations alongside the group's traditional oral storytelling. She's planning to have several displays set up inside teepees, including traditional outfits and dolls, diagrams of the parts of a buffalo used by Native people, and set-ups showing how the interior spaces of teepees used to look.

During the school year, Iron Cloud, a member of the Northern Arapaho tribe, is a teacher at Wyoming Indian High School in Ethete. It's located on the Wind River Reservation in the west-central part of the state.

Her son, Samuel Iron Cloud, spoke in an interview about how their demonstrations at CFD are an educational opportunity "to teach people, to show people that we're still here as Native people ... and walk away with a little bit more knowledge that they may not have had before."

Sandra's sister, Aleta Moss, also teaches at the reservation high school. Moss is the co-coordinator of the Little Sun Drum and Dance Group.

Tribes represented at the Indian Village this year will mainly be Northern Plains tribes, Sandra said, primarily Northern Arapaho and Oglala Lakota.

Some of the stories used in the cultural sharing portions come from her great-great-grandfather, who was one of the reservation's first councilmen and its last traditional chief. The stories Sandra and her fellow orators share are from the Northern Plains perspective.

Up close

Interactive elements within the Indian Village were at a minimum in 2021. Visitors from the reservation were acutely aware of the dangers of COVID-19, as the disease had disproportionately killed Native people in the state.

Now, with every member of their drum and dance group fully vaccinated and boosted, and young children able to be vaccinated, as well, Sandra Iron Cloud said they're ready to reintroduce some interactive pieces.

They'll return to more social dancing, but will leave it up to individual dancers as to their comfort level. Sandra said presenters have been told they can wear a mask while dancing. They don't have to participate in the Friendship Dance — when spectators are called into the dance area to join performers — if they feel uncomfortable.

One new dance the group is introducing this year is the "hat and boot dance." It's performed by young men dressed in Western wear who dance with a rope, Sandra said.

"I'm excited about that because no one has done that" at Frontier Days, she said.

Hoop dancer Jasmine Pickner-Bell will also make a return to do demonstrations and speak about the history of hoop dancing. Her young daughter, Aloysia Bell, also a hoop dancer, will join her.

Dance presentations will take place each day at 11:15 a.m., 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. Storytelling is scheduled for 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. each day. A Native flute player will perform at 2 p.m. and 5:15 p.m.

Children will have an opportunity to make crafts at the village between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. today and Sunday, as well as July 27 and 30.

Gift and food vendors round out the Indian Village.

Presenters will hold a powwow at 7 p.m. on July 27. Samuel Iron Cloud said the powwow is an opportunity for visitors to come try out Native dances.

"It's a chance for them, the spectators, to showcase their talents, whether they want to dance or whether they want to sing, and it's all about having fun," Samuel said. "It's for the people to enjoy themselves, and not in a stereotypical way where they feel like they're making fun of us or feel like they're mimicking or copying in a negative way. We're encouraging them to dance, we're encouraging them to enjoy themselves. That's what the powwow is about."

It's part of "keeping our culture alive," Samuel said. Sandra stressed that they are "powwow people," and the dances they put on and the stories they present are not solely for show.

"We're not just performance dancers," she said. "This is who we are."

Hannah Black is the Wyoming Tribune Eagle's criminal justice reporter. She can be reached at hblack@wyomingnews.com or 307-633-3128. Follow her on Twitter at @hannahcblack.