Alex was sent off to the Smithsonian, and to study other Native American exhibits around the country. He critiqued them and learned from them, and the result was a creation of a miniature universe resembling the Makah hunting camp five-hundred years ago. So much of the culture revolved around whaling and fishing, that even irrigation canals were built from whalebone.
Alex hadn’t done any traditional Makah carvings or paintings, but he was about to be entered firmly into his own culture. Alex had taken a class in carving from a master Makah carver. His role at the museum fueled his drive to learn more. He learned to make traditional Makah canoes, and became adept in carving totem poles. He gained a Master’s Degree in contemporary art, and learned printmaking and traditional Makah jewelry. His Austrian-Polish mother was also an artist, and her father as well. “He refurbished old violins. If you needed your Stradivarius repaired, he was the man you went to.”
“Carving was a natural thing because my older brother was able to teach me a lot. As soon as you have an interest in something, that interest kind of gravitates toward you.”
Today, the Makah Museum features a traditional carving of his grandfather harpooning a whale. The piece is bold, crisp, detailed and masculine. Whaling was central to the Makah culture, and in 1855, the Makah entered into a contract with the United States guaranteeing them the right to fish and whale indefinitely.
The Makah always wanted to assert their right to their culture, and justifiably so. Under the contract, Alex’s grandfathers and great-grandfathers continued to hunt as always.
Like Alex, his grandfather was also a traditional carver. Like Alex, he also taught his carving and painting skills to the community. Like Alex, a fisherman, a teacher, an artist.
I asked him about his grandfather’s role in the whaling canoe. He “attended the float bags and was also the lancer. The harpooner catches the whale, but the lancer is the one who kills the whale by stabbing him whenever he can.”
Float bags were blown-up seal skins. Alex’s grandfather would string them to the harpoon’s rope line and attach them to the whale. These bags would help keep the whale afloat once dead.
Alex’s great-grandfathers and his great grandfather whaled together. He says, “they’d leave at about eight o’clock at night. They’d paddle fifteen to twenty miles offshore, straight off Makah Bay…they’d paddle out all night, get out really early.”
“There wasn’t just one canoe, but several. They’d all work together…the other canoes would help…it was a dangerous thing to do, but everybody really enjoyed it.”
“It was a long battle, it could take days to bring the whale back in. My great-grandfather Hishka was the harpoonist, and grandfather Jerry laid the lines, and my other great-grandfather, Arthur, steered the canoe. After the whale was completely dead, great-grandfather Arthur would quickly dive under water and sew the mouth shut. He spent a long time underwater just tying the mouth shut so the whale wouldn’t sink.”
Alex’s grandfather had an ability to stay underwater for unheard of lengths of time. It was a skill that the Makah practiced as if sport.
But times changed when the world realized that commercial whalers had slaughtered the gray whales to almost imminent extinction. The Makah abided, and ceased whaling.
By the 1990’s, the gray whale population had come back. It was a rare pinnacle of international environmentalism. There were so many gray whales, that some scientists even predicted there were too many. Gray whales had been mysteriously dying off the Pacific Coast. Perhaps, the present levels – 26,000 whales, up 6,000 from the estimate of their pre-slaughter levels, had created a shortage of food in their feeding areas.
Alex McCarty carves a 10-foot Totem
The Ozette site was creating a renewal of traditional pride among the Makah. Before the dig, they were already testing the limits of their treaty with the United States by protesting against strict fishing laws – laws put into place because of the overfishing of other people – sport fishermen in fancy weekend Bay Liners, not by the Makah. They led multi-nation ‘fish-ins’, where they would continue to fish on their lands despite the regulations. These fish-ins were largely successful, in some cases forcing on state and local governments change in regulatory policy.
I ask Alex about the most important moments for the Makah. He says, “Reviving of the culture, helped by the dig site. Since we’ve regained the right to practice our cultural activities, there has always been this strong desire to bring our traditional culture back.”
Alex’s father, John, and his brother Micah had their own ideas. They would test the limits of their tribe’s cultural freedom, by once again hunting a whale. Just as Alex’s grandfather and great-grandfathers had done. Many in the tribe latched on to the idea, citing its importance in the spiritual recovery of a tribe that was facing woes such as high unemployment and drug addiction.
The Makah started training, and they formed a commission. When environmentalists learned of this, they poured in. Paul Watson sailed in on two ships. He was the co-founder of Greenpeace, but had evidently been kicked out because of his preference for using violence to achieve his goals. He painted one ship to look like a killer whale, to scare away the gray whales. His staff blared orca sounds into the straits of Juan de Fuca.
