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Nearly 1,000
pounds of salmon were skewered, fired and served Sunday at the
45th annual Klamath Salmon Festival in Klamath.
Walt “Black Snake” Lara of Klamath said the salmon was cooked
the “Indian way,” on sticks inserted in the ground next to a
fire pit.
“I’ve been coming to this since I was a little boy,” he
said. “People still have their culture and practice it because
it’s their religion.”
Lara was a master of ceremonies at the festival and works as a
tribal forestry and fire field coordinator for the Yurok Tribe.
Macy Donahue, the event’s coordinator, said the festival
celebrates salmon and brings together the Yurok Tribe and their
community.
“It’s like a giant family reunion,” said Cindy Robertson of
Hoopa. “You get to see people you don’t see every day.”
Robertson sold her prize-winning Indian tacos at the festival. She
said she has cooked fry bread for more than 30 years and loves to
share it with her friends at the event.
The day’s festivities included a brush dance demonstration,
American Indian stick games, music, and arts and crafts.
The event kicked off with a veterans breakfast and a parade.
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Jamyelynn
Norris, of
Crescent
City
, was last
year’s Klamath Salmon Festival princess. Norris said she
was competing for the title again this year at the 45th
annual event on Sunday. Ashley Bailey/The
Eureka
Reporter
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The parade
was led by American Indian veterans and featured live music from
Humboldt
State
University
’s Marching Lumberjacks.
Minnie Macomber, a 99-year-old Yurok elder, served as the grand
marshal and waved from a maroon convertible to the hundreds of
festivalgoers lining the streets.
Lena Hurd of Cave Junction,
Ore.
, was wearing handwoven
accessories she created, including earrings, a hat and a
medallion. She said she started weaving 12 years ago.
“Weaving is a way of connecting with my ancestors and who I
am,” she said. “I feel my grandmother is in my fingers.”
The 2006 Klamath Salmon Festival “princess” was at the event
to try to hold onto her crown for the second year in a row.
Jamyelynn Norris of
Crescent
City
raised more than $1,400 last year
by selling $1 sponsor tickets to community members.
Norris raised the most money, which contributes to the Yurok
Tribe’s scholarship fund, and was awarded the title of princess.
An Emergency Preparedness Fair also took place at the north end of
the festival field.
The fair, expected to become an annual event, offered information
about tsunami preparedness, and residents were shown how to build
disaster kits for their homes and vehicles.
The Yurok Tribe organized the fair to bring disaster plan
awareness to the community.
A school bus in the parade, covered in drawings by elementary
school students, illustrated the love of salmon in the Klamath
community.
It read: “Salmon is everything.”
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