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Welcome to this month's LEAHLetter.
It is a mixed blessing of organic foods like our Massachusetts native cranberries from two perspectives, an article of joyous recollections and cold hard facts about pesticides and cranberries form Kaija Starck, A perspective from the commercial an organic growing of cranberries from Chris Severance who comes from America's cranberry family and is now an organic landscaper. All this cranberry talk is illustrated by Susan Aron's gorgeous and historically well researched artwork.
There is First Nations perspective, an indigenous voice offered from a youthful place. There is also my very long 'story on the first thanksgiving and the political implications of the day of mourning and Sarah Josepha Hale with insights from some of today's Wompanoag.
Alyssa Owens enlightens us about organic potatoes and Drake Higgins is portrayed in Confessions of a Maine Potato Picker...
And there are recipes, enough to keep you well nourished in a healthy and organic and local fashion while honoring the traditional and historical foods of the season and finally there is a story of the Three Sisters, my version of a Haudosenaunee (Iriquois) story of growing in harmony with the corn, beans and squash.
Be well fed, or well fasted and think of the hungry and your blessings this year!
Ellen
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Cranberries for Life
by Kaija Starck
The tradition of Thanksgiving is bundled in the promise of feeding our nation, the Pilgrim's scourge on Native Americans, giving wholeheartedly and of course cranberries. My Mummi, or grandmother to all non-Finns, tells me a wonderful story each time she sees me eating cranberries. Her deathly ill father was sent away to a place that would help battle what ailed him. After his return home, alive and well, he maintained a daily routine to keep him healthy. Each night he would eat a bowl of cranberries. What an amazing fruit, full of vitamins and healing powers, my Mummi believes. Many of us maintain the Indigenous peoples' use of cranberries for healing of the urinary tract but what about their healing command over tooth decay, cancer, stomach ulcers, clogged arteries and brain function? read more
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The American Cranberry: Considering Organic and the Constraints of Conventional Production by Chris Severance
The Leah Collective has asked me if I could write something about Thanksgiving's fruit, cranberries. I am well versed about how cranberries are grown under conventional management, because prior to becoming a NOFA organic land care professional, I was a full-time cranberry grower. Well, that might understate my connection to our favorite holiday fruit. In addition to my work in the cranberry industry as IPM scout and pesticide applicator, my family history owes much to the uniquely American berry.
read more
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Artist’s Statement on the Cranberry Bogs and Wampanoag Dress by Susan Aron
The era of the Wampanoag life I am referring to for the cranberry harvesting is for the 17th century (1600s); Clothing for the 17th century Wampanoag has been researched and is similar to what the Native people who work at Plimoth wear. The basic clothing for men, boys, women and young girls was the breechcloth. Breechcloths were made from deerskin and worn between the legs with each tucked under a belt made of woven hemp and other materials and herbs. In the cold weather men and women wore mantles made of deerskin, sometimes fastened at one shoulder and wrapped around the body, usually tied at the waist with a woven belt. For very frigid weather, mantles made of raccoon, skunk, otter, beaver, and other animals were worn with the fur side closest to the body. According to Bryan they wore the skins in reverse when it rained to keep away the moisture. After contact, men and some women wore English shirts that for which they traded. read more. |
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PLEASE PASS THE ORGANIC SPUDS!by Alyssa Owens
Years ago, I would wonder why I could not enjoy a potato like all my family and friends. It was irksome but I did not use the computer back then so I did not try to find a reason. I just shrugged my shoulders and added that food to my list of no-can-do's.
Fortunately, I recently discovered that I can eat potatoes-just as long as they are organic! Therefore, it wasn't the potato, per say, it was the pesticides that bothered my delicate little system! A huge A-HA moment in my mid-adult life!
read more.
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Confessions Of A Maine Potato (Rock) Picker
by Ellen B. Fine
Like most kids growing up in rural northern Maine, Drake Higgins worked picking rocks…er I mean potatoes… he jokes with that typical Maine accent and frank-friendliness. For those of you from away, in Aroostook and Somerset County, late September means potato harvesting. For over a century kids have been let out of school in these northern areas without much economic development or jobs except for paper mills, potato harvesting or blueberry raking. This child labor has been the dirty little secret of the rural Maine economy for years.
read more
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THANKSGIVING and The DAY of Mourning: One Voice SPEAKS
(The author has requested anonymity and we honor that as well as his words.)
I was kindly asked to write what The Day of mourning means to me, someone that is of an eastern indigenous tribe. Specifically, I am part of the tribe that is well known for being the tribe of the "first" thanksgiving. We were all reminded of what happened in the first Thanksgiving in school. Now I'm not sure if they left out the real details of that day because we were young and they did not want to explain the graphic details or if the truth was not something most Caucasian teachers would like to admit about their heritage. But from my understanding I know that the whole "the Pilgrims and the natives came together out of peace and were a whole happy bunch" wasn't the full truth. I'm sure that some of the trying to come together and make peace part was true. But What I also know is that My tribe tried to bring the Pilgrims food because at the time us natives knew the land and how to cultivate it a bit better than the Pilgrims. After our last and largest harvest we sent food to the Pilgrims and out of fear of the natives, my tribe was thought to be trying to trick the Pilgrims and was thought as an act of war. The thanks giving that was taught to me in schools, taught by non native people simply is not true. I do understand that young ears may not be ready to hear such graphic truths but eventually you would think that the true story would come out. The true story was never taught to me, except by a school teacher but from one from my own tribe.
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The "True" Story of the First Thanksgivingby Ellen B. Fine
Definitely Not Your Grandmother's Plimoth Plantation...
Today, I found myself smiling in sunshine on a 65 degree late November day at Plimoth Plantation. At this time of year, Plymouth, Massachusetts is a bit of a Turkey Day circus with events and parades and all you can eat Thanksgiving buffets, which at times can feel like a glorified Thanksgiving carnival. I first visited Plimoth Plantation as a kid on the obligatory school field trip, and I remember being absolutely fascinated with the thatched roofed houses and longed to go back. We drew pictures in our Thank you notes of headdress more common to Plains Indians and the black buckled hat pilgrim’s hats with the broad white collar over black shirt that had absolutely nothing to do with historical accuracy. I can’t help but wondering if my teachers or my mom who was along as a chaperone that day believed about the inaccuracies we were fed, did they realize the racism and belittling of people’s heritage occurring in the mythmaking. Did they even know that there could be more to the story?
read on
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The Three Sisters: Corn, Beans and Squash a Version
by Ellen B. Fine
(Editor's Note: In my short telling of the traditional tale often attributed to the Haudosenaunee, I hope you will see the wisdom of this permaculture indigenous technique of growing food.)
There was once a story of three sisters, The first sister to be born of her brown-black earthy and mother was Sister Maize, this corn-she is proud and straight, we plant her first, her hair grows long and golden and she wears a green shawl, her babies are dark brown, purple yellow and deep red ( kernels). Sister Bean is a clever girl, able to talk or weave herself in and out of any situation, so she is planted and taught to wrap herself around the corn or proud sister. Finally sister Pumpkin or Squash is a protector, cultivator- her job is to make big leaves to catch rain, create shade so that weeds are naturally eliminated. This last sister occupies herself with our cousins, our relations the creepy crawlies. Sometimes she gives of herself for them to eat, but because of the perfume (pheromones) that emanate from her, she can quite easily tell them... "Enough is enough, you have had quite enough to eat!". The bean sister holds within her the secret of the cosmology how do we reproduce ourselves. The oldest prays constantly to Father Sky, she is in communication with rain, cloud and sun. They were a very close group of sisters who always wanted to live in the same place. When you plant one sister away from her sisters, she does not fare well, too many creepy crawlies will eat of her babies, or too much water will drown out the other sisters home. It is only when they are all together that the humans can share some of the bounty of the sisters and so that we can be thankful to the Three Sisters by eating their offerings as corn bread, squash soup or squash and beans, and pumpkin pie, but always leaving some of their Gifts for next year!
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Mom's Cranberry Sauce
