Some notes on ‘Chief’ as a (hockey) nickname

In Seeking the Center, there’s a scene where Claude is referred to as “Chief” by an opponent:

Good thing you got ol' Chief there to look out for you, eh MacKenzie?

It's not meant as a compliment, either for MacKenzie, who, it is implied, is not man enough to stand up for himself, or for Claude, whom the opponent tries to belittle by referring to him by the racial stereotype “Chief.”

Hockey nicknames are known for their unimaginative-ness, and while researching Seeking, I quickly learned that “Chief” is, or was at one time, the go-to for First Nations/Native American/Métis players of hockey - and other sports as well. According to Don Marks, author of They Call Me Chief: Warriors on Ice, “almost every Indian who played in the NHL or anywhere else has been called ‘Chief' at one time or another.”

Jim Neilson, who played in the NHL in the 1960s and 1970s, told Marks,

I’ve been called Chief all my life, everywhere else I go. In hockey, you know that your teammates were calling you Chief in a friendly, natural sort of way. But then you would play guys from other teams and you knew it wasn’t so friendly. Most of it was just during the heat of the battle and they were trying to throw you off your game and you just ignore it.

Stan Jonathan, Mohawk/Tuscarora NHL forward from 1976-1983, said, also to Don Marks,

They called me Little Chief and I didn’t mind that. It was when they called me ‘wahoo’ or ‘F#$%’n little Indian’ that I didn’t like [it]...

Judging from Neilson’s and Jonathan’s comments, the context of the name-calling could influence players' feelings about it. But also, as Jonathan indicates, the term “Chief,” while intended to isolate, belittle, and ridicule a person on the basis of race, might have been different, in some sense, than other slurs.

Year in Nam is Leroy TeCube's memoir of the year he served as a G.I. in Vietnam. (I also wrote about it in an earlier post.) Like Jim Neilson and Stan Jonathan, TeCube, a Jicarilla Apache man, was given the nickname “Chief” by his "teammates," i.e. the soldiers in his platoon.

When I joined the platoon it consisted mostly of white GIs, followed by blacks and Hispanics. I was the only American Indian. Someone asked, ‘What race are you? You look like an Indian.'

TeCube describes how he discussed his tribal affiliation with the guys, until finally one of them says, “In that case we’ll call you ‘Chief.’” TeCube answers him, “In my traditional way the title of chief is earned and shown respect.” He then recalls: 

Most of the guys would call me Chief from then on, although a handful of individuals called me by my real name. Up until that moment throughout my training no one even suggested calling me Chief. I wondered why that was so. Perhaps because as trainees we were used to being treated as animals and were addressed by our last names. Now here in Vietnam everyone had an identity. 

Regardless of how the name was intended, TeCube chooses how he will take it - he re-appropriates it - and throughout his service in Vietnam he works hard to live up to the name “chief” and what it means to him and his traditional beliefs. He writes:

I also thought of my new responsibility from my Jicarilla Apache way...the short translation of Nahn Tahn is leader. A more indepth translation, however, describes it as someone who is also an orator. He tells his people what happened in battle or what is about to happen to them next...being Nahn Tahn was something to be feared. Only the very strong took on the responsibility. One had to set a good example and ensure that the needs of everyone in his group were met before he thought of himself. He must never be corrupted or gain wealth from his position. The main criteria were that he never retreat in battle and he show a lot of courage. He had to be the first one into a conflict, and if need be, he would fight single-handedly with an enemy leader…

Towards the end of his time in Vietnam, TeCube recalls “meeting a fellow soldier who was Navajo...as we talked I realized he was also a leader within his platoon and was also called Chief. This gave me a good feeling, knowing that another individual lived up to the name.”

Finally, TeCube is awarded sergeant’s stripes. He writes: 

That day I felt a great sense of pride and accomplishment. I never expected to be a sergeant when I entered the army. Now I had orders in my hand stating just that. I also knew that I had earned the rank….It took a little time before I got used to being called sergeant or sarge. Some called me Sergeant TeCube. Most of the time I still went by Chief or Sergeant Chief. This had more meaning. According to my traditional beliefs, I had now earned the right to be called Chief.

TeCube - along with all of his platoon-mates - quickly recognizes the futility of the Vietnam War, but, having no choice in the matter, he takes it as an obstacle to overcome, just as he takes the moniker given to him, "Chief," as a personal challenge. And while I didn't know about TeCube and hadn't read his story when I was writing Seeking, I like the way that, without knowing it, the player who calls Claude "Chief" unwittingly points to certain facets of Claude's character and aspirations, facets that don't come to light until later in the story. Claude feels that he has little choice but to play what he thinks of as "this white man's game," and while, like TeCube, he is certainly aware of racism and the obstacles it places in his path, he soldiers on, keeping his identity, self-respect, and dignity intact.

Update: I’ve written another post about Claude and the idea/ideal of the Chief.

La belle Françoise: the evolution of a traditional song

"La belle Françoise" is a song that appears in Seeking the Center and on my Seeking the Center playlist. I think its background is interesting, and I want to share it with you. 

When I was writing Achille's main scene in Seeking, I looked for a song that could play a certain role in it. (I won't elaborate on that role, because I don't want to spoil the story.) I wanted a traditional voyageur song, because that is a major part of Achille's background and identity. (The voyageurs were the French Canadian paddlers of the birchbark canoes that carried trade goods north and west into the interior of North America, and brought back loads of furs to the companies in Montreal. They used traditional songs to synchronize their paddling. Most of these songs pre-dated France's first settlements in Quebec, so they date back to the 17th century or earlier.)

"La belle Françoise" appears in sources including Grace Lee Nute's The Voyageur and Thomas R. Draughon's Canot d'Écorce: Chansons de Voyageurs. Though it isn't the song most associated with the voyageurs, I chose it because of its minor key, which gives it a melancholy mood, and because of its lyrics, which dramatize the impending separation of two lovers.

In the song, Françoise weeps because her man must go to war, but he assures her that, if she waits for him, he will return and marry her. Their plight echoes the situations of some of my characters. Although it is not actual war that they are going to, they are facing unknown and sometimes hostile situations, away from their homeplaces.

You can listen to different versions of the song on YouTube. I chose Garolou's live version for my Seeking the Center playlist mainly because it makes an exciting finale. But it also represents a further evolution of the song that, although it doesn't pertain to Seeking, is interesting in its own right. 

Garolou was a French-Canadian group active in the 1970s that often took traditional French and French-Canadian chansons (songs) and gave them modern, rock settings. "La belle Françoise" was an early hit for them (mid 1970s). You can hear how they've contemporized it with a Vietnam-era anti-war message by inserting an intense version of "La Marseillaise." The Seeking the Center playlist version is from Garolou's 1997 live Réunion album.

A momentous race, at home and in 'Nam

A few summers ago, while researching for Seeking the Center, I read a number of books about sport in Native American/First Nations cultures. (If you're a member of Goodreads, you can follow me there and see what's on my bookshelf.) American Indian Sports Heritage by Joseph B. Oxendine, in particular, stresses the centrality of sport to Native life and belief, as does Tom Vennum in his American Indian Lacrosse: Little Brother of War, which I wrote about here. 

I'm reading Year in Nam, now, Leroy TeCube's memoir of his experiences serving as an infantryman in Vietnam in 1968 and 1969. TeCube is Jicarilla Apache, and in his book he often reflects on the role his heritage played in his actions and ultimate survival. In light of my earlier research, I found the following passage especially interesting. It weaves together TeCube's memory of a traditional tribal relay race with a life-or-death race to cross a bridge under enemy fire in Vietnam.

Published by University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. Winner of the 1996 North American Indian Prose Award.

As I ran across the narrow bridge I had a flashback to my youth. On September 15 of every year my tribe has a traditional relay race between our two clans. The outcome of the race determines the type of year ahead. Depending on which clan won, there would be more wild game or crops. This race gives my people an idea of how to plan their activities for the year to come.

The relay race is on a racetrack three hundred yards long and about ten yards wide. Head runners are determined at a preliminary race the day before. Before the race starts, elderly men paint the runners in an aspen kiva, conduct prayers for them, and run down the track blessing it. When they finish the race starts with the head runners running at a full sprint down the track. When they reach the end of the track another set of runners runs back. This goes back and forth until a clan gets ahead by a full length of the track. When that happens the clan in the lead wins the race. If the runners from each clan are evenly matched the race could take several hours.

I had participated in the race several times. It could be very deceptive, especially going in an easterly direction. That is because in that direction about three-fourths of the way down is a slight rise that looks like the finish line. If you are not aware of the illusion your energy is expended when you reach this point, and you have to continue on with heavy legs. Elderly men holding aspen branches give you words of encouragement and whip you on the legs with the branches for added strength. It works. You find the burst of energy needed to take you to the finish line

I was now about three-fourths of the way across the narrow bridge. My legs were heavy from carrying my pack. I thought of the elderly men in our traditional race. In an instant, just that thought gave me the encouragement to continue. I ran off the bridge on the other side and took cover next to the trail. After catching my breath I fired toward the wood line. Out of the corner of my right eye I could see the others running the same race. Eventually, we all made it across without a casualty.

As TeCube describes, the ritual relay race has spiritual and practical dimensions, but also serves as a way to build and inspire courage and determination. It would be interesting to know whether, traditionally, the race was in any way considered to be, like American Indian lacrosse, a "little brother of war," or if it just worked out that way for TeCube in this instance. In any case, it was a treat to, unexpectedly, come across this intriguing recollection.

Loud buildings

So, here's something interesting.  Today I've been reading an article titled "Acoustics and ritual in the British Neolithic" by Aaron Watson.* His idea is that Neolithic structures were built not only as tombs, or as a type of "calendar" in which, for example, at Newgrange, the structure is aligned so that at the winter solstice the rising sun shines down the passage into the central chamber - but that these structures might also have been deliberately constructed to achieve certain acoustic aims.

I read about sound and ritual back when I was doing research on Scandinavian religion in the Viking age (which is, of course, considerably more recent than the Neolithic). During that time, they used sound - for example chanting or the beating of swords on shields - to create environments conducive to various rituals. And speaking of beating swords on shields, the noise of battle, at least poetically, was also part of its identification as a distinctive environment to which spirits such as the valkyries are drawn and during which supernatural events may take place. 

Now, Viking battles always remind me of hockey (that's just the way my mind works), but where was the connection to Watson's ideas about ritual in Neolithic megastructures? There was nothing obviously hockey-like there. Until I came across this:

Neolithic communities were constructing places within which the propagation of sound was artificially bounded and controlled to a greater extent than had ever been possible before. Schafer has even proposed that most ancient buildings were constructed not so much to enclose space as to enshrine sound.

As soon as I read that, the phrase a loud building popped into my head.

Hockey players and coaches will sometimes describe an "enemy" arena as being especially loud, i.e., the fans are very vocal in support of their team, and they fill every seat. This loudness is, in theory, anyhow, supposed to carry the home team a good distance toward victory. Especially during the playoffs, there can be competitive boasting about whose building is the loudest. It's a big deal.

I'm not sure that the arenas themselves are built to maximize volume, but they are equipped with monumentally loud sound systems and jumbotrons that, at key points in the game, urge fans themselves to get loud!

Am I going way out of my way to link Neolithic structures with hockey arenas? Quite possibly I am. But the role of sound in creating a certain environment, conducive to certain activities, hopeful of summoning the spirits of victory...it just reminds me of hockey arenas. I'm sorry, but that's just the way my mind works.

*Watson's article is part of The Archaeology of Shamanism, edited by Neil Price.

Book Review: Killing Frank McGee by Don Reddick

Frank McGee was a Canadian hockey star during the early years of the 20th century, and, according to the cover copy of this book, “the only legitimate Hall of Fame athlete of any sport to be killed in action fighting for his country.” Killing Frank McGee is a fictionalized account of McGee's near-miraculous prowess as a hockey star (he was blind in one eye and only 5' 6" yet scored prolifically), and his considerably less extraordinary death in the trenches of France during World War I.

Interestingly, Reddick chooses to tell McGee’s story not through the athlete’s own thoughts or words, but rather through those of the novel's two narrators, Alf Smith and Billy Kinnear. The result is an unusual sort of character sketch in which the context and surroundings are clearly pictured, but the man at the center remains a bit of a mystery.

Those surroundings, though, are dense and vividly described. On the home front, we’re treated to a startling close-up of Smith, an Ottawa Hockey Club coach and player-coach whose disdain for the privileged classes (including the McGee family of which his teammate Frank is a member) is matched only by his single-minded determination to win the Stanley Cup. Through Smith’s opinionated musings, the era’s economic, social and class terrain, as well as the hockey culture of the time, come to life.

If Alf Smith shows us the Canada that created Frank McGee, Billy Kinnear, a young, sensitive, working-class man from rural New Brunswick, brings us the war that kills him. Through Kinnear, Reddick renders not only the blood, mud, stench and deafening thunder of trench warfare, but also the humanity of the soldiers who cling not so much to life, which they cannot hope to grasp, as to spirit.

Up to the moment of his death and beyond, McGee remains that mystery, that blank slate upon which we, or Kinnear, or any of his other fans and followers may draw what they will. An unusual way to portray your protagonist, perhaps, but isn't it rather in keeping with the way the rest of us "mere mortals" tend to view our star athletes and war heroes?