Pocumtuck Homelands Festival

A Celebration of Native American Art, Music, and Culture
Saturday, August 1, 11 am to 7pm
Unity Park Waterfront, Turners Falls
Entertaining and educational for all ages, Free!

The Pocumtuck Homelands Festival returns to Unity Park Waterfront. Sponsored by the Nolumbeka Project and Turners Falls RiverCulture, this free all day celebration of Native American culture and history will include live music, drumming, dancing, storytelling, traditional children’s games, children’s crafts ($2 materials fee), educational talks, primitive skills demonstrations and a wide array of vendors of Native American arts and crafts.

The Festival’s music this year will feature Cheyenne flute player Joseph FireCrow. Considered one of the top three Native American flute players in the world today, Listen HERE. FireCrow will present two sets of his award-winning music and stories on the riverfront stage, along with returning favorites the Medicine Mammals Singers, led by Loril MoonDream (Apache). The Abenaki group Black Hawk Singers, who celebrate their tribal spirit through traditional and new songs, and, for the second year, the popular Visioning B.E.A.R. Intertribal Singers will set up their powwow drums under the trees along the banks of the river.

In addition to demonstrations of traditional native skills by Neill Boivaird of Wolf Tree Programs and Elyssa Serrilli of Vermont Wilderness Schools, this year’s educational offerings will include two half hour historical presentations by the Nolumbeka Project’s Joe Graveline and David Brule on the significance to the Native Americans of the Great Falls/Peskeompskut-Wissatinnewag/Unity Park area. For the first time, Dr. Kevin McBride and Mary and James Gage will be present and share their expertise in the fields of pre-contact and contact period (1600s) New England archaeology/anthropology and Native American/colonial artifacts and historic stone structures identification. They will be available to interpret and analyze the significance of artifacts or photographs that festival goers bring to their booths during the day.

Schedule

11 – 11:15 a.m.—Opening ceremony
11:15 – 1:30 p.m. – Black Hawk Singers and Visioning B.E.A.R. Singers
11:30 to 12:15 – Story telling at tipi
Noon – 12:30 p.m. – Brief Native American History lesson with David Brule and David Tall Pine White
12:30 – 1:15 p.m. – Children’s crafts at tipi ($2 fee)
1:30 – 2:15 p.m. – Joseph FireCrow
2:30 – 3:15 pm. – Medicine Mammals Singers
3:30 – 3:45 – Friendship Dance led by Loril Moondream and Medicine Mammals Singers
4 p.m. – 4:45 p.m. Storytelling at the tipi
3:45 – 4:15 p.m. – Brief Native American History lesson, David Brule and David Tall Pine White
4:00 p.m. – 5:15 p.m. – Black Hawk Singers and Visioning B.E.A.R. Singers
5:15 – 5:45 p.m. – Medicine Mammals Singers
6:00 – 6:45 p.m. – Joseph FireCrow
6:45 – 7:00 p.m. – Closing Ceremony