By Scott Wilson on December 26, 2013, Three Sheets Northwest
If you’ve been surprised by the flurry of newspaper articles and Facebook posts about whale sightings in the Salish Sea this fall, it’s no fluke… there really have been an unusual number of unusually close encounters with the massive cetaceans in our waters this year.
The Vancouver Sun has the full story. Both recreational and professional whale watchers have been seeing an unusual amount of humpback and orca whales this season.
Some Canadian whale-watching businesses have been holding off from performing annual maintenance haul-outs because business has been so good in this traditional “off” season. Orcas, both transients and members of the Southern Resident pods, have been sighted almost daily off of Victoria.
At the same time, other orca pods have been ranging south through Puget Sound, escorting a ferry carrying artifacts from an archeological site of the Suquamish tribe, bouncing around between Admiralty Inlet and President Point, and generally making their presence known to mariners and waterfront communities through the north Sound. Humpbacks have popped up all up and down the coast, rubbing against whale watching boats here, and even nosing around a sensitive oil removal operation from a sunken hulk in Grenville Channel on the central BC coast.
Although this winter is seeing an unusual surge in whale encounters, the overall trend in the local orca population has been relatively stagnant. From an estimated level of around 200 individuals in the late 1800s, the local resident pod numbers dipped into the upper 60s by the late 1960s, and have slowly climbed to around 90 whales and stayed there for the past decade.
And increased orca sightings may not be a positive indicator overall; the surge in whale activity has coincide with a spike in local harbor seal populations. More food here may be drawing transients in from places where fewer prey than normal are available.
Humpback sightings, on the other hand, are a more unalloyed good sign. The huge mammals have not been widely hunted locally since 1966. The fact that they have returned to local waters in such numbers, says the Pacific Whale Watch Association, may indicate that some of the natural apprehension of human encounters has begun to fade. Several of the huge mammals have approached whale watching craft closely enough that the boats have been forced to shut down their engines and just drift until the whales have lost interest and moved on… anywhere from 15 minutes to two hours. One whale spent the time rubbing its face along the hull of an inflatable.
Whatever the reasons for the visits, it’s been a happy holiday season for the normally slow whale-watching trades.
LINDSEY WASSON / The Seattle Times Enri Mendoza, left, and Daniel Sandoval, sort geoduck at Taylor Shellfish Farms in Shelton last week. China, the biggest market for West Coast geoduck, suspended shellfish imports from Northern California to Alaska on Dec. 3 after toxins were detected in two shipments.
China’s suspension of geoduck imports from the West Coast has hit Washington harvesters hard. Tribes, private companies and the state itself are losing hundreds of thousands of dollars.
On a typical morning, Lief Cofield and his three crew members pile into a 30-foot aluminum boat to harvest hundreds of pounds of geoduck clams.
But for more than two weeks, his boat, the Eagle Scout, has been tied to the dock at Fair Harbor Marina in North Bay, near Shelton — the dive suits stored, the equipment stashed and the crew stuck on land.
“We are supposed to be harvesting 1,500 pounds a day this week,” said Cofield, 26, who is a dive supervisor at Taylor Shellfish Farms in Shelton. “My guys make $15 an hour plus a 10- to 15-cent per-pound bonus on what they personally harvest; and that can really add up.”
His crew is not alone. Since Dec. 3, when seafood inspectors in China suspended imports of West Coast geoduck and other bivalve shellfish such as oysters after reporting high levels of algae toxin or arsenic, harvesters along tribal, state and private shorelines have all been hit.
Altogether, the state produces more than 6 million pounds of geoduck clams annually, and last year almost 90 percent was sold to China.
But now, tribal harvesting companies have laid off divers. Geoduck farms have reduced hours for many workers, and wild-geoduck divers all around Puget Sound are out of work.
LINDSEY WASSON / The Seattle Times Geoduck are seen in a crate awaiting shipment. Since China’s import cutoff, quotas have fallen drastically.
Meanwhile, the state is missing out on well over $1 million in revenue from the wild harvest. Washington auctions off rights to harvest geoduck on state aquatic lands; this year those rights were worth about $12 a pound.
“We only fished two days last week,” said Cendtary Xeno, a geoduck diver for Global Pacific Seafood. “Everyone has bills to pay and families, and lack of work at the holiday time is pretty bad.”
Currently, state and federal agencies are waiting to get more information from Chinese officials, and the Department of Health is preparing to start testing arsenic levels on Thursday.
While the investigation is ongoing, geoduck harvesting in Washington is essentially at a standstill.
According to the Washington Department of Natural Resources, an average of 50,000 pounds of wild geoduck are harvested weekly by divers such as Xeno, with Global Pacific.
With almost 1.1 million pounds of state-regulated wild geoduck left to harvest before March 31, the department estimates the current ban represents not only lost income for fishermen, but also $600,000 per week in lost revenue for the state.
Some tribes and companies have already completed their harvests for the year. But those who have not are missing out on millions of dollars’ worth of product that would have been shipped to China.
Suquamish Seafoods, run by that tribe, exports almost all of its geoduck to China, and has laid off all 24 of its divers.
The tribe still had 140,000 pounds of geoduck to harvest before the end of the season in March. If the ban is not lifted soon, divers may not be able to finish harvesting, said Tony Forsman, the company’s general manager.
The tribe was selling geoduck for $11.50 a pound before the ban took effect, so the Suquamish Tribe could potentially lose out on more than $1.6 million worth of clams.
Divers receive 40 percent of the take for the geoduck they harvest, meaning each diver is at a risk of losing $67,000 — a large portion of their annual income — right before the holiday season, said George Hill, the harvest coordinator and a diver for Suquamish Seafoods.
“You can’t think about Christmas when you have to think of next month’s bills,” Hill said. “We have bills to pay, and not knowing when we are going to go back to work is very hard on us.”
To make up for the lost income, the 47-year-old Hill, who has five children, may look for a diving job harvesting sea cucumber. He hopes the ban can be lifted in time for the tribe to finish harvesting this year’s quota.
Seattle Shellfish, a company that farms only geoduck and ships exclusively to China, has shifted its 18 divers to other duties, such as geoduck farm maintenance, since they are not currently harvesting the giant clam.
Taylor Shellfish Farms, one of the largest geoduck providers in the state, ships only half of its harvested geoduck to China, which means there is still some work to be done. However, many employees have been moved to half-time and have been given other tasks, company spokesman Bill Dewey said.
Both farms say they will have to consider layoffs if the ban continues much longer.
At the Taylor plant in Shelton, holding tanks are usually packed full of thousands of pounds of live, freshly harvested geoduck. Starting at 11 a.m. each day, the four-man geoduck team, led by Gustavo Hernandez, has to work quickly to sort and pack all the clams before the first truck leaves for the airport at 4 p.m.
Last Thursday, the men raised the lid on the holding tank and stared down at the measly 1,000 pounds of geoduck, stacked in orange crates, that had been beach-harvested the night before. They didn’t start packing and sorting until 2 p.m. and were in no hurry.
“This is usually the busiest time of year,” said Hernandez, 35. “But without exporting to China, we just don’t have a lot to do.”
Geoducks first caught on as a banquet delicacy in Hong Kong, and the clams’ appeal has spread to other parts of China.
Geoduck harvesters, the state Department of Health, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) all have been scrambling to understand the suspension.
Fish inspectors in China identified high levels of arsenic and a toxin that causes paralytic shellfish poisoning, or PSP, in two shipments of geoduck — one from Washington and one from Alaska.
Friday, state and tribal officials closed the 135-acre geoduck harvesting area outside Federal Way where the Washington geoduck shipment originated.
The 385-pound shipment was harvested by the Puyallup Tribe in Poverty Bay, on what the Department of Natural Resources calls the Redondo Tract.
PSP is a biotoxin produced by algae that shellfish eat. In humans, high levels of either PSP or arsenic can lead to severe illness or even death.
However, testing in October by the Department of Health found PSP levels in the Redondo Tract well below internationally accepted limits.
Because there is no federal safety standard in place for arsenic, the last arsenic testing done in the area was in 2007. Levels found at that time were not of concern for human health, according to an agency spokesman.
The Department of Health originally had focused on investigating PSP levels, but last week the agency learned the Washington shipment was blocked because of arsenic, while PSP was the issue with the shipment from Alaska.
“The last thing I would want to have happen is for someone to get sick,” said Cofield, from Taylor Shellfish. “But closing down the whole West Coast because of two shipments seems a little heavy-handed.”
The Alaska shipment of geoduck originated from outside Ketchikan, and that state has also provided federal agencies with detailed reports, said Jerry Borchert, the marine biotoxin coordinator with the Washington Department of Health shellfish program.
Borchert said China uses a different unit of measure when reporting PSPs, and officials here don’t know how Chinese inspectors tested the arsenic levels. “So we don’t know how they came up with the level they have reported,” Borchert said.
“We are full of questions and are looking for some answers,” he said. “We are waiting for more details.”
NOAA, the federal agency working directly with the Chinese, sent a report with the health department’s PSP findings to Chinese officials, along with questions about how the toxicity levels were measured. Federal officials also are awaiting more information from China, and it is still unknown when the ban might be lifted.
Information from The Seattle Times archive was used in this report.
Coral Garnick: 206-464-2422 or cgarnick@seattletimes.com. On Twitter @coralgarnick
On Thursday, Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) signed a controversial “mascot” bill making it harder to force public schools to drop tribal, Native nicknames.
The law requires at least 10 percent of a school district board members to sign a complaint which would be reviewed by the Department of Public Instruction, with hearings in front of an administrative law judge. The new law also places the burden on those who file a complaint to prove that a race-based mascot or team name promotes discrimination, pupil harassment or stereotyping. Under the old law, the burden of proof was on the school district.
Many Native groups are outraged.
“[The bill] is an example of institutionalized racism in content and process,” Barbara Munson, an Oneida Indian who chairs the Wisconsin Indian Education Association’s mascots and logos task force. She also told the Associated Press, “It’s a poke in the eye with a sharp stick to all Wisconsin tribes, and it is an act of discrimination leveled directly at our children.”
Brian Cladoosby, president of the National Congress of American Indians said in a press release that these mascots do not honor Native people. “I was deeply saddened to hear that Wisconsin Governor Walker signed a misguided bill that protects racist stereotypes reinforced by using Native American names and images as school mascots,” Cladoosby said. “Wisconsin just took a big step backward in the journey toward a more inclusive and respectful society.”
The bill, which was proposed by state Republicans, passed the Wisconsin legislature in November, but sat on Walker’s desk for several weeks. It officially became law yesterday despite challenges from state Democrats and many other groups that the law was “racist.”
In a statement, Walker said that he signed the law because he didn’t want to stifle speech by preventing schools from choosing their mascots. He also said that a person’s right to speak doesn’t end just because what they say is offensive. “Instead of trying to legislate free speech, a better alternative is to educate people about how certain phrases and symbols that are used as nicknames and mascots are offensive to many of our fellow citizens.”
The new law repeals a measure passed by a majority-Democrat legislature in 2010. That law was signed into law by former Democratic Governor Jim Doyle.
The 2010 law was the first of its kind in the United States to set up a process that allowed a single school district resident opposed to a race-based mascot, nickname, logo or team name to file a complaint with the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, which would decide whether to take action against the district.
CARNATION, WA. – Inside the Snoqualmie Tribe Food Bank in Carnation, volunteer Fred Vosk said it is an all you can eat place where all are welcome.
Becky Fredrickson volunteers at the food bank too, and added that they do not ask a lot of questions.
“We don’t say show us what you make. They are here. They need food. We have food. We help them,” said Fredrickson.
But in a matter of days they will shut the doors.
“It breaks my heart because there’s many people who need extra food. I see a lot of children in here,” said Fredrickson. “It hurts.”
“We are open Christmas Eve and then that’s it,” said Vosk.
The Snoqualmie Tribe, which sponsors the food bank, decided it was time to close.
Jaime Martin, the Communications and Public Relations Officer for the Snoqualmie Tribe, emailed the following statement:
“The Snoqualmie Tribe is always looking to become more efficient and because of that the Snoqualmie Tribal Council has made their decision to close the Snoqualmie Tribe Food Bank. The tribe was going to close the Food Bank in September but they decided to keep it open through the holidays. The Tribe has donated more than $3.5 million to Puget Sound nonprofits, including multiple food banks, and will continue to do so.”
Vosk said the Snoqualmie Tribe has kept the food bank going for 38 years.
“They backed us so nicely,” said Vosk.
Now food bank volunteers hope to work with the city of Carnation. If they can get a new building to operate out of and a truck, they will try to reopen.
SEATTLE — Staff for the Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center have started an online fundraising effort to offset around $280,000 in debt. The center, which operates in Seattle’s Discovery Park, has struggled in the wake of grant and other program cuts.
“It is a really urgent situation. We really have to pay attention and get our bills paid for,” said Jeff Smith, board chairman of the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation which operates the facility.
Smith said staff considered closing Daybreak Star in September, when it appeared the situation was a “crisis”.
Since then, explained Smith, staff has been cut and the budget of the non-profit has been balanced. It now has six months to pay back about half of its debt.
“We’re motivated to work really hard to raise money so it doesn’t go out of business,” said Smith.
Daybreak Star opened in 1977, seven years after about 100 Native Americans scaled the fence at what was then Fort Lawson, demanding part of the property which was being decommissioned by the federal government.
The confrontation led to the City of Seattle setting aside land for Daybreak Star in Discovery Park.
Smith does not believe Daybreak Star will close. It runs five programs in the community for Native Americans which he said are in solid shape.
Online fundraising for Daybreak Star is on Indiegogo.com.
Now that we are at the height of the Christmas and holiday season, all of those little Elves and Santa will surely be making their way into your kitchen to sample some of those Christmas snacks and goodies.
Not wanting to disappoint our dear readers, in this light, we are introducing a few luscious holiday treats “Native and Pow Wow Style.”
Enjoy the Native deliciousness!
1. A Gingerbread Longhouse
In the midst of the Squamish Nation (about 40 miles North of Vancouver), Alice Guss took the time to teach Rachel, her daughter, and her daughter’s friend to create an amazing Gingerbread Longhouse (pictured above). The template was created by Alice’s brother Rick.
“We’ve been doing this for a long time. We put candy on the longhouses and blinking lights to make it look like fire,” said Guss. “I just did a workshop for seven-year-olds, and they piled so much candy on the roofs [that] the roofs started to collapse!”
2. Healthy Snack Bites (Healthy? Yes, and Yummy!)
86Lemons.com
Using earthly, fun-food treasures, such as sunflower seeds, agave and cacao powder, you can have an easy and cholesterol-free snack bites to offer Santa.
He’s eaten so many cookies, he’ll probably be appreciative!
INGREDIENTS:
1 cup raw sunflower seeds
1/2 cup each: raisins, coconut and sesame seeds
2 tbsp. each raw agave nectar and cacao powder
1/4 tsp. salt
Steps – Food process Sunflower seeds and raisins until coarse, add agave and cacao powder. Roll into a golfball-sized ball, coat with coconut or sesame seeds and chill.
Wait a minute, do we even need to add a description here? I was a sucker at Pumpkin chocolate! Add the word “cookie” and the show is over. Sign me up!!
The recipe’s from TwoPeasandTheirPod.com. Turns out, there is a healthy, and even healthier version. It’s a win-win, YUM!
In 2011, Laura Hahnefeld of the Phoenix New Times named Chocolate Fry Bread from the Fry Bread House as one of the top 100 Favorite Dishes of 2011.
I don’t know about you, but I think Santa would come running full-speed to come get a taste of this one!
5. Nopalitos (Cactus) Salad
Last but not least, a “guilt reliever” dish.
Not wanting to “over-sweet” your Christmas or holiday season, let’s at least throw in a salad to offset some goodie calories. Not just any old salad, but a cactus salad, that’s a pretty cool indigenous-themed dish!
Nopales are the edible cactus leafs or pads that are cultivated in the mountainous areas near Mexico City. It is also known as prickly pear and, surprisingly, can be found at many specialty grocery stores such as Whole Foods Market.
Check out the full recipe, which includes Nopales, onion, tomato, cilantro, jalapeno, avocado and lime, at WhatsCookingMexico.com.
Last year, the Department of the Interior established the Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations to implement important land consolidation requirements set forth in the historic Cobell Settlement Agreement. That agreement provided for a copy.9 billion fund to consolidate lands that have become fractionated, over time, across Indian country. By establishing the Buy-Back Program, the Department made a commitment to work together – with tribes and individual Indian land owners alike – to address the negative impacts of land fractionation in Indian country.
Fractionation of ownership affects more than 93,500 land tracts on more than 150 Indian reservations. These tracts often have hundreds, sometimes thousands, of owners that must each be consulted before even basic decisions can be made about use of land and resources.
Over the next 10 years, the Buy-Back Program will make purchase offers to willing sellers in an effort to make land more usable and prevent further fractionation. By doing this, Interior will help expand tribal economic development opportunities across Indian country, and, in turn, restore tribal control over tribal lands and resources in order to build towards true tribal self-determination and ultimately strengthened tribal sovereignty.
In our first year, the Department has focused on establishing the building blocks of program success. Nation-to-Nation conversations have been critical to this development, and have helped us make significant policy decisions about the Program. This past month, we released an Updated Implementation Plan, which incorporates suggestions and responds to comments received through multiple tribal consultations and one-on-one meetings.
We have heard from tribal leaders that we must implement the Buy-Back Program in a fair and equitable manner, moving quickly to ensure that we reach as much of Indian country as possible. Additionally, we sought independent analysis from The Appraisal Foundation, the nation’s foremost authority on appraisal standards to ensure a high quality valuation process would be used.
Tribes also expressed the need for predictability and transparency on the timing of implementation efforts. In response, the Department expanded its implementation strategy by opening up a solicitation period through March 2014, during which tribes with jurisdiction over the most fractionated locations are invited to submit letters of interest or cooperative agreement applications for participation in the program. This solicitation puts much of the timing in the hands of tribal governments and will allow the program to move on a quicker timeline.
And, in a historic step this week, Interior announced that the very first purchase offers have been sent. After working closely with Oglala Sioux leadership, landowners on the Pine Ridge Reservation – one of the most fractionated locations in the United States – will be receiving purchase offers this week. Individuals with interests at the Makah Indian Reservation will receive offers as well.
We know the challenge ahead is mighty, but we are working hard to ensure that this incredible opportunity for Indian country is not wasted. Change will not be implemented overnight, but ultimately the Program will restore lands to tribes and place decision-making over these lands back into the rightful hands of tribal governments. Our Nation-to Nation partnerships have been critical to the work that has gotten us to today and we look forward to our continued work together.
Kevin K. Washburn is the Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs at the Department of the Interior and a member of the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma.
Nearly a year ago, the Indigenous Action Movement coordinated a protest at the Peace Arch on the U.S.-Canada border. “It’s a peaceful, prayerful action … a ceremony with smudging, drumming and singing,” Kat Norris, spokesperson for the group, told ICTMN. “Every time we have to cross a border, it hits our hearts. It only reminds us of what we once had.” The gathering was focused on Indigenous women, but had a strong youth element to it. Video director Dave Wilson set out to capture the spirit of Idle No More’s future: Young people from both countries united by a cultural pride, and a willingness to question the status quo.
Entitled “Idle No More: The Next Generation,” the video was produced by Natives Brodie Lane Stevens (Tulalip) and ICTMN contributor Gyasi Ross (Blackfeet), and uses the song “Letter to My Countrymen” by the Minneapolis-based rapper Brother Ali, who has collaborated with Wilson in the past. The clip was posted to the RockPaper Jet YouTube page on January 9,
Before a crowd of 400 people waving signs reading ‘Don’t Kill Me’ above swirling, hand-painted salmon, Winnemem Wintu Chief and Spiritual Leader Caleen Sisk declared California’s proposed $25 billion Delta Tunnels a pernicious threat to salmon and tribal rights to consultation.
“During this whole process the tribes have been ignored, and so have our ‘first in time, first in use’ water rights. Our fisheries and our subsistence to water have been totally left out of this study,” Sisk said. “All of the rivers in California are contaminated, and now we’re going to be transporting [water] to the cities without acknowledging we need to clean them up.”
The coalition of tribes, farmers, environmentalists and fishermen gathered in solidarity on December 13 at the State Capitol in Sacramento to protest the recent release of Governor Jerry Brown’s plan to build two giant tunnels—40 feet in diameter and 35 miles long—to divert freshwater out of the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta to three million acres of farmland, much of it industrial agriculture, and to more than 20 million people in central and Southern California. Some have estimated the actual cost of the tunnels will be closer to $54 billion, once interest from the financing is factored in.
State and federal agencies already annually export millions of acre-feet of water out of the delta, and environmentalists and tribal officials say that the delta, the largest estuary on the West Coast, is in a precarious state. Further damaging its delicate balance of salt and freshwater by exporting more water could threaten the existence of many endangered species and fisheries, including Chinook salmon, as far north as Oregon, the plan’s critics say.
“By taking away our water, the tunnels are taking away from our salmon that we feed on and give us life,” said Jessica Lopez, vice chairwoman of the Konkow Valley Band of Maidu, to the crowd.
It’s taking away from our future generations,” she said, noting that her tribe has never been consulted about the tunnels, even though planning began in 2006. “I’m going to do what I can with my tribe to make sure we stop the tunnels.”
About copy0 billion of the project would be allocated to 100,00 acres of habitat restoration to benefit 57 species, including salmon, and state and federal water officials say the plan will achieve “co-equal” goals of conservation and stabilizing California’s water supply, as climate change is expected to cause water shortages in the coming decades.
Many tribal officials agree with environmentalists and oppose the project because they feel that no amount of habitat restoration could counter the damage caused to the Delta fisheries by the lack of water. The project, called the Bay-Delta Conservation Plan, also doesn’t state directly just how much water will be taken from the estuary, though each tunnel will have the capacity to transport 9,000 acre-feet of water per second, according to the plan.
Also causing concern and even outrage among tribal officials is that the tribal consultation process on the massive project hasn’t even begun well after the 35,000-page public draft was released. On Dec. 10, the project lead agency, California Department of Water Resources held an initial informational meeting for tribes.
“For some tribes, that meeting was the first time they had ever heard of the tunnels or the BDCP,” Sisk said.
A different iteration of the project, then called the Peripheral Canal, was investigated as far back as 1982, eventually failing to be approved by a public referendum. The current BDCP began the latest proposal in 2006, and the fact that decades have gone by without consultation has caused some tribes to believe that the omission is intentional.
“When they were studying the peripheral canal [in the 1980s], they did surveys and would find signs of human remains and village sites, so they’ve always known that our sites are there,” said Randy Yonemura (Miwok), who has been following the BDCP since its inception.
Several Miwok village sites with burials are likely to be disrupted by the construction, Yonemura said. However, he said, at a December 10 meeting, state Department of Water Resources officials acted as if they were unaware of the project’s potential to damage the Miwok sites.
“It’s a water grab,” Yonemura said. “They don’t ever talk about California Indian rights to water, even though we were all riparian tribes. They know what they’re doing. They’re seeing what they can get away with.”
Though it’s a work in progress, the Department of Water Resources had only completed a new consultation process in November 2012. Thus tribes have a right to be upset about not having a voice in the Delta tunnels, said Anecita Augstinez, the state water agency’s new tribal policy advisor.
Augstinez said she will be spearheading an extensive outreach effort in the coming months to ensure that tribes receive adequate information.
“Consultation is very important, and I do think the commitment and foundation here is strong (at DWR),” she said. “It’s not going to be a situation where we have one meeting and think we’re done.”
However, many tribal officials remain highly skeptical as to whether state officials will seriously consider altering the plan based on their input.
“Even though we have always been here and have never ceded these lands, it’s convenient for them to act as if there are no tribes in the Delta because so many of us are federally unrecognized,” said Don Hankins, a Plains Miwok cultural practitioner and water resources professor. “The landscape has a lot of different layers of meaning to us, and we want to see the delta be what it should: A healthy, resilient ecosystem for future generations. This plan isn’t going to do that.”
Pioneer of Distortion. Champion of the Power Chord. Rockabilly Legend. Link Wray is well-known as a musical force. This Shawnee artist created an enduring legacy that climbed the charts, influenced popular culture and permeates movies and tv soundtracks throughout the decades. Link Wray has been inducted into the Native American Music Hall of Fame, Rockabilly Hall of Fame, Washington (DC) Area Music Association,Southern Legends Hall of Fame and many more. Now, Link Wray fans have the opportunity to vote to place this performer in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Link Wray has been named as one of the 100 GREATEST GUITARISTS by Rolling Stone magazine. In addition, this profound musician has been featured in the Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of the Native American Indian ”Up Where We Belong” exhibits in both Washington DC and New York City.
PULP FICTION, INDEPENDENCE DAY, DESPERADO, THE SOPRANOS, BLOW and many other movies and tv programs have incorporated Wray’s music into their soundtracks. Link Wray has influenced Jimmy Page, Neil Young, Iggy Pop, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Pete Townshend, Dan Auerbach and countless thousands of other musicians the world over.
“Rumble”, “Raw-Hide” and “Jack the Ripper” are representative of Link Wray’s distinctive sound. ”Daddy was such a proud Native American man,” states his daughter Beth Wray Webb, “and he was always proud of the music he made and determined to make music his way.” To vote for this Native American artist to be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame, visit http://www.rockhall.com/inductees/nominees/link-wray/ and cast your vote.
