Prince Albert says goodbye to totem pole
PRINCE ALBERT A totem pole that had overlooked the North Saskatchewan River in Prince Albert for the last 44 years came down on Monday.
The city held a ceremony to recount its history and bid farewell to the icon, which was carved as a gift by Saskatchewan Penitentiary inmates in 1975.
City officials, students, and the family of one of the original carvers gathered near the stump of the removed pole to reflect on its meaning.
“It’s a day that all of the city’s … residents will remember forever,” deputy mayor Don Cody said. “We go with heavy hearts today when we see that one of our great pieces of art is leaving us.
“However, it is leaving and will be put to rest in a very well-deserved place. For that, we appreciate it.”
The totem pole will travel to Okanese First Nation in southern Saskatchewan, near Balcarres, the home community of Dale Stonechild, the primary assistant to the main carver, James Sutherland.
The pole had begun to rot and was considered a safety risk. The city consulted with knowledge keepers about the proper protocol and attempted to contact the artist, but Sutherland had died and the city couldn’t track down his next of kin.
They learned that in the tradition of coastal B.C. peoples who carve totem poles, they are allowed to fall and return to the earth, or they are removed and laid to rest.
That was the plan for Prince Albert’s totem pole, until Dale Stonechild’s sister, Darlene, contacted the city and offered to bring the artifact to her home.
On Monday morning, the pole was dismantled and loaded onto a trailer. Darlene said she plans to restore it so Dale’s family can see what he created during his stay in the penitentiary. She thanked the city for allowing her to take home a part of history her brother helped to build.
Once it’s restored, Darlene said, she’ll have a pipe ceremony and a feast to honour the tree itself, as well as Sutherland, her brother and the other inmates who helped build the pole, and the people of Prince Albert.
Her brother supports the plan, she added. She spoke to him on Monday morning by phone. He’s currently serving a sentence at a federal institution in B.C.
“We don’t have a flag … so that totem pole is our flag. That’s what my brother told me,” she said. “We honour that.”
The Prince Albert Historical Society has vowed that the pole’s history will not be forgotten. Historical society member Fred Payton worked at the prison when the totem pole project was approved. He said it was made at a time when the federal corrections system was moving from a philosophy of punishment to one of rehabilitation.
Inmates chose to carve the story of the eagle and the beaver, where the eagle teaches the beaver how to exist in the world in which he finds himself, while the beaver passes along what he’s learned to the eagle.
“It is interesting to me how the allegory parallels what was happening at that time in correctional programming,” Payton said. “The citizens of Prince Albert were trying to teach those people in the penitentiary how they could function successfully in the world to which they would ultimately be released.”