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3 / Family across the Generations M any cultures point to family relationships and understandings as a key, even a defining feature. It is basic. The role models provided for children by family and friends profoundly affect how they grow up. One’s identity is formed, at least in part, out of these early learned experiences. Children develop patterns in which they operate for years to come. While this is by no means unique for Native American families, the particular sets of understandings are. In many cases, connections to places, to long histories of struggles, to the pain wrought by European conquest of the continent are passed down across generations . Increasingly in the twentieth century, these family narratives came together to foster a broader “Indian” (or pan-Indian) identity alongside those of family and tribe. But Native peoples do not live in a vacuum. Their lives and ways of understanding the world have been inexorably altered by centuries of association with the many migrants who came to North America from around the world and even by Indian exposures to life in other countries. Such was the case for Don. He grew up hearing stories of his family, of the lives of their many friends that connected him to a past experienced by many different Indian peoples. He also gained appreciation for many other cultural traditions, including the “Western canon.” His ability to negotiate those different influences, to chart a safe course amid them 37 illustrates his own tenacity, the security of self that his family provided, and the importance of understanding lives across generations. DAD He never understood art, but he was always supportive. Don’s father, Fearon Smith, was born in 1906 in Montana. He worked a variety of jobs there and in eastern Oregon. While he never identified as “Indian,” he came into close association with many Native peoples in the region. In some respects Don inherited those networks that his father had established, though he extended them significantly. The major breadwinner for the family early in Don’s childhood, Fearon lost his business near the end of World War II, leaving Mary and Don as the main income earners in the family. Beginning in the 1950s, Fearon increasingly moved into a supporting role for those two, which continued until his death in 1987. Most visitors to the family complex at Ariel, Washington, overlooked him, a man of few words and little desire to be in the public eye, and instead focused on Don, his siblings, his niece, his nephew, and Mary. Most purchasers of Don’s art did the same, not realizing that Fearon was a vital part of the entire process as procurer of wood, sander of carvings , and builder of crates for shipments. Indeed, his efforts made the entire family’s artistic production inestimably greater. While Fearon received little praise for his efforts, Don and the family clearly recognized his contributions . In his quiet, reserved way, Fearon taught Don much about life. Most of the years I was growing up, through the [Second World] War period and everything, why, he was involved in tires and recapping, tire sales, and all. I remember I was very small and I used to go out to the logging camps with him. I would usually end up over in the cook shack getting fed. That was always something I looked forward to. He would take in a load of tires and take out a load to be recapped. He got himself appointed a deputy sheriff, which helped with collecting because loggers were not the easiest people in the world to collect from. First of all, they were hard to get to and when you bearded them in their own den, why, they could be a little difficult! Dad usually had a flask in his hip pocket along with his star—his credentials . It went from sociability to legality. Lelooska • 38 Salem is where I started school. We lived on a road there that was way, way up above on the hill. You could see the airport from there. I remember there were the blackouts during World War II. Camp Adaire, which became a big military base for training troops, was on over a far, far distance . The Timberwolf Division was trained there. My grandpa Enoch Fountain Hinkle was the guard and security for a while there, and some of Dad’s friends were, too. They worked on the base and then every Saturday and Sunday...

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