It’s the week of the Pendleton Round-Up rodeo and Happy Canyon Night Show. Covered wagons with ornery oxen, Native Americans riding fast horses and a live orchestra make up the Happy Canyon Night Show, which is now 110 years old.
One dress featured in this Western show is even more mature at 111 years old. She’s a heavily-beaded antelope hide dress.
A family dress
This dress has been in Alvina Huesties’ family for five generations. “I believe I was about 25, and my grandmother brought it out and she put it away again,” Alvina, 79, said. “But she showed it to me. She said, ‘This is your dress.’”
The dress features a brightly colored shoulder area of tiny seed beadwork. Colored chrysanthemum shapes punctuate the design. Long fringe flirts along the dress’ edges.
“And I said, ‘Oh,’” Alvina said. “I didn’t know what to think. ‘Grandma's giving me a dress?’ I was barely able to get a beaded belt.”
She got that belt, but Alvina didn’t get the dress until later.
“When my grandfather passed away, I think I was about 35, the dress came out, and she said, ‘Here’s your dress, you take care of it now,’” she remembers. Alvina was a Happy Canyon princess in 1963.
Years later, Alvina’s daughter — Althea Wolf — was a Happy Canyon princess, too, in 1996. Their family are members of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Althea says all the family dresses hold conversations, energy and memories of those who’ve made and worn them.
“So if you’ve ever tanned a hide, there is a lot of wringing, there’s a lot of stretching, and while you’re doing that you’re usually talking and laughing and telling stories and listening to stories,” Althea said. “And that’s just the tanning part.”
Now, this treasured dress is being donned by Althea’s 18-year-old daughter, Manaia Wolf. Manaia is one of two Happy Canyon princesses who are promoting the Western show.
Manaia says when she wears the over-century-old dress, people sometimes try to touch her. Or feel her braided hair wrapped in otter furs. Especially adults at the rodeo, and in classrooms of children.
“And you’d be like, ‘Oh, don’t touch me,’ but like, ‘Hi!’” Manaia said. “They’d reach a few times and I’d let them touch a little bit, and then I would calmly brush their hand away. Not in a rude way or an aggressive manner, but in a gently, correcting them in a way.”
‘The past is still alive’
It’s just before the big Happy Canyon show, and Manaia is wearing her special dress. Amid the teepees, she helps braid her cousin's long hair. These young women were raised together. They talk and tease.
“Maybe you shouldn’t argue with me. Maybe you should just trust me,” Manaia teased her cousin with a slight smirk.
But this dress she’s wearing is alive, according to Manaia, Althea and Alvina. The elements that make it up, and the garment itself — live. When it comes out, it recruits energy and makes new memories.
Manaia’s grandmother, Alvina, says some of the loved people who have cared for this dress are now gone.
“To talk about it now, it’s a little hard,” Alvina said. Her voice breaks a bit with emotion. “But the past is still alive. It comes back, and we get to see the dresses all come out and be happy for who they are.”
At the start of the show, Manaia rides in her appy-quarter horse with all his fringy trappings. The Happy Canyon Night Show announcer, Jason Hill, announces her entrance into the arena.
“When you see that dress and you’re sitting down, you’re happy for the ones that are wearing that dress,” Alvina said. “It brings back lots of memories about yourself, your sisters and your cousins — when you were all dancing together.”
This year, the dress is with the people.
To read the audio transcript, click here.
