It's All in the Details

On Chief Shakes' Island, Wrangell, Alaska, there's a reconstructed clanhouse--made by the CCC, about a third the size of the original, but still one of the more authentic-feeling clanhouses in Southeast--and a bunch of totem poles, along with a few graves.

One pole, to the left of the clanhouse entrance--the door is very low to the clanhouse, both so you had to bow and show respect to the house when you entered, and also so that the people inside could bash you in the head before you had time to straighten up if they didn't like you--is called "Bear Up the Mountain." Think of the flood story, but instead of Noah, a bear climbs a high mountain to get away from the water. The pole has the bear's tracks up the side, then the bear himself crouching at the top. It's astoundingly beautiful, my favorite of all the hundreds of totem poles I've seen.

And then, with nothing more than a few berries, someone found a way to make it even better. Four berries, bright red, between the bear's claws.