68th Annual Brighton Field Days Highlights

By Susan Etxebarria

BRIGHTON — For the first time at the Brighton Festival & Rodeo the extraordinary Haskell Dancers from Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kan, were featured performers. Their outstanding performances and instructive interpretations enthralled the audiences on Feb. 18–19.

Approximately 1,000 students representing 150 federally recognized Tribes from 36 states are pursuing associate of arts degrees or four year baccalaureate degree programs at the University. Haskell incorporates the perspective of Native American culture in the class curriculum. The dancers are students or alumni who perform ancestral dances they have learned from their elders.

In the Brighton show arena, the narrator, Dustina Abrahamson, explained the cultural dances and their symbolism after introducing each performer. She stressed that the dances are complex and difficult.

“To be a dancer you have to be in really good shape,” she said.

The young men and women danced under a warm sun their energetic and colorful fancy shawl dances, fancy dances, the hoop dance and warrior dances.

Abrahamson also explained the difference between the women’s honor cry versus the men’s warrior cry which she said are often mistakenly portrayed in Hollywood movies. She also told the crowd that some of the dances they perform have become favorites in the Pow Wow circuit.

Hoop dancer Lumje Micco Sampson, told the crowd that he is a Muskogee Creek from Upstate New York attending Haskell University.

“It has taken my whole life to perfect the hoop dance,” he said.

He explained the symbolism of the hoop dance which represents the circle of life with no beginning and no ending.

“Everything in the Earth is made of circles,” Micco Sampson said.

Sampson began with one hoop and kept adding hoops into formations that represent man’s journey through life.

There was a variety of beautiful arts and crafts at the many colorful booths at the rodeo grounds. Two Aztec leather crafters from Mexico, Jose Acevedo and Iki Balam, said it was their first time at Brighton and they hoped they will get invited to many more Seminole festivals.

Very popular was the Native Village with its incredible display of alligator, snakes and wildlife. Alligator wrestler Paul Simmons and snake handler David Weathers put on a terrific show. The children had the rare opportunity to pet a baby alligator.

The cultural exhibits educate the public about Seminole traditions and customs. Among other items such as miniature tomahawks and canoes, wood carver Vinson Osceola demonstrated his traditional hand carved sofkee dipper. He said he sells many dippers to Tribal citizens. Osceola, who started carving as a child, won second place this year in woodcarving at the Seminole Tribal Fair in Hollywood.

Serving delicious sofkee, pumpkin bread and fry bread on Saturday and Sunday at the cooking chickee were Jennifer Chadwick, Donna Turtle and Nancy Billie from Big Cypress.

The Brighton Festival drew one of the largest crowds ever this year. The PRCA Rodeo was packed. Every year the Festival just gets better and better due to the hard work of all the Brighton staff.