After Hurricane Michael literally blew away the event last year, South Georgia’s signature celebration of Native American culture will be held this weekend near Whigham.
Creek Tribe Historian Peggy Venable said last year’s storm forced the cancellation of the Tama Intertribal Pow Wow, even though eager fans still showed up.
“We didn’t have any electricity or water,” she recalled. “But we had one car after the other. I don’t know how many hundreds of people we had to turn away. I had to sit there all day to tell people they had to wait until next year for the third week in October and we’d have another Pow Wow. So our little world was torn apart because we did lose a lot!”
After Michael, a tornado further devastated the grounds. But Venable said that’s all in the past.
“We’re up and running and like all Southern folks, we get up and do it again,” she smiled.
As has become longstanding tradition, Venable said the Tama Intertribal Pow Wow is now back, bigger and better than ever.
“Pow Wow started in the early 1900s when a lot of the people from the reservations went to work in the steel mills in Chicago and other Northern cities. That’s how Pow Wows got started and then eventually like all things Indian people will go together. Not just one tribe, but many tribes.”
So even though the event takes place on the homeland of the Creek Tribe, Venable said many other tribes will be coming from all over to take part.
“We usually have some of the Apaches and then we’ll have some of the Seminoles who’ll come up. And then you always have Cherokees and some from out west. There will be all kinds of people at the dances because there are many dancers who follow the pow wows, going from one to the other.”
And this weekend will be what’s called a “three drum” pow wow. Meaning three complete contingents of drummers and dancers, demonstrating music and steps that go back many centuries. Linda Hutchison, a national women’s archery champion, is also an integral part of the Tama Intertribal Pow Wow. But her true passion is educating young people about the ways of America’s first residents. To that end, the tribal land now includes an historically accurate native village to bring the traditions to life.
“The children don’t know pottery, or basket weaving, bow making and how to flint knap to make the (arrow) points. Over the years, we built 12 little houses that replicate what the Muscogee farms looked like in 1830. All of the regalia there is accurate to that time period. We’ll have story tellers and a hunting camp.”
Hutchison said it will be an entire weekend of non-stop activities centered on Native American history, culture and societies.
“It’s going to be on October 18th, 19th and 20th,” she explained. “We’ll have grand entry Friday night at 7:00 p.m. We’ll have dancing again on Saturday from what we say is noon, but will probably be 1:00 p.m. You know how ‘Indian time’ is,” she chuckled. “Depends on how warm that drum is. They have to warm that drum up. Then again at 7:00 Saturday night. On Sunday, the gates will open at 12:00 and they’ll have grand entry at 1:00 p.m.”
Peggy Venable added the tribal grounds aren’t hard to find.
“We’re between Cairo and Whigham, Georgia on the Collins Road,” she said. “You go through Cairo on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue out to Collins Road. If you’re coming from Whigham, you can see the signs where it says ‘Tama Community. Turn right if you’re coming from Dothan (Alabama) and there will be lots of signs out. Go down the Collins Road, turn left and we’re on the right about a mile down the road.”
It’s a short drive that will transport Pow Wow visitors back hundreds of years.
