Week 9 Reading Diary: Native American Pacific NW Unit

For this weeks readings I choose out of the Native American Un-Textbook a Unit titled Pacific NW. If you have read my introduction post or my favorite places post you will see why exactly I have choose to read this unit in particular! The Pacific NW is one of my favorite places and it is somewhere that I would like to live at some point in my life! Listed below are some of my favorite sections I read within the PAcific NW Unit!

Pacific NW Totem Pole

Reading Part A:

How Old Man Above Created the World: Perfection. I absolutely love creation stories so it was very awesome to be able to read this particular creation story from the Pacific NW. This story starts out with an old man who was not able to reach the earth. To do so he poked a hole in the sky and sent down ice and snow. Then through the new hole in the sky the old man climbed down from cloud to cloud to reach the ground. When he got to earth he used his fingers to bore holes in the earth and plant the first trees. Then through the hole in the sky the sun warmed the ice and snow and gave growth to the trees. He gather leaves from the tress and blew on them creating birds. He took a stick and broke it into pieces. At the small end of the stick he made fish. The middle of the stick he made all other animals except the grizzly bear. With the large end of the stick he made a grizzly bear.

How Dog Stole Fire: This story starts when a man steal the two women of a shaman. The shaman dances and sings and it begins to rain, but it does not stop raining. Finally the man decides he must kill the shaman to stop the rain from killing him by drowning him. So the man goes out and beheads the shaman. The rain had put out all the fire in the land and so the people sent owl to Mt. Shasta to look for fire. Owl finally found fire in the west. It was dog who had fire. He had hidden a punk in his ear and so he gave the people fire again.

Reading Part B:


The Origin of Tribes: This was a really interesting and fantastic story that gave an explanation for how different tribes were created. So it starts with a very pristine and beautiful lake were a giant beaver lived. Animal people wanted to fish in the lake, but they could not because the giant beaver named Wishpoosh would kill the people. A coyote decided to challenge the great beaver. He began fishing and was quickly attacked. The coyote speared the great beaver and Wishpoosh fell to the bottom of the lake drag gin the coyote with him. The coyote fought back though and soon the had created many lakes from the fighting. Finally coyote being so cunning allowed Wishpoosh to swallow him and coyote then cut open his intestines and dragged the giant beaver to shore. He cut Wishpoosh up and from various body parts created different tribes!

Coyote and the Dragon: Once in a cave lived a monster who would eat people by night and return to its cave by morning. Coyote wanted to help the people who were being eaten. The monster could not be in the sun and could only come out of the cave at night. Coyote was clever and knew the monster could only come out during night, so he hid the sun behind a river. When the monster saw it was night he came out. The coyote released the sun and it blinded the monster then coyote killed him.