Background and Precursors to the Modern Saami North American Movement

By John Edward Xavier

NOTE: This is an opening chapter, as of June 4, 2012, with much more to come.

Introduction: History and Culture as On-going Processes

     It is often fascinating and eye-opening to find out what has gone on over time before the coming of big events. Here, this post will explore the background and precursors of the Saami North American Movement. As an aid to understanding, and an introduction to the way much of history develops, here is a prime example: what Americans like to call the American Revolution.
    To the American Revolution, the year 1776 is firmly attached. Yet the nation we know today is not the direct fruit of that year, but rather of a number of movements both before and after 1776. Some would point to only one year earlier, 1775, when multiple events showed colonial resistance to English rule. Others would point as far back as Magna Carta, signed in 1215, a time when important and mostly hereditary Barons in England demanded and obtained limits on the power of King John.
     Yet even Magna Carta had its precursors, especially in the Assizes of Clarendon, when vivid and frank discussions entailed issues of kingly powers, in the century previous. Closer to home, some historians, few of them in the old Confederate States of America, argue that the U.S. became true to its declared status only in 1865. That year marked the end of medieval-type slavery in America and subsequent Constitutional Amendments (Numbers 13, 14, and 15) cemented the nation, as both citizens and states were tied together. So, America was not just born in a day, July 4, 1776; rather, America is itself part of larger processes, on-going at that, even to our time.
   If we see culture and history as on-going processes, we then can obtain a view more realistic and yet human of those processes and the stories that go into the processes. For many people, perhaps the most compelling reason to find out about and then enjoy the stories is the personal connections that arise, and the process such people have experienced. As an example,I invent here a composite character: suddenly as the evidence pours in from new digital sources, old neighbor Carl Nelson, long deceased, is no longer seen as just another moderately successful farmer or teacher who inevitably drinks too much on Veterans (Armistice) Day, each November 11.
     Instead, Carl becomes a sympathetic figure, an emotionally wounded survivor of World War I who lost a brother and friends in a massive military fiasco on November 3, just before the war ended. He suffered from what we now would call post-traumatic stress disorder. In recent years, local historians learned that Carl's Nelson's loneliness was compensated by a mutual fund portfolio of several millions of dollars which he shared in a fifty-mile circle with each and every returning soldier, sailor, or air force man or woman. He had it to share because his schoolyard friend owned a bank and told him in 1924 to put his excess money into the new mutual fund industry and to never, ever, sell the shares.
     Much of the excess money came from World War I Serviceman's Life Insurance money from war deaths of a brother and a cousin, $20,000 in total (a fortune at the time, when one could retire on about $5000 if one had a little paid-for house and garden). Thus a small farm operator, a sort of local object of gossip and mockery is transformed by new information, and is seen in new lights. Now, he was a participant in some of the great world and national processes, including war and peace; farming versus stock market investments; sharing with returning military personnel versus hoarding money; drinking versus modern treatment for war-related stress; and on and on. In sum, Carl Nelson was himself a case study in process.

On Precursors: Ideas About the Saami North American Movement

     An essay on precursors should spell out and build the case for the hints, bumps, and rumblings that come before an eruption, whatever the topic. In this case the topic is that of the Saami North American Movement.  I choose to use that name, as it has become increasingly apparent that there are active Saami descendents on both sides of the US-Canadian border. It is often fascinating to accumulate knowledge on those who come before: their efforts, themes, and variations are the hints, bumps, the rumblings. In the case of the Saami North American Movement, there are some fine examples of precursors who have carried on and lived long, to the point that the eruption has also included them and their work.
     To give a reasonable context for the Saami North American Revival, this chapter will begin with the pre-1990s. The pre-1990s times were characterized by what can only be called a wide-spread lack of awareness of Saami-related people, even by the Saami North American population. That lack of awareness, a bit dismaying to today's ethnic activists, was evident in general, beyond the Saami North American populace itself to include as well historians and social scientists.
     From the discussion of the general state of lack of awareness, this essay will move on to discuss several precursors, examples of the roles so often played out in by the hints, bumps, and rumblings. These men and women, and their efforts are of interest not only for the colorful and creative aspects of their lives, but for their humanity and foresight.
     Finally, to conclude this essay, we hope to include remarks on the prospects for the future of the Saami North American Revival.

Pre-1990s: Limited Awareness of Ethnic and Historical Background of Saami-Americans

     Amateurs and professionals alike in the fields of social and cultural studies sometimes find themselves carrying out the rewarding tasks of observing, writing about, and perhaps even participating in, the revival of ethnic or cultural groups. Since the 1990s, the Saami-American Movement has been increasingly visible in North America, growing at varying rates of speed. The Saami North American  Movement is somewhat simultaneous to, and closely linked with, the trans-border Saami revival in the Nordic homelands. The North American revival, or movement, has come to fruition due to the efforts of many individuals and small organizations. This revival has gone on despite the limited awareness on the part of most Saami-Americans prior to 1990.
     The Saami-American Movement has been so named in this article because, prior to the 1990s, the generally limited awareness of Saami-Americans was a dominant fact in their history. This limited awareness extended to the vast bulk of professional researchers in immigration history, who overlooked the Saami or (more likely) did not even know the locations of such basic information as there was. As a prime case in point we need only look to the monumental work, They Chose Minnesota, published in 1981.

   This massively researched book was vetted and fully supported by the venerable Minnesota State Historical Society. The result is a a 600-page monument featuring chapters on every ethnic and immigrant group one theoretically could imagine, including the Ojibway [Anishanabe] and Siouan peoples. Each group had a chapter, researched and written by well-credentialed authors. The book continues to be regarded as a capital reference work for ethnic and immigration history in the Upper Midwest.
     Yet, when I first encountered They Chose Minnesota, over ten years ago, I was quite surprised to find what amounted to a total absence of information on Saami-Americans. While the book drew on the resources and expertise of one of America's leading historical societies, the book nonetheless missed the mark on the Saami-Americans.
     Of the Saami Americans, the book made only a minimal passing reference,and that is relegated to a solitary footnote of the chapter on the Finnish and Swede-Finns. Preposterously, especially in our own lights of 2012, the footnote flat-out declares a complete absence of information on the Saami in Minnesota, except for one small written essay found at the Historical Society. The footnote, quoted in its entirety here, tells its own tale:  

"No published studies of American Lapps [sic.] have been located. A copy of a   four-page typed paper by Rudolph      Johnson of Duluth entitled "En Samisk Pioner," ["A Saami Pioneer,"] brought to my attention by Helen M. White, represented the sole scrap located. A copy is in MEHP papers. On Lappish languages, see Hajdu, Finno-Ugrian Languages and Peoples, 203-213." [1]

     Such a statement as this leads inevitably to discussions of the kind of double "masking" or double assimilation of the Saami that took place in Minnesota and elsewhere, as they became associated with numerically larger host communities. In Minnesota the Saami were largely affiliated with Finish and Norwegians, although there was some Swedish hosting of Saami immigrants. It was in the context, then, of those communities that the Saami moved through the process of assimilation into the large, dominant culture of the United States (and Canda).[2]
    
Notes:

[1]  June Drenning Holmquist, Ed., They Chose Minnesota: A Survey of The State's Ethnic Groups (St. Paul, MN: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1981), Chpt. 15, Timmo Riippa, "Finns and Swede-Finns," 296-322. Footnote 10, p. 317 contains the quote referred to above. 

[2]  For example, many Saami immigrants could be found in southern Minnesota among Norwegians and Finnish immigrants in Renville and Kandiohi Counties, and the "Finnish Triangle." This has been shown in authoritative fashion since the publication of They Chose Minnesota. For a solid academic work, see, Einar Niemi, "Nils Paul Xavier: Sami Teacher and Pastor on the American Frontier," Norwegian-American Studies, 34 (1995), 245-270. Along that same vein, see also, Ellen Marie Jensen, We Stopped Forgetting: Stories from Sami Americans (Karasjohka-Karasjok, Norway: CaalliidLagadus - Authors' Publisher, 2012), re various locations for Sami American presence, pp. 24-28, re Nils Paul and Amanda Xavier, pp. 30-32.


     Notable among those individuals instrumental in the post 1990s Saami-American Revival are (alphabetically) Jean Marie Brown, Donald Engstrom-Reece, Faith Fjeld, Jennifer Harkonen, Ellen Marie (Elle Marja) Jensen, Arden Johnson, Rudolph "Rudy" Johnson, Solveig Arneng Johnson, Anja Kitti, Vicki Lantto, Cari Mayo, Nathan Muus, Mel Olson, Chris Pesklo, Borghild (Xavier) Selid, Christian Klebo Skjervold II, Alvin Seaberg, Eric Seaberg, Kurt Seaberg, Marlene Wisuri, John Edward Xavier, and others whose names will be entered here over time. These individuals and others have been so prolific and helpful in Saami-American events, publications, and other works that it would be impossible to list their work. It would also be impossible to express enough gratitude for their time, efforts, and sacrifices in what they have done, as principal actors in drama of the Saami-American Revival.
     Of particular note in that revival have been two semi-regular publications, the journal Baiki, published and edited for twenty years by Faith Fjeld (assisted in recent times by Nathan Muus), and the younger newsletter, Arran, published and edited for about sixteen years by Mel Olson and Arden Johnson.[1]



[1]  Baiki has a website: www.baiki.com and a facebook page, facebook.com "Saami Baiki". For Arran, the website access is spotty as of June, 2012, as the periodical is merging itself into a new blog. For now, try
arrant2.blogspot.com.


Appendix I. Elders Known to have Participated in the 1990's Formation of the Sami Siida (Alphabetical Order)

Jean Marie Brown
Faith Fjeld

Nathan Muus

Mel Olson
Chris Pesklo

Appendix II. Periodicals Related to the Saami-American Movement

Baiki

Arran

Rudy Johnsons speech.......

ALf-Isak Keskitalo, "Research as an inter-ethnic activity,  paper delivered at the 7th Nordic Ethnographer held at Tromso Mus in Tromso Norge 29 Aug, 1974, Acta Borealia B. Humanoria, no. 13, pp. 15-42. Tromso Tromso Museum, 1976.

Information for transfer to precursor post: 

Steen, Adolf. Biography (Item no. P0362 )

Nils Paul Xavier, 1839-1918, the Kautokeino-Lapp Who Became Minister in Amerika, 3 typescript pages, by Adolph Steen and translated by Magdalene Xavier Visovatti, a granddaughter of Xavier. The file includes an obituary (clipping) of Xavier.

[1]  They Chose Minnesota: A Survey of the State's Ethnic Groups, June Drenning Holmquist, Ed. (St. Paul, Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1981), p. 511. In fact, at time of publication it was long since true that the Norwegian American Historical Association (NAHA) in Northfield, MN, held substantial documents pertaining to Saami-American history;. Furthermore, NAHA's well-respected journal, Norwegian American Studies, had by 1981 published several articles pertaining to Saami-American history. These articles, listed in an appendix here, were both professionally researched and thoroughly vetted before publication.

     Somewhere along the line of the editorial process, They Chose Minnesota placed any potential Saami matters in the category of the Finnish group. It is really quite understandable that such a decision took place, given the large presence of Finnish immigrants in Minnesota. Furthermore, it is understandable that expertise in the Finnish end of things would not necessarily include knowledge of resources available at NAHA, Vesterheim in Decorah, Iowa, or other resource centers primarily known for the Norwegian side of Nordic studies.