- [Rita] On this edition of "Native Report," we learn about the John Hopkins Center for American Indian Health, Great Lakes Hub - [Ernie] We then follow artists, Moira Villiard and Michelle Defoe on their journey and the painting of a mural in Northern Minnesota city.

- There's so many misconceptions about Native people that it makes it hard to exist here - [Rita] And we meet Ojibwe lacrosse stick maker, Thomas House.

- We also learned that we can do to lead healthier lives here from our elders on this edition of "Native Report."

- [Narrator] Production funding for "Native Report" is provided in part by The Blandin Foundation.

(upbeat tribal music) - Founded in 1991, the John Hopkins Center for American Indian Health supports public health interventions designed for and by Native peoples and has offices in tribal communities across Arizona, New Mexico, as well as the Great Lakes Hub serving tribes in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and along the shared border with Canada.

Join us now, as we learn more about the Center.

(gentle music) - [Michael] Tucked away on a side street in Duluth, Minnesota is the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health, Great Lakes Hub.

The Center opened in 2019 and what this expansion into the Great Lakes region, the Center will reach 125 Native communities in 20 States.

- The Center for American Indian Health started over 25 years ago at Johns Hopkins in collaboration with primarily Southwestern tribal communities including the White Mountain Apache tribe and the Navajo Nation.

And the founder of the center, Mathuram Santosham, actually lived and worked as a physician on the White Mountain Reservation, and when he started working with the community, they were experiencing a lot of loss of their infants due to diarrhea and dehydration actually.

And so with White Mountain Apache tribe, Mathu and others created what now is known as Pedialyte, or oral re-hydration therapy, which has saved millions of lives across the world.

The Center for American Indian Health has its anchor administrative ship, I guess, in Baltimore at Johns Hopkins University.

And then we have Hub offices all across the Southwestern US and here in Duluth, Minnesota.

After receiving my PhD in 2007, I really knew I just wanted to come back to Minnesota.

I wanted to work with our tribes.

About 2012, I started working with people at the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health as a guest lecturer and some of their institute courses.

And the more I learned about the Center at Johns Hopkins the more I saw they were really working to influence policy change and policy change translates into changes at the local level, which translates into differences in our health outcomes.

After a lot of years of discussion and a lot of years of trying to figure this out we joined the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health in 2019.

- [Michael] There are 13 who work at the Great Lakes Hub, Melissa and two others are faculty members at Johns Hopkins, and several local undergraduates are also part of the team.

- [Melissa] Our students that serve as research assistants for us, so they do everything from data entry, to helping us prep packages to be sent out to communities for both research and public health programming and do everything you can imagine under the sun to make sure that all the work gets done.

So for example, we have a family-based drug and alcohol prevention program we do with kids.

We are just getting ready to launch a home-based diabetes intervention, which focuses on intervening on diabetes and adults, but preventing it among our youth.

And through all of that, we take the lessons we've learned from all of the research to create what are called empirically or evidence-based programs that we hope will have impact.

All of our research is a thing called community-based participatory research, so CBPR, and what that means to me is that our community team is equal partners in the process.

I may be listed as the administrative lead on a project, but I don't lead, I co-lead with a community team.

So everything we do involves community-based interviewers, research council members, co-investigators of the projects who decide, "What should we study?

How should we study it?"

Every questionnaire that goes out, every survey, we painstakingly pour over every single item together to decide is this worth asking, is this important to my community?

And then our team also works together to get the data back into the community once it's collected.

We work with some local tribal clinics and hospitals.

We also work outside of clinics and hospitals on projects in people's homes, and always, no matter what we do, before we start anything, we get tribal approval through government tribal resolutions.

Across our projects, we work with over 80 tribal members from tribes all across the region.

- [Michael] The Great Lakes Hub may be a research center but during this time of a global pandemic, Johns Hopkins has been instrumental in the response to the health crisis.

- When it hits, we happen to find ourselves working for Johns Hopkins University, which is the number one public health school in the world, and is honestly the leader in tracking the COVID-19 pandemic and doing research on this topic.

Because of our home with the Center, we've had access to get PPE very quickly out to some of our clinics.

We've been able to secure donations and funding, to send out food boxes, holistic wellness kits that are grounded in our research findings to try to just, you know, get a little bit of light out there during this very difficult time.

And we have access to some of the top information about how to prevent the spread of COVID, and we share that with our community teams.

Historically, and for good reason, when we think about research, especially in Native communities, we don't get a good feeling.

Researchers, historically, have exploited our communities, haven't done research in a way that benefited us, and I hope that our Great Lakes Hub can do better, can work to really correct some of those wrongdoings and make research work for our communities in the way we want it to work.

We deserve to have access to the top public health information in the world, and the top public health school in the world can learn a lot from our communities.

(upbeat music) (fabric rustling) - (foreign language) all my relatives.

I'm Dr. Arne Vainio.

I don't know if that doctor thing makes a whole lot of difference for this.

Today, we're gathering Muskeegobug which is swamped tea, Muskeegobugwaaboo, sometimes it's called.

Waaboo is... it means a useful liquid so makade-mashkikiwaaboo is coffee.

And so I'm gonna make tea out of this.

(phone dings) And Muskeegobug is a medicine.

(foreign language) means medicine.

(phone dings) (foreign language) means he or she has inner strength And that were bug, B-A-G, means a leaf and it has to do with that so... and Muskeeg is a bog, it's a swamp and muskeg probably comes from that word.

Muskeeg.

But this is swampy tea.

This is Muskeegobug.

Lavender tea, it's also called sometimes.

And when you harvest something, when you gather something, and especially the first time you do it, but every time you do it for this, you know, you should offer tobacco.

Tobacco it's a gift from the creator, and it's something that use in all our ceremonies and... (foreign language) So you know this medicine thing, this for medicine, (foreign language) Please accept my tobacco.

And when you harvest this, then... You know we're harvesting this as medicine.

And I'm actually picking this for someone else, someone who's got COVID-19, and that I haven't even met.

Social media thing.

And you know, but somebody that like, somebody that's... raising daughters or granddaughters by herself.

So I'm going to send this to her.

I'll ask for her address and send this to her.

But when you harvest something, you don't want to take all of it.

You know, you want to take what you need.

And you know, you don't want to invent some kind of a machine that can just come in here and take all of this, you know.

If you're gathering it as medicine, you need to be respectful of this.

And you need to...

I was told by an elder, Herb Sam who... (phone dings) wanted me to know a lot of things, that... you know, if you're using this as medicine, that... you don't necessarily accept this as medicine, this has to accept you.

And we're all part of nature and we're all interconnected.

And this bog, you can hear.

(birds chirping) You know, people don't come into these bogs because they're swampy and wet and in the summer full of mosquitoes, but these are full of life, and these are full of medicine.

And there's things that we can learn from this.

So we drove quite a ways to come out in the woods.

We don't want to be next to a highway when we do this with all the exhaust fumes and all that stuff.

So we tromped out into the woods to do this.

And this is... this is medicine.

(foreign language) I mistakenly called this lavender tea when I was harvesting it.

And that should have been Labrador tea.

I'm just glad I got the English name wrong.

Muskeegobug is used for respiratory and other illnesses, and it contains compounds including one called ledol that can be unsafe in high doses.

Side effects can include vomiting, diarrhea, delirium, spasms, and paralysis.

A generally recommended safe amount is one teaspoon of dried leaves to one cup of boiling water, and limiting that to one cup per day.

Stay safe, everyone, and remember to call an elder, they've been waiting for your call.

I'm Dr. Arne Vainio and this is "Health Matters."

(upbeat music) - Artists Moira Villiard, and Michelle Defoe served as leading artists on a public art project.

A mural that depicts cultural imagery designed to shed some light on the indigenous history of Duluth, Minnesota.

The mural serves as a reminder that even in uncertain times, the stories of the land we reside on and the people who were the first stewards of Turtle Island should not be forgotten.

(gentle music) (serene tribal music) - [Michelle] This is very loud and colorful.

We're here... (music continues) - [Moira] For people who are Native to be able to see something and be like, "I really identify with that or that, you know that image and that symbolism," it just means so much.

(music continues) - [Michelle] It's about us having visibility, about us elevating our voices.

(music continues) Somebody's going to look at it and say, "What is that tobacco teaching?

Why is the hand so big in the center of that?

What about the turtles and the fish?"

'Cause like every fish has a story.

You know, the turtle has many stories there's just thousands of stories and hopefully people look at that and they get curious about it and they go on the journey of learning the stuff that they were never taught.

(music continues) (foreign language) My name is Michelle Defoe and I'm from Redcliffe, Wisconsin.

I am Lake Superior Ojibwe and I am an artist on this mural.

There's many artists and I got to design a few pieces on the wall here.

- My name is Moira Villiard.

I grew up on the Fond du Lac Reservation.

My dad is Fond du Lac enrollee, so I'm a direct descendant, not enrolled.

But I grew up there and I do a lot of Indigenous land acknowledgement, community collaborative art projects.

And then I like to include ricing because I just think it's such an interesting story of, you know, the Anishinaabi migration to this area and how it became, you know, such a significant historical part of of being here that a lot of people, I think, in the mainstream don't really know about.

The mainstream narrative of Native people is very negative.

Like there's the image of like, they're just drunk or they're homeless and it's... we're represented in all of these really bad statistics and that's all you ever hear, you know, sort of covered about Native people.

And so to be able to be like, "Hey, we contribute beautiful things.

We contribute beautiful art.

We're contributing to this community, and we're a part of it," I think that's just incredibly important, especially when we're living on territory that, you know, has such a complicated history of the settlers coming and then the Treaty of 1854 and everything like that.

There's just a complicated history and nobody knows it, and then we only see these negative statistics, and it's just... there's so many misconceptions about Native people that it makes it hard to exist here.

And even, you know, while we were painting it, sometimes people would come up and have questions, and it was really... sometimes hard to describe some of the significance of the mural or the (foreign language) or things like that, 'cause people just don't know and you get that awkward moment of having to explain.

And so hopefully having this artwork in this visual representation gets people used to seeing us so that future generations won't have to answer as many questions and be put on the spot constantly like repeating themselves and going through what we are going through right now as artists trying to connect with the community sometimes.

(metal clattering) - Over the years, we've slowly been creating space here for us, with our own voices and our own vision.

It's important that we tell our own stories.

We've had non-Native artists do art pieces that are revolved around our stories and they were not told accurately, so that's even more frustrating.

- [Moira] Usually I have like hundreds of people who come out and help out like a time, but we had to limit it to one apartment building of kids, which was fine 'cause kids are everywhere all over the place anyway.

But also just that idea of like being able to sort of quickly like make a dragon fly outline, and instead of having kids design stuff onsite, being able to have them submit that online and then get a little gift card for you know, their contributions.

That was a really cool part of, you know... an unexpectedly interesting way, I guess, to have people engaged during the pandemic.

- [Michelle] I've heard a lot of people talk about how they're struggling with mental health, under a lot of restrictions and a lot of pressure and a lot of stress and how do we deal with that?

Not being able to connect how we normally do, which is maybe through large social gatherings, powwows, dancing, singing, feasting, being together.

And so it's a little difficult to be able to find how do we support ourselves now because we can't get into big group gatherings like that.

And so this is the reminder here too that there's other ways to receive that help even though it's difficult.

And we want to be able to be with our community, the plants and the animals are our community too.

So I think for me, it's a reminder that we have our traditional ways as well, and the reminder of our stories and all the strengths that come from our traditional teachings.

And so when you look at this mural, there's a lot of Ojibwe teachings in here to pull out.

And the reminder that we're not alone, the plant life and the fish life are here and they've always been here, and they're like our ancestors, they're older than us.

And so if we need help or we're having a hard time, we can always offer tobacco, which is our first teaching, tobacco offerings, and ask for help.

And so they're there to help us and they care about us and love us, and so that's incorporated in our teachings.

The beautiful parts are resilience, you know, 'cause what Moira was talking about, people like to focus on the trauma and the horrible parts, which is important to know about.

But what about the resilient parts of us?

You know, what about the parts that give us strength?

And so hopefully this mural helps people identify with that too.

(music continues) - Historically, almost all Native Nations play the Creator's game, the sport of lacrosse, but there are subtle differences in the game and the gear used play it.

One difference is in the lacrosse sticks, and tonight, we visit Thomas House who has learned the art of Ojibwe lacrosse stick making.

(gentle music) - It's tricky.

And so it's all catching and pulling and turning your wrist over 'cause it's such a small hoop, and so that's how you can catch.

Same thing, if it's on the ground, you're capturing it and turning it over Right around me.

Everybody, come on in.

(boys cheering) Well, there's a reason we've had this game, Ojibwe people have had this game for...

I don't even know how long, you know.

Before Europeans, we had this game and with that interaction, we've lost contact, at least of it here, especially in my village in Fond du Lac.

There's no one around it that remembers the way it was played.

Tom Peacock has a story though that the old ball field up on Res Road, before it was a baseball field was a lacrosse field.

You know?

So when this pandemic's over... (chuckles) I'm making sticks partly for that.

I'll make a set of sticks and we're going to go have a game and it's sort of reclaim that space.

It's relatively new to me.

I haven't been doing this for that long.

It's still a learning process, I was really getting into it and then this pandemic happened.

It's really fun to play with people that know really well how to play.

Menominees, Ho-Chunks, Ojibwe, Lakotas, Dakota and, man, is that fun.

Just to play with like high level?

Man...

There's another wager game that guys play sometimes that I think has really cool sort of community values, is everybody who's going to play that day, brings something.

Blanket, tobacco, whatever it is.

Beads, earrings, something.

And if you're going to play, you put your stuff in the pile and then you play, and if I score, I get to go to that pile and I get to take anything I want, but I don't get to keep it.

I have to give it away to one of the spectators.

So it's that idea of being selfless.

11 years ago when my twins were born, I was at a Birch Bark canoe-making event out in Fond du Lac and Marvin Defoe full says to me, "Hey, you're gonna make them babies, a (foreign language).

(Thomas chuckles) And he's like, "Guess you gotta make two," you know, after he learned I was having twins.

Always loved these and these I just finished with beeswax.

And so that's how I learned you got to get really into steam bending wood with that, and so since I knew how to do that, this wasn't as much of a leap to get into.

And no one that I know of from Fond du Lac makes them, and that's sort of one of the big hurdles to people playing is just having sticks.

And so I figured, "Well, I'll start making sticks."

But when I picked one up and I actually played with it, I don't know how to explain it, but it's magical.

It belongs, it belongs...

It's probably part of... the way I see the world, I guess, as an Ojibwe person is we've lost so many things, and to be able to reclaim, revitalize the game play itself but also the art of making them, just sort of appealed to me.

There's a lot of different stories of the origin of this game and where it comes from and what it's for, and that all differs depending on where people come from, but there's a reason we have it, and I feel like there's a reason that we have it back again.

There's some reason to have... like it spoke to me in a certain way, I don't know how to explain that.

This is the grandest game, you know, and the one thing that I think that it's more than a game is there sort of three items that we have as Ojibwe people.

We have our war clubs, we have our drumsticks and we have these sticks.

And then I think we need that now more than ever, especially, in a time where we're in a pandemic, it exposes our weaknesses.

(gentle music) - This morning, it was very uplifting to hear from past NCAI presidents and tribal leaders about the importance of this election and Native Americans' part in it.

In my campaign, I've been very strong on climate change and renewable energy.

I care deeply about the environment.

We're also talking a tremendous amount in New Mexico about healthcare for every New Mexican, and our public schools, making sure that we're moving forward and giving every child an opportunity at a quality public education where they can find success, including early childhood education.

Yeah, and of course, here at the conference, in the event I just left, there were a number of women who have been working on the missing and murdered Native women.

That epidemic that's sweeping our nation.

So that's also an issue that I have talked at length about and care deeply about in my campaign as well.

Tribal leadership in this country is important.

It's important that we stick together on the issues that we care about with our children, with our veterans, with making sure that we have justice in Indian country.

So it's always good that we can convene and talk about those issues and find ways where we can make sure that we're working together to bring those to the forefront.

(gentle music) - [Ernie] For more information about "Native Report."

Look for us on the web at nativereport.org, on Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram.

- Thank you for spending this time with your friends and neighbors across Indian country.

I'm Rita Aspinwall.

- And I'm Ernie Stephens.

Join us next time for "Native Report."

(gentle folk music)