The GREAT LAKES ODYSSEY Radio Hour – Six Nations & Lake Erie Influence

The Great Lakes Odyssey Radio Hour is broadcast on NPR (National Public Radio)

s5.e8. GREAT LAKES ODYSSEY Radio Hour – Six Nations & Lake Erie Influence

Iroquois allied Nations moved north of Lake Erie from their traditional New York homeland after the American Revolution and many years later the monumentally engineered canal system to the Atlantic Ocean set a path for historic social and economic change for an entire continent.

Ashley Quimby-Simoni, Outreach Director of Erie Canalway, celebrates over 200 years in continuous operation making Erie Canal in New York the longest constructed transportation system on the continent.

Scott Robertson, member of Six Nations of the Grand River and legal counsel dedicated to improving the quality of life, wealth and prosperity for First Nation communities while preserving the unique identity of Canada’s original inhabitants.

Cat Clyde is a Métis artist out of Perth County, Ontario and the broader traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee, breathing new life into protest song with the classic sounds of yesteryear.

Featured Music: Ode’Min Kwe Singers. The Weavers. Golden Eagle String Band. Jen Tucker. Cat Clyde.
Music beds: Roddy Elias & Matt Warnock. Lead Belly.
Theme music: Ray Bonneville. Rusty McCarthy.

Painting: Like Father Like Daughter by Doug Bradford

s5.e8. GREAT LAKES ODYSSEY Radio Hour Music Credits

Title – Big Five Water
Artist / Composer – Ray Bonneville

Title – Haudenosaunee Round Dance
Album – New Moon Medicine
Artist – Ode’Min Kwe Singers
Composer – Traditional

Title: Lake Erie Shore
Artist: Jen Tucker
Album: Occidental Journey

Title – The E-Ri-E Canal
Artist – The Weavers
Composer – Roger Ames
Album – The Weavers

Title – Chrysalis
Artist – Roddy Ellias & Matt Warnock
Album: St. Marys Sunrise

Title – Time
Artist – Roddy Ellias & Matt Warnock
Album – St. Marys Sunrise

Title – St. Marys Sunrise Part 1
Artist – Roddy Ellias & Matt Warnock
Album – St. Marys Sunrise

Title – A Trip on the Erie
Album – Grand Canal Ballads: History of the Erie Canal
Artist – The Golden Eagle String Band

Title – Longest Walk
Artist – Ode’Min Kwe Singers
Album – New Moon Medicine

Title – The Gloom
Artist / Composer – Cat Clyde
Album – Down Rounder

Title – Where Did you Sleep Last Night
Artist – Lead Belly
Composer – Huddie Ledbetter
Album – Leadbelly – Where Did you Sleep Last Night

Title – Mr. Hitler
Artist – Lead Belly
Composer – Huddie Ledbetter & Alan Lomax
Album – Leadbelly – Let It Shine On Me

Title – Tear The System Down
Artist / Composer – Cat Clyde
Album – Down Rounder

Title – Papa Took My Totems
Artist / Composer – Cat Clyde
Album – Down Rounder

Title – I Feel It
Artist / Composer – Cat Clyde
Album – Down Rounder

Visit: raybonneville.com

Visit: rustyandmaja.com

Visit: facebook.com/odeminkwesingers

Visit: jentucker.bandcamp.com/lake-erie-shore

Visit: eriecanalway.org

Visit: metalliclaw.com

Visit: folkways.si.edu/leadbelly

Visit: catclydemusic.com

Visit: bradfordartshow.wordpress.com/doug-bradford

This program produced by GLOW Radio Partners in venture with The Borderline Events Co.

Great Lakes Odyssey World

Inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, the Great Lakes Odyssey World is a multi-national effort to strengthen and explore our relationship with the natural wonders known as the Great Lakes.

In this part of the project, we have created a multi-part audio series looking at the way the Great Lakes shape our lives, our livelihoods, our health and our culture.

50 years ago, folks in the media and elsewhere were ready to declare the Cuyahoga River and Lake Erie “dead.”

The thought so appalled citizens in Canada and the United States, they forced their national governments to act.

Because, of course, the Great Lakes shape the life of both Canada and the United States. And, of course, the Great Lakes are a single system stretching from Duluth to Ottawa and down the St. Lawrence seaway. What happens to any of the Lakes will soon happen to the others.

So, the politicians of 50 years ago negotiated the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, “for the purpose of restoring, protecting and enhancing the Great Lakes and the Great Lakes basin.”

50 years later, we can see the agreement worked. We see more fish, cleaner water, and less pollution. Unlike the early settlers and colonials, who mostly saw the Lakes as a resource to tap, we now recognize, like the First Nations, the Lakes are part of our identity. They shape our relationships, our songs and celebrations of place, the way we eat, how we play, and what we make, or sell, or harvest.

50 years since the wake-up call of a burning river, Great Lakes Odyssey wants to learn how we live and love, hurt and restore the incredible gift which is the Great Lakes.

We will explore Great Lakes art and artistic expression, and meet the artists, writers, musicians who make it. We will also dip into Great Lakes history and lore – and learn from the people who have been here the longest and know it the best: The People of the Three Fires, the Anishinaabek.

On our Odyssey around the Great Lakes, we will also hear from people working to prevent poisonous algal blooms or stop the spread of invasive species. We will meet visionaries undoing decades of development that hardened shorelines, emptied marshes and wetlands, and destroyed critical spawning grounds. We will talk to people working to ensure all beings have access to pure drinking water.

Because none of us can live without pure drinking water.

In this wondrous place we call the Great Lakes, we know we are blessed by these Sweet Water Seas. We claim them as our H.O.M.E.S. as the emotionally accurate mnemonic says. They are Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior, and they are our HOMES.

As long as humans have lived in, and of and through the Lakes, people have told stories about them, sung about them, and gloried in this great gift of the long departed Ice Age. Left by glaciers thousands of years ago, they are the World’s storehouse of fresh water. If they are drained… or ruined… or damaged, they can never be replaced.

So, as we travel around the Great Lakes basin, we want to see how we are doing – what we are doing – how we’re feeling and what we’re learning as we try to live as lovers and restorers – and children and family – of the being whom the Anishinaabek call Nayaano-nibiimaang Gichigamiin, the five freshwater seas.

We hope to galvanize, inspire, and motivate you to strengthen, support and steward the Great Lakes to a beautiful and healthy future.

So please join us on this magical, dare we say “magical mystery tour” of the Great Lakes basin and Great Lakes culture.