Bay County past and present . er North American Indians. The Indiansof this part of the country built their homes of skins and long, slenderpoles. If an Indian wanted to build a home for himself, he wouldsave all the skins he could get. Then he would go out into the forestand cut down three or four saplings. These were long slender treeswhich were used by all northern Indians. He then cut all the smallbranches and twigs from the poles and stood them up for a frame-work for his tent, fastening them with strips of leather or bark. Hethen covered them with the skins. He sometimes sewed designs on
Bay County past and present . er North American Indians. The Indiansof this part of the country built their homes of skins and long, slenderpoles. If an Indian wanted to build a home for himself, he wouldsave all the skins he could get. Then he would go out into the forestand cut down three or four saplings. These were long slender treeswhich were used by all northern Indians. He then cut all the smallbranches and twigs from the poles and stood them up for a frame-work for his tent, fastening them with strips of leather or bark. Hethen covered them with the skins. He sometimes sewed designs on theside of the tent. Other Indians built their houses out of bark. Theywent into the forest and cut the bark off from several large trees andthen built their home something like what we call a shanty. Many ofthem spread the bark on long poles in much the same way as the skinswere used, forming a wigwam. These wigwams were small—most of (1) From an account by one of the pupils. (2) Gansser, 39. BAY COUNTY, PAST AND NATIVE LIFE—THE CHIPPEWA INDIANS. 37 the work, such as cooking, cleaning fish and animals for food, grind-ing corn, and so forth, was done outside. (1) On the floor of thedwelling were rush mats made by the squaws. If the fire was made inthe wigwam at any time, an opening was made near the top on theside opposite the direction from which the wind was blowing fromwhich the smoke could escape. There were a few wooden or stone dishes, stone knives and skin-ning stones (2) for preparing game and fish for cooking, and theweapons were the usual bow and arrow, stone tomahawk and course after coming in contact with the white people they werequick to make use of the white mans weapons and implements of ironand steel—such as the gun, knife, dagger, and axe. But the stoneweapons, crude and dull as they seem to us, were wonderfully effec-tive when in the grasp of a skillful and powerful Indian brave. The food of the Indian consisted of berries, nuts, pot
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