Billy Blackwell explains that the wild turnip was put together and tied like this. Two of these were given to Billy Blackwell: one fifty years ago and one twenty years ago. A friend traded a deer hide and many other gifts for one. The other was given to him on trade for helping a family. Recently, a woman from the White Earth Reservation came to learn how to gather and secure the “Ma tosh Kisimin” or wild turnips. Her grandmother taught her how to cook it. The farmers and settlers, not understanding its value, destroyed much of the wild turnip.
Many years ago, two young boys were coming from days away to the east of the “Mizi zibi,” which today is called the Mississippi River. They were Ojibwe boys and as young ones, they had fasted with charcoal on their faces, and wore nothing but a breech cloth, moccasins, and a blanket around them.
Around eight or nine years old, the boys had fasted without food or water for eight days. One of the boys had gone on much longer. Now, they wanted to cross the “Mizi zibi “(this word means the huge river which goes all over). They had made natural twine sacks to gather “Ma tosh kisi min,” which is a delicate type of wild turnip.
In the 1850s, Jonathan Kohl, a scholar from Germany, wrote in his book how hundreds of black bears that came from Michigahn and Wis Kahn seemed to stay for one or two moons (meaning months), to eat the powerful wild turnips. The turnips would make them strong before their months of sleep, when Old Man Winter would come and lay his thick white blanket over the ground. Old Man Winter along with his friend, the North Wind, would blow the freezing cold of the north. The bears would sleep for months waiting for “See gwan,” the beautiful maiden spirit to arrive. Today, “See gwan” is called Spring.
One of the boys told his brother to always have his buckskin bag filled with water. The boys had walked for days. One night, his brother forgot to fill his buckskin bag with water and it went dry. When he awoke the next morning, he followed the tracks of his brother. He saw that the tracks had weakened and then he could see from the tracks that his brother had started to crawl.
As the searching boy approached a river, he could see that the crawling tracks of his brother had turned into a quivering line. The boy cried out apologizing for his mistake to his brother. As the boy got closer to the river, suddenly a large colorful snake arose out of the water and told his brother, “See what you have done to me! And now, every time our people, the Anishinabeg (Anishinaabe), come to this river, they must offer tobacco to me!”
Today, near Hinckley, Minnesota, this river is called “The Snake River,” a river that flows into the “Mizi zibi.” The next county to the west is called Kanabec County. Kanabec is from the word “ka ney bik,” which means snake. The white people had heard the story for many years and had occasionally seen the powerful serpent arise from the water.
The old woman that told me this story was named “Ogima Biney si Kwey” which means Chief Thunderbird Woman. Fasting as a young girl on her first time with a girl’s period, she had dreams. In her dreams with the thunderbirds, they raced from cloud to cloud and the thunderbirds would let her win. This woman had named my wife of long ago “Mary,” Bock ina waush ikwey, which means soaring winning woman. Mary, the mother of my three sons, passed away recently.
The older woman passed away long ago. Her father was Jim Little Wolf and her mother was also from Mille Lacs. She was first married to Chief Eagle whose family were 1837 Treaty signers. This woman told me many stories and now I must pass on these stories.
In the Anishinaabe custom, I must put out a bowl of food and natural tobacco to tell this story, as I will. Later, I will tell more stories of Cook County and the North Shore.
Miigwitch, Thank you,
William Blackwell, Grand Portage, Minnesota
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