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PHOTOS: ‘The Grandfathers’ are for everyone

Grandfathers — we can play with them, seek comfort in them, and certainly, we can learn from them.
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Leslie Stonechild visits with the stones that will be organized into a stone circle this week in Coronation Park. “I feel good” said Stonechild. “Just being with them gives me a good feeling.”


Grandfathers — we can play with them, seek comfort in them, and certainly, we can learn from them.

And though the 20 “grandfathers” who have now moved into Coronation Park will not be able to dote on anyone or speak any “Back in my day . . .” stories, the people who have brought the stone “grandfathers” to the public hope Red Deerians will be able to get all the same benefits from them that they would their aged human relations.

On Saturday, the Stone Circle, Red Deer’s first permanent monument celebrating aboriginal people and culture, was unveiled with a dedication ceremony attended by approximately 100 people. The monument is made up of 20 boulders — 12 perimeter stones arranged in a 20-metre diametre circle; eight on the interior pointing to the four directions and representative of everything from the four seasons to the life cycles of the universe.

The boulders, donated by Bettenson’s Sand and Gravel, are called “grandfathers” because of their age.

Out in the open in Coronation Park, the monument is one of the few where it is encouraged for people to hop up onto its parts and play around.

“I want everybody to make this place their own,” said Lyle Keewatin Richards, one of the local aboriginals who spearheaded the project.

“Every time I see somebody come by here, or talk to them, they come up with a new definition of what it means to them. Whether it’s a teepee ring, somebody said it was a sun dial, somebody said it was standing stones.

“Although it was made to represent our culture — the sun dance, the sweat, the teepee — everybody making it their own is just the most satisfying thing,” he continued.

An interpretive sign will eventually be added to the monument, but for now it rests completely open to interpretation and the imagination.

“For me spiritually, it’s a place that becomes sacred when people come here and sit against these old grandfathers . . . People can have a place to come and experience calm and have a place to learn a little bit about some of the real fundamental teachings of the culture as well,” said Tanya Schur, executive director of the Red Deer Native Friendship Centre Society.

Schur said she likes the fact that the monument is in a very accessible place for Red Deerians. She expressed that it would be a great site to add to a downtown walking tour.

The monument can be used by the Friendship Centre, she said, to benefit aboriginal youth.

“When aboriginal kids come to this spot and recognize it, and they will, they will know that this city says that aboriginal history is important. I think that’s going to help our young people to understand themselves as a part of Red Deer as a citizen. That’s a really important piece for us,” said Schur.

The push to incorporate a Stone Circle into the Red Deer landscape began in 2000. For the past 13 years, discussions with the city had been ongoing regarding the monument’s eventual location, with the aboriginal organizers consistently pushing for Coronation Park, due to the fact that treaties were signed between First Nations and the Crown.

In the end, it was the Red Deer Centennial Committee coming on board with the project that finally got it to happen. The project would have cost around $35,000, but the stones were donated, and the city stepped up to transport and place the stones in the park.

The design was given to the group by Siksika Nation elder Tom Crane Bear. While the assembly resembles a Medicine Wheel, it is not being called one.

“(Crane Bear) said that the Medicine Wheel has really gone out of living memory. We kind of have an idea of what went on, but it’s really left living memory, and for us to try to pretend that we’re building another one really isn’t appropriate. We need to make something that’s real significant for ourselves, not necessarily try to copy something that we don’t really know,” explained Keewatin Richards.

mfish@www.reddeeradvocate.com