Preserving Elders Knowledge

    As we know, when an elder passes on they take with them a life time of knowledge. Their memories and life experiences are lost to all. True, a lucky few have been blessed with the retelling of these stories but that is usually reserved for the close friends and family members. Some times a great story surfaces at family gatherings or sad to say,"funerals". When this happens we wish we could have captured that memory for children and unborn children to hear. After all this is our history. Each Elder has similar stories waiting to be told. If only we could save the history as a way to benefit all our people. This is why Onondaga like other Nations has started a process to record our oral stories and memories. We realize the lose of this knowledge is the lose of ourselves. We used to abide by the saying,"that is not our way" until the the stories needed to be retold and no one was able to retell it.

    Time passes and new problems show themselves. As a Nation we must adapt to the new problems. Recording or video taping is a means of solving this problem. We hope to ask our elders to volunteer their memoirs and life experiences. We also know our elders aren't too mobile so we will go to them if they wish. Hopefully the general response will enrich our children's knowledge of who our elders are and also show them the life styles our elders grew up with. This knowledge will help solidify the children's wellbeing of who they are. It will also enrich the community as a whole. The stories and memories will be stored as a DVD to be kept at our Onondaga Elementary School library. Copies in DVD and VHS will be available upon request.