The Button Blanket Project

In 2002, the Carcross/Tagish First Nation and the Four Mountains Resort Project team worked together to create twelve button blankets. This project was the beginning of a community-driven process to discuss respectful cultural tourism, appropriate protocol to share this culture and a community–driven model for economic development. The project would also provide a forum for rules and practices for the creation of cultural products.

The twelve button blankets were designed by Keith Wolfe Smarch, a renowned artist and member of the Carcross/Tagish First Nation, and were created by the women of the Carcross/Tagish First Nation. All stencils from the blankets are stored at the First Nation Administration Office and are still available for members of the clans to create their own blanket.

This project created necessary discussion in the community and lead directly to the development of the Carcross/Tagish First Nation Tourism Code of Conduct, a document that guides tourism development in a manner as dictated by the community to protect the land and culture. The project also lead to the formation of the Caribou Crossing Adventure Company, strategic economic decisions and a comfort with sharing the culture and land in a good way.

Now safeguarded by the Carcross/Tagish First Nation, it is the intention to share these blankets in public venues until such time as they can be displayed at the Four Mountains Resort and our future cultural centre.

Button Blankets
Button blankets are ceremonial capes that display the emblems of the person wearing the blanket. Often, the blanket will display symbols only that person or members of the person’s clan can wear. The Tagish/Tlingit culture is matrilineal, meaning that it follows the mother’s line.  When a child is born, s/he is born into the mother’s moiety, clan or house group. 

There are two moieties, (Gooch) Wolf or Crow (Yeitl), in our culture.  Within each moiety there are clans.  The Carcross/Tagish area has six clans; two which are of the Wolf moiety and four which are of the Crow moiety.  The Daklaweidi (Killer whale) and Yen Yedi (Wolf) are both of the Wolf moieties.  Deisheetaan (Beaver), Ganaxtedi (Raven), Kookhittaan (Crow), Ishkahittan (Frog) are of the Crow moiety.

The Role of the Clans
Each clan owns and carries their own crest or emblem. This crest could be attached to their regalia such as a button blanket, dance tunic or a vest. This identified which clan individuals belonged to when they attend certain functions, such as potlatches. It is illegal and considered taboo to wear a crest or emblem that is not your own. This is done so people of other clans know who you are.

Traditionally a person of Crow moiety must marry a person of wolf moiety and vice versa, but with the arrival and intermarriages between Europeans and other First Nation people, this custom is no longer as strictly observed. This was done to ensure the interdependence and balance of life and the Nation was maintained.

It is also important to mention that all clans have clan leaders who are chosen by their respective clan members to be their spoke person, and speak on behalf of the clan at meetings, ceremonial activities, or any other public events. The basic requirements in the selection of a clan leader relates to their character, abilities, social standing and demonstrated commitment to the welfare of their clan members.

The Clans
It's difficult to establish exactly where all the clans came from because there are so many similarities between some of the clan "creation" stories. Because the stories and history were passed on orally, many variations were created in the same stories. A team of researchers, documenting the Carcross/Tagish First Nations Research Project has summarized the creation stories as gathered through their research.

Daklaweidi (Killer whale)
The Daklaweidi clan traces its origin to the Telegraph Creek area of northern British Columbia and is closely linked with the Tagish and the Tahltan of the interior.

According to one story, the Daklaweidi Clan split after a dispute with the other clan members about a woman. One group of people traveled down the Stikine River, but a glacier across the river blocked their way. Two old men on a raft volunteered to find a way underneath the glacier. They put green leaves and/or feathers on their heads so that they would be able to feel the top of the ice tunnel. Luckily they came out the other side without messing up their feathers. Eventually, some of these people found their way to Tagish.

Another story, with a lot of similarities to the story quoted, also describes a trip under a glacier. However, in this story the people were starving because the glacier was blocking the river and preventing salmon from swimming upstream. The name "Daklaweidi" may mean "back/black sand people", a name which refers to the sand where the people camped after their trip under the glacier.  In some stories there is also reference to a "flood" that caused people to move north from their homeland at the head of the Stikine River.

Carcross/Tagish Daklaweidi claim the Wolf, Bald Eagle and the Killer Whale as crests.                       

Yan Yedi (Wolf)
The histories of the Yan Yedi and the Daklaweidi people are very closely linked. Both clans came from the upper parts of the Stikine and Taku Rivers, although they might be able to trace their origins even further back to the Yakutat on the Alaska Coast.

There are both ‘old’ and ‘new’ Yan Yedi. The ‘old’ Yan Yedi refer to them selves in English as "wolf wolves", while they call the ‘new’ Yan Yedi "wolf fish-hawks".

What seems likely is that the ‘old’ Yan Yedi were pushed back up the Taku River by the ‘new’ Yan Yedi who were moving in from the coast and from the Stikine area. One story quoted by McClellan suggests that a young Yan Yedi couple fled to the Nisutlin area after committing incest.

The name "Yan Yedi" has been interpreted as meaning "White Cedar People", "Mainland People", or "Place of Hemlock People".

Yan Yedi claim the wolf as their crest, while the new Yan Yedi claim the golden eagle.

Deisheetaan (Beaver)
The Deisheetaan clan is closely related to the Tuq'wedi clan from Tagish. Both these clans eventually merged to become Deisheetaan.

Stories about the Deisheetaan clan revolve around four daughters of an Angoon woman who married a high-ranking Chilkat man. These sisters left Chilkat and went to Juneau before turning inland and traveling up the Taku River. On the upper Taku, the sisters separated. One married a Tahltan from the Telegraph Creek area; one married an Inland Tlingit from Teslin; one married a Tagish man; and one married a man from Pelly Banks. We know that there were three sisters, with the possibility of a fourth who married the man from Pelly Banks. This story is yet unclear.

According to the some of the stories quoted by McClellan, the beaver caused floods in revenge for the way in which he had been treated ("… because it almost killed us, that's why we have the beaver"). Deisheetaan claim to own Carcross. The clan may have originated from Angoon.

The Deisheetaan are undecided about the meaning of their name (Tuqwedi). One clan member suggests that it refers to cottonwood, which is the favorite food of the beaver.

The Deisheetaan have the beaver as their crest.

Kookhittaan (Crow)
The Kookhittaan clan is generally considered to be an offshoot of the Ganaxtedi clan.  One source said that ancestors of the Kookhittaan were supposed to have gone down the Taku River long before there were any other Tlingit speakers in the area. (the implication is that they were then Athabascan speakers). Another story says that the Kookhittaan are part of the Kaagwaantaan clan, which is part of the wolf moiety. The Kaagwaantaan claim to be the oldest and most powerful.

Another source said that the name Kookhittaan was taken by a branch of the Ganaxtedi after some of the group had moved to Angoon. There the group split because there were too many Ganaxtedi living in one house. The new group built another house at the end of the village. But because they were afraid of the Ganaxtedi, they built a hole or cellar in the middle of the house in which to hide. Another story says that they put the hole in the middle to protect the women and children of the house.  The name Kookhittaan means "people of the house with the hole in the middle".

In the late 1800's or early 1900's, there was a potlatch house that was built near the head of the Taku River, which had a large cellar dug out.

The clan emblem of the Kookhittaan is a crow with the three babies (sometimes carrying two human heads said to belong to slaves). They also use the Three-heads encircling the Salmon called Ick a taxt, (they represent spirits associated with the Salmon Hole of the Ishkahittaan people).

Ganaxtedi (Raven)
There is not very much information describing the origins of the Ganaxtedi clan. One story talks about a chief near Ketchikan who found his wife's lover hiding in a box and killed him. This caused trouble, and part of the clan moved away and settled in places like Hutsnuwu and Chilkat. Apparently, four Ganaxtedi women married Yan Yedi men from the Taku River (which is how Ganaxtedi came to exist in the interior).

The Ganaxtedi claim crow as their emblem.

Ishkahittaan (Frog)
Interior people still think of the Ishkahittaan as a coastal clan. They are linked to both the Ganaxtedi and Kookhittaan clans. Their name means "deep place/stays in one place". Swanton listed an I'cka hit (Salmon Hole House) as a house of the Taku Ganaxtedi.

A Tagish Deisheetaan has said that, "It's like the Ishkahittaan is our other half. It's like we point a finger at them".

Ishkittaan claim both the crow and the frog as their emblems.