Oct 14, 2022 | By Rick Miller | County Reporter | salamancapress.com
SALAMANCA — Over the past six months, volunteers have built a replica of a bark-covered longhouse near the Seneca National Museum and Onöhsagwë:de’ Cultural Center.
The longhouse was the center of life for Seneca families and its clans for centuries, said Dr. Joe Stahlmanm director of the Seneca cultural center. “I’m really proud of this building.”
Volunteers from the community and Buffalo State College are gearing up for several tasks today to finish off the interior and exterior of the longhouse and a perimeter fence before winter sets in, Stahlman said during a visit to the site on Thursday.
“We’re super close to being done,” he said. Five-person teams will each be assigned tasks including finishing building beds and storage areas on each side of the interior.
They will be putting the finishing touches on both sides of the exterior and filling in the perimeter fence with more poles made from trees cut both on the Allegany Territory and in the Allegany National Forest.
Additional simulated “bark” is on order from the St. Louis company that supplied it for the sides and ends of the longhouse. About half of the roof is awaiting the product.
The “bark” is a rubberized product made to resemble bark that Senecas would have used to cover their longhouses, Stahlman said. The reason real bark wasn’t used is that it would have to be replaced every three or four years.
“I hope it doesn’t take too long for that 18-wheeler to get here from St. Louis,” Stahlman said. He’ll feel a lot better when the rest of the roof is covered.
In the spring, volunteers will spend time making a garden outside the longhouse with plants that their ancestors would have cultivated.
“We want to get community kids interested,” Stahlman said. “We want to introduce families to the longhouse concept. This will be a good place for a showcase. It will show non-Native visitors how we lived.”
Plans call for a large area for a community garden as well, Stahlman said. “It doesn’t matter if families are Indigenous or not. We want to share with all of our community. It shows how necessary it is to work together.”
The Cattaraugus County Agricultural Society has expressed interest in the community garden, as have some people who collect seeds.
The longhouse has been on the minds of Seneca elders and leaders for a decade. Stahlman called it a “10-year labor of love. Despite the pandemic, despite losing employees, we never doubted this would get made.”
Tribal elders went to other communities to study longhouses. There are four or five left in New York state.
“Our goal is to fill it up with programming,” Stahlman said. “We plan to offer programs all the time.”
Some of the wood designated for the project didn’t dry as planned and last year Seneca Nation foresters were sent back out to cut trees on the territory and in the Allegany National Forest, Stahlman said.
The longhouse measures 25 feet by 45 feet and tops at 18 feet. There are bunks along the two walls and storage above that.
“The longhouse can be expanded as the families grow,” Stahlman said. Some longhouses were up to 200 feet long with many families of the same clan.
Rod Pierce is the project foreman, Stahlman said.
The longhouse project will paint a picture for visitors and members of the community, to help them fill in the gaps in their knowledge of Seneca culture.
While his job is rooted in the past, Stahlman wants to use the longhouse to focus as well on the future. “How do we get our kids here and how do we get them to stay?”
The longhouse signifies the utilization of the environment while “maintaining relationships with all life forms and each other,” he said.
