Of the Puget Sound Salish people, only the S’Klallam actively hunted whales and fur seals along the Pacific Coast. At the bottom of the central pole, you will see the figure of the whale and a hunter. Head down as if to dive, the whale begins this pole. Just above the whale’s head, between the rising pectoral fins, a small human face represents the blow-hole, with the dorsal fin jutting out from it. The whale hunter peers between the tail flukes, his arms and legs wrapped around the whale’s body. Above the whale hunter is the sun. In old Salish myth, the “Chief Above,” or “Old One,” created the Sun to be the father to all people, as the Earth is their mother. In the myths, Mother Earth is alive, the soil her flesh, the rocks her bones, the trees and the grass her hair. The wind is her breath, the water her tears. From Earth’s flesh, mixed with her tears, Old One shaped clay figures, and Sun’s warmth brought them to life. These were the first, the animal people. Last of the mud-balls shaped by Old One were human beings, the most helpless of all creatures. Shown with his beak around the Sun’s corona, Raven is a cultural hero in many Northwest Coast Native legends, a prestigious crest figure, and an incorrigible supernatural trickster. Able to transform himself into anything at any time, Raven helped the people by putting the sun, moon, and stars into the sky, fish into the sea, salmon into the rivers, and food onto the land. Raven, Sun, Whale, and Hunter represent S’K’lallam cultural history. Raven has been carved with his eyes half closed as a symbol of the long sleep of Tribal cultural heritage during the years when S’Klallam land and rights were obscured. Now that heritage, like Raven on this pole, experiences a new awakening. In keeping with that idea, the paddler at the pole’s top commemorates the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe’s participation in the “Paddle to Bella Bella,” a contemporary canoe journey. Joined by scores of hand-carved canoes from tribes along the Northwest Coast, these challenging annual paddle journeys encourage awareness and pride in tribal heritage.