The West Chester Green Team launched its summer family education series on Saturday, June 24, during a rare break in the weekend’s downpours.
A group of almost 40 people of all ages gathered at West Chester Friends Meeting House to hear Chris Applegate from the Museum of Indian Culture in Allentown. Applegate spoke about the daily lives of the Lenape tribe 500 years ago, before the arrival of colonists. She displayed dozens of items including a pair of elk-hide moccasins. Pennsylvania, she told her audience, is the home of the largest elk herd in the country, living appropriately in Elk County. In so many other ways, however, there have been vast changes since those times. Now the Lenape live as others do, with cell phones, cars, and jobs.
Blythe and Charlotte Wessman making journey sticks with Renee Perna and Molly Hanford. (Photograph by Jim Hudgings)
Applegate talked about the importance of music to the tribe and showed a turtle shell rattle and shakers made from deer hoofs. She demonstrated a bow and arrows, as well as a spear. A Lenape style cradle board with a life-size doll in it, carried by a strap on the forehead, not by shoulder straps as are modern baby packs. was also shown. Applegate described the grinding of corn and the growing of “Three Sisters” vegetables, with corn in the center and beans and squash by its side, asking audience participants to volunteer to play the roles of the vegetables. Planting in this way insured the health of the crops and, when eaten together, “the three sisters” provided healthy, balanced nutrition.
“Wanishi” means thank you in the Lenape language, with generosity the core value of the culture. In her concluding…
Photograph: By Roy Pataro | Nora Thompson Dean 
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