Students learn voyageur life style at Youth Symposium Ron Hobart tells students his 36-foot birch bark canoe is modeled on voyageur canoes that held up to 3.5 tons of cargo and people. Hobart took groups of students for paddling excursions on the Portage Waterway during the recent Lake Superior Youth Symposium held at Michigan Tech.    HOUGHTON - ’ÄúAwesome’Äù was the word Calumet home-school student Sarah King used in describing the adventure of paddling a 36-foot birch bark canoe on the Portage Waterway in Houghton during last week’Äôs Fourth Biennial Lake Superior Youth Symposium held on the Michigan Tech University campus. Many of the more than 350 middle school and high school students from Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Ontario enjoyed the opportunity to play a voyageur role, thanks to Ron Hobart of Hayward, Wis. - storyteller, musician, singer and paddle-maker.   Students paddle a 36-foot birch bark canoe with Ron Hobart, right, on the Portage Waterway during the Lake Superior Youth Symposium.  Sarah King said she learned from Hobart that voyageurs who could sing were paid more money because they inspired the others to keep paddling in rhythm, usually 60 strokes a minute. Another detail she noted was the fact that the voyageurs measured distances in pipes, since they would stop to rest and smoke a pipe after a certain distance. Hobart estimated the paddling distance from the eastern end of Lake Superior to Grand Portage, Minn., at about 247 pipes (pronounced almost like the English word peep).   Ron Hobart leads Copper Country AmeriCorps workers in singing French voyageur songs, as they help paddle his canoe from Princess Point near the MTU campus to the Portage Lift Bridge during the recent Lake Superior Youth Symposium held at Michigan Tech. Pictured from left are AmeriCorps workers Andrea Hinsenkamp, assistant coordinator for the Symposium, and Elisabeth Wilson; and Keith Pennington, Symposium student and recent Houghton High School graduate.  Hobart began each canoe excursion with an Ojibwa prayer song to the Virgin Mary, sung to the tune of the popular French love song, ’ÄúA la claire fontaine.’Äù A talented singer and musician, he also led the students in singing French Canadian voyageur songs such as ’ÄúVent frais’Äù (’ÄúCool wind’Äù), ’ÄúAlouette’Äù (’ÄúLark’Äù) and ’ÄúC’Äôest l’Äôaviron’Äù - a song that combines a rhythmic chorus about the canoe paddles with a story about meeting three women from La Rochelle in France.   At the Princess Point canoe launch site, AmeriCorps worker Crystal Anderson waits beside a historic French flag for Lake Superior Youth Symposium students to return from their canoe excursion with Ron Hobart so she can escort them back to the Michigan Tech campus.   Copper Country AmeriCorps worker Crystal Anderson of Houghton, who escorted the student groups to the canoe and then back to campus, said the canoe excursions were both informative and fun because of Hobart’Äôs stories of canoeing and voyageurs. The sunny, warm weather during the Symposium was another plus. AmeriCorps workers, who manned the information desk and helped supervise activities and dormitories during the event, also showed up to help Hobart paddle the canoe from Princess Point near the MTU campus, the launching spot for the student excursion, back to the Portage Lift Bridge dock.   Christina Burma of Houghton, another AmeriCorps member, said her duties included  letting students back in their room when they locked themselves out. After her inside duties of the day, she was glad to have a chance to be outside and help paddle the canoe.   ’ÄúThe kids are great,’Äù Burma said.   Symposium students listen to Ron Hobart, in the role of 17th-century voyageur Louis Baron, as he tells tories about the original La Salle Expedition of 1681-82 during his ’ÄúSpirit of the Voyageur’Äù presentation May 18 in the Fisher Hall Auditorium at Michigan Tech. Besides taking groups of 15 to 20 students for hour-long paddling excursions during two full days of the Symposium (May 18-19), Hobart shared with the students his own voyageur experience as a member of the 1974-1976 La Salle Expedition - a re-enactment of one of French explorer La Salle’Äôs 17th-century voyages from Montreal through Lakes Ontario, Huron and Michigan and down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. For his Friday evening presentation, ’ÄúSpirit of the Voyageur,’Äù Hobart dressed in authentic clothing - muslin shirt, canvas pants, wool socks, moosehide moccasins and a symbolic hat that transformed him into the role of Louis Baron, 17th-century voyageur. After an entertaining storytelling session, Hobart showed slides of his own memorable 20th-century voyageur experience as a young teacher participating in an authentic re-creation of La Salle’Äôs 1681-82 expedition.   ’ÄúThat is what really got me interested in voyageurs,’Äù Hobart said of the trip that has inspired him to present programs on the voyageurs to schools, camps, elderhostels and other groups for more than 20 years.   ’ÄúWe lived as they did and paddled 3,300 miles from Montreal to the Gulf of Mexico,’Äù Hobart said.    Hobart told students the voyageurs were the ’Äútruck drivers’Äù of the 18th and 19th centuries - trading items like knives, axes, cast iron or copper cookware, cloth, blankets and beads to the Indians for beaver skins to supply a market for beaver hats.     Students delight in Ron Hobart's demonstration of how a voyageur wrestled a bear. In the role of voyageur Louis Baron, Hobart told stories about  17th-century voyageurs, including the account that, like the Fur Trading Companies, La Salle hired voyageurs who couldn’Äôt swim as an ’Äúinsurance policy’Äù for the valuable cargo. (If they couldn’Äôt swim they would be a lot more careful not to let the canoe tip over.) Hobart’Äôs lively sense of humor and fun as a storyteller was evident when he even wrestled a bear on stage!   Ron Hobart shows a slide of the 1976 La Salle Expedition re-enactment, in which he participated. Here the group heads down the Mississippi River toward the final destination, the Gulf of Mexico, which La Salle reached in 1682.  Removing his hat, Hobart played a more serious role as he showed slides of the 1976 La Salle Expedition re-enactment, in which he participated as music director.   ’ÄúHow many of you think the world could be a little better than it is today?’Äù Hobart asked the audience in MTU’Äôs Fisher Hall Auditorium. ’ÄúIf we know more about ourselves we can be better people.’Äù   Hobart said making a list of things you’Äôd like to do in your life is connected with making the world a better place. He told a story from his childhood growing up on a farm in southern Minnesota: Watching his father pull a snapping turtle from a creek, he said, was an experience that made him curious about the natural world. Eventually that experience led to his studying biology and becoming a science teacher. Another item on his list of things to do in life, Hobart noted, was finding out how people did things many years ago. Thus, when, in 1974, a French teacher came up with the idea of the expedition to teach students first-hand about the 17th-century role of the French in American history, Hobart applied to join the group - 17 students and 7 adults - who trained for two years for the voyage. Planning began when the students were 15 years old so they could make the trip at age 17, after high school graduation.   ’ÄúWe built all our own canoes and paddles and made all our own clothes - sashes, moccasins, hand-sewn shirts,’Äù Hobart said.   He added one exception was the fact that a group of senior citizens knitted the wool socks and mittens for the entire group - 24 people, each of whom had eight pairs of socks and two hats. The group also made their own flintlock muskets and tools. Since matches were not allowed, flint and steel were used to start campfires. They limited their diet to simple fare as close as possible to what the voyageurs would have eaten. Pea soup, not Big Macs!   The two-year training included extensive safety and First Aid training, survival lessons from a U.S. Navy instructor, learning to get along better with one another and planning the route one year ahead.   Hobart's slides of the 1976 La Salle Expedition demonstrate the difficulty of canoeing in winter. The trip, which lasted from August to the following April, was full of challenges, especially in winter. Hobart recounted how the group survived dangerously cold temperatures (including a 68-degree-below wind chill), even when one canoe tipped over in an icy river.   ’ÄúWe kept on schedule by walking 12 to 20 miles a day on the Illinois River,’Äù Hobart said.  ’ÄúAt night the fire became the most important thing for us.’Äù   Frozen rivers meant they had to make sleds for the canoes. Once, they were forced to walk along the highway because no other route was possible. That proved to be the most dangerous part of the trip when a 20th-century truck ran into and injured four of the young men ’Äì one seriously. Although the four spent time in a hospital, they recovered well enough to join the group later for the completion of the trip in New Orleans.   Besides the history lesson, the expedition also proved young people could do things they set out to do, Hobart noted.   ’ÄúTake something off your list and try it, and I think we can make the world a better place.’Äù   The Symposium offered students a wide variety of presentations and activities designed to increase their understanding of challenging environmental and scientific issues and to enhance their appreciation of the resources ’Äì natural, cultural and historical ’Äì of the Lake Superior region.   With her parents David and Barbara King, Sarah King, right, a home-schooled student from Calumet, admires a Web site designed by Tyson Luoma, an eighth grader from Bothwell Middle School in Marquette. The Web site was part of an extensive Symposium exhibit by Bothwell students on "Marquette and the Lake."    Sarah King noted that, without choosing it, she found herself attending a session on "Preparing for an Environmental Career," which impressed her.   "It was very informative," she said. "We learned we all have a responsibility in preserving the environment."   Joining the AmeriCorps workers in paddling the voyageur canoe back to the Lift Bridge was Todd Waurio of Atlantic Mine, who teaches eighth-grade science at the CLK Washington Middle School in Calumet. Waurio said he was glad he brought a group of six students to the Symposium. It was a first for him and the students, and he said he expected to take students again when the Symposium is held in another location around Lake Superior.   ’ÄúThey’Äôre having a good time here,’Äù Waurio noted.   To assure that everyone had fun, Hobart invited all the  Symposium participants to enjoy a voyageur rendezvous ’Äì singing and storytelling around the campfire ’Äì on Saturday evening at McLain State Park.   Andrea Hinsenkamp, AmeriCorps member and assistant coordinator for the Symposium, said about 352 students and 66 teacher chaperons from the Lake Superior watershed attended the May 17-20 event, sponsored by the Center for Science and Environmental Outreach at Michigan Tech.                                                                                                                                                   - Michele Anderson                                                         May 28, 2001                                                                                           Editor’Äôs Note: Keweenaw Today regrets that recent technical difficulties caused a delay in publishing this article. Watch for another article on the Symposium soon!   Click here to read Fred Young’Äôs article on International Joint Commission Chairman Thomas Baldini’Äôs keynote speech opening the Lake Superior Youth Symposium on May 17.   Click here to comment on these articles or the Symposium.