Totem Village

An extensive array of quill boxes is part of Totem Village’s upscale, handcrafted side, contrasted with its inexpensive, battery-free, traditional toys.

To passing motorists, Totem Village—part museum, part gift shop, part zoo—may not seem any different from tourist traps trading on Indian imagery. If you come inside and explore, however, it's clear that this is informed by a sincere spirit that respected Ojibwe life as the founding entrepreneur/artist came to understand it, at a time when Ojibwe culture got little respect.
The late Ralph Ojibwe's roadside attraction, started in 1950, falls in the category of a folk art or outsider art environment made by an artist whose images and words preached his message. (Such artists were very seldom women.) Today it is a designated State Historic Roadside Attraction. When McCarry was in his late forties, he had a heart attack. His doctor told him to find something less physical than logging. Fascinated with woodcarving, he started to research and study subjects from early forts to Indian life to the lumber camps on the Tahquamenon River where he had worked.

His efforts and collections grew in scope and scale, and did provide a living for him and his family. Contemporary sophisticates can fault him for blending Ojibwe philosophy with totem poles from the Pacific Northwest. McCarry's approach predated by decades any hint of political correctness. "He was part Indian himself and saw Totem Village as an educational tool to restore pride in Indian heritage," says Totem Village proprietor Nancy Dandona. She readily points out that totem poles were not indigenous to the area. Local Native Americans, pleased to be subjects of any favorable publicity at the time, honored McCarry with the name "White Wolf of the Chippewas" and held spring and fall feasts at Totem Village.

Kids like it that a few dollars can go far in the gift shop. It also has a good selection of books, mostly about Eastern Woodland Indians, and crafts like quill boxes.

Peaceful pipe music accompanies the museum experience. It starts with beautiful beadwork, pipes, arrowheads, and other artifacts from many native cultures, displayed in a dark, confined log corridor. Then the museum opens up to areas of dioramas—meticulous scale models of a lumber camp, Fort Fond du Lac, the first Soo lock, and more—and, finally, the big, 40' by 60' totem pole building, over 20' high, with a replica of an Ojibwe medicine lodge, strewn with juniper boughs.

Here are McCarry's primitive paintings and hand-lettered philosophical sayings— things like, "Be not puffed up but kneel and pray with your brother" and his Chief's Prayer, "Before I condemn a brother, let me walk in his moccasins for 3 moons." Beyond the lodge, paths lead outside, where bobcats, sprightly sika deer, peacocks, and thunder foxes are in large enclosures beneath the cedars. Fees have gone up to $4/person because the cost of animal feed has doubled.

"I feel like I'm its caretaker," says Nancy about Totem Village. "People expect my museum to be like a state museum. That hasn't been my intention." She went to great lengths to preserve the vulnerable totems, which suffered in an outdoor environment.

Two miles west of the Mackinac Bridge on the north side of U.S. 2. (906) 643-8888. Open from May thru Oct. In high season open 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Otherwise open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission to museum: $4/adult, $2/child, $10/family. Wheelchair access: museum is fine. Assistance needed on one hill in animal enclosure.

Return to U.S. 2 from the Bridge

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