Building a Longhouse -- Cold Spring School

Building A Longhouse

I am studying the Iroqouis and their Long Houses during project. The Indians have had Long Houses since about 0696-Today. The Iroqouis built the Long Houses with the supplies they had in the North Eastern woods. During this report, I will show and tell you about the expwerience of me, Sam, Laura, and Karen making a Long House in the play. yard. I will also tell you how to build a Long House.

The supplies you need are: Elm Bark, Wood and Rope. Then you put a stick in each corner. Then you put a stick across the two bars. Then you put a stick on top of the cross bar. The stick should be a bit smaller than the others. Then you put a rock in between the two slants. Then you put two boards slanting over the rock. Then you put the side boards on and you put Elm Bark on the roof. Inside the Long Houses the Indians sleep on bunks. The Indians have a smoke hole for cooking. The hole is on the roof. The fire is made on the floor. Underneath the bunks is a hole that the Indians place all their treasures. If the Indians left they would leave all their treasures behind for a memory of that person if the person does not come back. Now I am going to tell you about Me, Sam, Laura, and Karen building a Long House. If you would like to see the Wampanoag Indians building their longhouse, Click Here.

This picture is of us digging holes in the garden for the sticks to go in. The holes had to be about one foot deep so that the stick would not be really tall and it would stay firmly in the ground.

This is a picture of what we have so far. As you can tell, we are working on the roof. We formed a triangle at each end and a center pole for across the middle of the roof so it would slope down from the center. It is winter and we are having a lot of trouble for the wind is knocking the longhouse down. Because there are no longer Elm trees to get bark, we decided to cover the longhouse with fabric. We bought some brown fabric. We thought that if it was a different color, it would be too far out of what the Indians would have done. We were also a bit worried that the fabric had three different patterns, even though they were all brown.

This is a picture when we were in the middle of putting the fabric on. When we were done, we decided that we should not put up the roof because the snow would make it cave in. So at the school meeting of January 16, 1997, we declared that it was DONE!

1997 Cold Spring School. Last update May 1997. coldspr@minerva.cis.yale.edu

	This picture is of us digging holes in the garden for the sticks to go in. The holes had to be about one foot deep so that the stick would not be really tall and it would stay firmly in the ground.
	This is a picture of what we have so far. As you can tell, we are working on the roof. We formed a triangle at each end and a center pole for across the middle of the roof so it would slope down from the center. It is winter and we are having a lot of trouble for the wind is knocking the longhouse down. Because there are no longer Elm trees to get bark, we decided to cover the longhouse with fabric. We bought some brown fabric. We thought that if it was a different color, it would be too far out of what the Indians would have done. We were also a bit worried that the fabric had three different patterns, even though they were all brown.
	This is a picture when we were in the middle of putting the fabric on. When we were done, we decided that we should not put up the roof because the snow would make it cave in. So at the school meeting of January 16, 1997, we declared that it was DONE!