NEAH BAY — Makah tribal members are hoping a cultural exchange with a delegation of Chukchi tribal members from Russia will be the first of many.
About 300 Makah and 20 Chukchi gathered at the Neah Bay school gymnasium Monday to share dances, songs and drumming following a salmon feast.
It was the Chukchi people who agreed to give the Makah part of their international whaling quota, which allowed the Makah to begin hunting gray whales again in the late 1990s.
“If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t be where we are today with whaling,” Makah Tribal Chairman Ben Johnson Jr. said.
“They were the ones who helped us get our whale.”
The tribe killed its first gray whale in more than 70 years on May 17, 1999, amid environmentalist protest and legal controversy.
The two tribes have been sharing whale populations for centuries as the giant mammals migrated across the waterways between coastal Russia and Makah villages.
Johnson credited Chukchi leaders with making it possible for the Makah to restore gray whale hunting in 1998 from the International Whaling Commission.