Ojibwe Storytelling Series

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courtesy Wisconsin Historical Society

A person poses for a photo in the woods.

Valerie Barber

The winter months are for storytelling in Ojibwe culture, and the Wisconsin Historical Society invites you to listen. Join in on Zoom Tuesdays in January as tribal leaders share stories sure to be both interesting and educational. The group of Indigenous speakers — Mike Wiggins Jr. (Jan. 10), Valerie Barber (Jan. 17), Chris McGeshick (Jan. 24), and Wanda McFaggen (Jan. 31) — will share stories that entertain while teaching attendees about Native American culture and history. Learn more below.

press release: In Ojibwe culture, winter is storytelling season. The Wisconsin Historical Society is celebrating by featuring Ojibwe storytellers in a four-part virtual series every Tuesday evening at 7 pm from Jan. 10-31, 2023.

January 17, 2023, 7 pm: Valerie Barber, Lac Courte Ojibwe Elder and Ojibwe Language Teacher

My name is Valerie Barber, but I prefer "Val" or "Koobie Val." I relate to children as if they are my own kids, grandkids, and even great-grandkids now (which is where the "koobie" comes from, as it is short for "anikoobijigan," or great-gramma).

I was born and raised in South Dakota, although my father, Edward Barber, was from Lac Courte Oreilles, and my mother Alberta Young, was from Lac du Flambeau. My father was a teacher, and my mother was a commercial cook, so they were hired as a team to run a small day school in Thunder Butte, South Dakota. I was fortunate enough to have my father teach my sister, Rose, and myself for our first six years of school. Then, since it was the law, I had to leave my sister, father, and mother behind to attend Cheyenne-Eagle Butte BIA boarding school. I think, seeing my terrible unhappiness, my father took a job with the US Forest Service's Job Corps to get us back home to LCO.

I graduated from Hayward High School and then tried college but left to go into the US Marine Corps. I took evening and weekend college classes at my duty stations and volunteered as an adult education tutor.

I served for six years, coming out with an honorable discharge and the rank of sergeant. I then attended tiny Mt. Senario College, where the nuns put together all my credits from everywhere and worked up what I needed to do, and I graduated with a BA in biology and a minor in secondary education.

I then started an adventurous career of teaching, organizing weekend college for nontraditional tribal students, dealing with the ending of grant-funded positions, working Saturdays running mail, traveling to other countries, working summers for the EPA introducing tribal youth into STEM careers, and serving in AmeriCorps for two years before I landed a job at Hayward Middle/High School as an Ojibwe Language and Culture teacher. I continued to take classes in the evenings and weekends and graduated from Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe University (then Community College) with an Associate of Arts degree in Native American Studies. While I worked for Hayward Schools, I realized I was far behind my students in the area of technology, so I took a Master's program in Teaching/Educational Technology from the College of St. Scholastica.

I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015 and had to retire from teaching in 2016, as the effects of the cancer treatment were very hard to take. It has taken me years to recover my ability to walk well and get my mind to function correctly again. But, a Marine never quits!

I now spend my time working with a leadership program for high school students in the summer and substitute teaching, volunteering for schools as a storyteller, helping with Ojibwe language, and generally having a good life relaxing and trying various cultural arts in the winter.

My paternal grandmother, Nigouyou, was a famous storyteller from White Earth, MN, and my maternal grandfather, Silas Young, was also a storyteller at Lac du Flambeau for the Boy Scouts; my whole extended family love to talk and are very good at language - English and Ojibwe - so I think I have been given a great gift by all of them. It is my great joy and privilege to share the knowledge and humor of Ojibwe culture with everyone I meet by storytelling.

The Wisconsin Historical Society, founded in 1846, ranks as one of the largest, most active and most diversified state historical societies in the nation. As both a state agency and a private membership organization, its mission is to help people connect to the past by collecting, preserving and sharing stories. The Wisconsin Historical Society serves millions of people every year through a wide range of sites, programs and services. The Wisconsin Historical Foundation, a 501(c)(3) tax exempt organization, receives grants and private contributions benefitting the Wisconsin Historical Society and administers the membership program. For more information, visit www.wisconsinhistory.org.