Ep. 53 - The Old Grandmother's Tree Conversation with Joseph Bolton

A single DNA result can feel like trivia until you chase it all the way back to names, places, and documents that prove a life actually happened. That’s where Joseph Bolton’s story gets gripping. He’s a West Point graduate and retired Army paratrooper who starts digging into his family tree, discovers Indigenous and French-Canadian roots he didn’t fully understand, and then turns that research into Old Grandmother’s Tree, a heavily illustrated folk tale series built on real historical anchor points from 17th-century Quebec. 

Joseph explains why he chose the folktale as the “language” for telling his ancestor’s story, how Jesuit records in Trois-Rivières preserve rare details about her life, and how he uses imagination to explore the emotional truth inside documented events. 

The conversation goes deeper than books. Joseph shares how connecting with Algonquin community members and other descendants reshapes his sense of identity and belonging, and how Canadian ancestry laws change the way he sees himself in the present, not just the past. If you’ve ever wondered how to research your family history, how to write historical fiction responsibly, or how ancestry can redraw your idea of who you are, you’ll find a lot to sit with here. 

Subscribe for more stories like this, share the episode with a friend who loves family history, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show.

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Old Grandmother's Tree Character Wiki

Old Grandmother's Tree Purchase options on Amazon

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Music Credit:  True Living by Patrick Moore

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Transcript

Quick Ways To Support The Show

SPEAKER_07 0:00

Just a reminder, don't forget to hit follow or subscribe wherever you're listening to this podcast. And two small things you can do that'll have a big impact on the podcast. Tell a friend about assorted conversations. And consider leaving a five-star written review wherever you download your podcast. That helps the podcast become more visible to other folks who may enjoy the content as well. Thanks for listening, and here's this week's episode. Everyday people following their passions.

SPEAKER_02 0:44

That's probably like one of the highlights of my life so far. Just being able to be creative like that. I'm able to.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

And then I decided to get another hive, and that turned into a lot of hives. As long as I can do that, I want to be a good citizen. Help people out.

SPEAKER_07 1:04

Putting themselves out there, taking chances, and navigating challenges along the way.

SPEAKER_04 1:10

I I absolutely identified with having stage rides because, you know, anytime I went on stage, I just felt like I was having a heart attack.

SPEAKER_03 1:17

Very first lap, very first practice session, I crashed, turned the car upside down, made a spectacle of myself, and I got back on that horse and started riding again.

SPEAKER_07 1:27

As they pursue what makes them happy and brings them joy.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

As long as people are having a good time and I have the opportunity to put smiles on people's faces, I love what I do.

SPEAKER_08 1:39

I have done things that I never thought I could do.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

To have somebody tell me how real it looks and how, you know, from their actual memory. Because that's telling me I captured what I was trying to get.

SPEAKER_07 1:55

Welcome to Assorted Conversation. I'm your host, Helen. I'm so glad you're here, and thanks for tuning in. Have you ever researched your family ancestry? Um not just a DNA test, but really researched your family tree. Found legal documents, newspaper clippings, old photos, and tapped into resources other distant family members may have found and made available online. I'm talking really dug into finding out, not just the names, but who your ancestors really were. This week's guest has gone deep into the research of his lineage, inspired by the stories he heard growing up, plus adding his own creativity and magic, and the voice of folktale, he takes us on an incredible journey as he shares his Native American and Canadian ancestors with us while paying homage to his heritage. Take a listen to this week's episode, and I'll see you on the other side. This week's guest was born in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, at the twilight of New England's French-Canadian cultural golden age, and raised on the rich stories of the place we came from, Quebec. That early love of heritage and storytelling would shape his life in powerful ways. An Army paratrooper turned West Point graduate, he served nearly two decades in leadership roles, including a combat tour in Afghanistan with the 10th Mountain Division. Since retiring, he's worked with the U.S. Air Force, taught mathematics, a role he calls his most fulfilling, and authored Old Grandmother's Tree, his debut book inspired by ancestry, identity, and the landscapes of New England and Quebec. Thank you for your service, and I am so happy to welcome Joseph Bolton to Astor of Conversations. Hi, Joseph.

SPEAKER_08 4:02

Oh, hello. I'm very happy to be here today.

Grief Sparks A Writing Life

SPEAKER_07 4:05

How are you? Doing good, doing good. How are you? I am well. I am well. So let's jump into this. With your military background, where did writing first become something you were interested in or something you did?

SPEAKER_08 4:21

Well, I mean, like any lot of other kids, I used to write stories, you know, as a child. As a teenager and a college, you know, kid in college, I wrote poetry. Wow. Well, of course, you know, you're young and you're romantic, you write love poetry, you write poems. So I did. And but I really haven't written a poem in a long, long time. But once I was in the army, I really didn't write anymore except professionally for you know operations orders and so on and so forth. But my modern, more recent writing career really didn't start until after my brother passed away with ALS in 2013, my younger brother. And it was a terrible disease to witness, and it still haunts me even to this day. But right after he died, I decided to start a blog. And blog was really for me. I didn't really have a lot of ambitions. I would share it. Sometimes it did some blogs did get picked up nationally a couple of times, which was nice. But the topics ranged from mathematics, history, philosophy, science, family history, my family history. And then eventually, towards the end, I actually wrote a short story to talk about mathematics. And it was a based on Greek fables and Greek mythology. And it's still a very cute story, but it's never been, you know, really finished. But that's kind of where I said, hmm, I really like this creative writing stuff. And so because I liked it, because you can tell an entertaining story, but you could also get a message through at the same time. And, you know, so it's like a little bit of spoon, you know, a little sugar with the medicine, you know. So it really was an eye-opening thing for me. So I started liking that. So I wrote that first, and then eventually I wrote my first story, which is now part of the whole series of Old Grandmother's Tree, which was La Trope de Sabot. And I wrote that as part of my French class. I wrote a little short story in French, and it was called La Trope de Sabot, and that became the genesis of the whole book series.

SPEAKER_07 6:30

Oh, wow. I was gonna ask you, what was the seed that was planted that that started you on this this journey with the with the trilogy so far?

SPEAKER_08 6:38

Well, you know, sometimes I just like to be, I don't know, mischievous in my writing. So I was told to do some writing for French by my tutor. So instead of just doing some writing or writing some bland paragraph, I decided I'm gonna write this silly story about my great-great-grandparents' farm in Quebec. And at midnight, their farm animals escape out of the barn, grab a toboggan, go up the hill, and have an adventure going tobogganing down the hill until my great-great-grandmother finds them. And but instead of scolding them, she hops onto the toboggan and starts sledding down with them. So I wrote that all in French, and it was a cute little story. But you know, a little you add a little bit, and then you it's like anything else, you you add something more to the story. Instead of you just building it up, it actually opens the doors to other connections and other stories, and it kind of built up from there. And so initially, the very first story didn't really include directly my ancestor Marie Mateya Weawagwe, who is the actual old grandmother of the old grandmother series. But she showed up like in the in the second story, and she was more of a like a backstory to my great-great-grandmother, who was you know, her that was her descendant or ancestor. But eventually, as I learned more about Rima Tea Wewagwe and a Remarkable Life, her story actually became the centerpiece of the whole book series.

A French Class Story Becomes A Series

SPEAKER_07 8:11

Right. Okay. All right. So how how true to life are these stories?

SPEAKER_08 8:22

Well, the the stories are written in the language of a folk tale. So that'll include folktale elements like magic, magical beings, trickster animal characters based on, in this case, Native American mythology, but none of it was directly lifted from any existing folktales.

SPEAKER_06 8:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_08 8:42

Kind of like inspired by. So I chose folktales as the language to tell the story about my Algonquin ancestor and her descendants because folktales are a universal language throughout the world. We all enjoy them. And even though every culture's folktales have a different flavor based on the environment that they came from, there's still a kind of elemental familiarity with all of them. A lot of them have trickster characters, a lot of them have lessons in there, many of them are also extremely entertaining. That's why many of them have endured sometimes for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. So I took that style and I overlaid it, overlaid it the real story of my old grandmother, Mibate Weawagwe. And she had this very remarkable life, and as it turns out, not only did she live a remarkable life, but her life was relatively well documented compared to other people who lived in that time in the 17th century in Quebec.

SPEAKER_07 9:48

Why is that?

SPEAKER_08 9:50

Well, I think it's because she lived close to a Jesuit mission in Taurire, and the Jesuits were very meticulous in keeping records. So the facts of her life, what I do know, and this is kind of like what I started with, was I know that in 1652, she was about 21, 22 years old. Wow. And she was married to another Algonquin man. His name was Asababish. And her and Asababish had two small children, very young, a boy and a girl. And in 1652, Mohawk tribesmen from down south, south of in into New York, came up north, attacked their village. Her husband was killed in the attack, and her two small children were taken by the Mohawks, and she never saw them again.

SPEAKER_05 10:40

Oh, wow.

Folk Tale Magic With Real Anchors

SPEAKER_08 10:40

And she never even knew what happened to them. They just disappeared. So at 22, she lost her husband and her children. So it's very devastating for someone, a woman, young woman, just barely out of her teens. Right. And five years later, she married a French settler named Pierre Cauch. And Pierre Couch and Rima Tea Wewagwe became my ninth great grandparent. So that's the second event that I know about her life. Then at the end of her life, the priest in Trois Riviere wrote this very short but very beautiful eulogy about her. So as the priest in Trois Revier, he would record, you know, birth, baptisms, and deaths. And most of the time he would just write the date of a death of a person. But in her case, he took the time to make an extra statement. And what he wrote was this Marima Te, Weawagwe lived a full life with dignity, respect, and love. A courageous and loving Algonquin woman. And I always thought that that is the most beautifully written short eulogy. If at her own deaths, at our own funeral, if somebody could stand up and say that about us and then sit back down, it'd be perfect, right? Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 12:05

Simplicity, but it covers everything that's important.

The Documented Life Of Old Grandmother

SPEAKER_08 12:08

It does. It does. So she had to have had a significant impact and influence on the people around her. Probably not just the fellow members of the Algonquin community around Toyre Vier, but also the French settlers that lived there. For this priest to be able to be so moved to write this about her, that her life was noteworthy. And remember, this is in 1699 when she died. And women at that time didn't have a very high status in society. Right. European women. And you figure that native women, indigenous women, probably had even less. We're a little farther down the hierarchy. So she had to she had to do something right. She had to have lived a remarkable life. So between those events, you know there is a story there. And so what I did was with my working with my artist, we kind of filled it up and I reimagined how she felt after the attack. I imagined how her marriage to Pierre Cout came about and that life. And then I would have, I would skip a few generations to like my great-great-grandparents in Quebec and their children. And I would talk about how what happened in the past with her life, Maribate Weyowagwe's life, still echoes through all the generations that follow in that family. And I have uh something kind of visual cue in the stories that kind of connects all the stories together. So obviously, Maribate Weyowagwe, you know, she didn't live throughout the whole, you know, into the 20th century and onward. But how do we capture her essence of continuity? Well, what I have is that Maribate Weyowagwe on her wedding day was given the gift of a shawl. And the shawl on her wedding night was transformed into a magic shawl by the spirit of her first husband that she encountered on her wedding night. And so her first uh the spirit of her first husband, you know, comfort her, told her it's she's happy, he's happy that she's married again, that she's not alone. And as a g wedding gift for her, he he reached up, grabbed the northern lights, and then threw it at the shawl. And so instead of this gray shawl, the gray, the shawl became this brilliant color of the northern lights. And because it's a magic shawl, it survives and it gets passed down from generation to generation. So you see other characters in the book, you know, women characters who are descended from Rimate Weawagwe, they will be wearing that very same shawl that was the wedding gift from Pierre to Ribate Weawagwe. So that is a symbol of that continuity from old grandmother all the way through other generations.

SPEAKER_07 15:09

Yep. Now, yeah, you mentioned continuity. How many, I only have one. How many books are there in your series?

SPEAKER_08 15:18

Only have one? Oh, you got to catch up.

SPEAKER_07 15:21

Only have one. But I have to tell you, it is the most beautifully written and illustrated book. It's a little more oversized. I got the, I don't know if there's a hardcover edition. I get the paperback and it's oversized, and it is absolutely gorgeous.

SPEAKER_08 15:38

Well, thank you. Yeah, it is. And the artist Natasha, Natasha Pelley Smith, who's our finishing artist, did an awesome job with those. And I have to also mention Masami Kiona, who's a young woman in Manhattan, who does the storyboard work. So she did all a lot of the rough sketches and helped plan the illustrations with me. Yeah. Natasha finished them. It's too big of a project for one artist to do both. Storyboarding is a separate task than doing a finishing. You can't just go to finish illustration. You have to plan what you're going to do, how it's all going to work, the whole story. Yeah. Anyway, how many books are there? Well, right now there are three. Three books. And just from this last month, we finally have put out hardcover editions, which are beautiful. And they're and I'm kicking myself because I didn't do this earlier. Because when you hold them, they're so much easier to hold and read, because you mentioned these are not small books, they're they're big. Yeah. So the hardcover makes it a little easier, and they're very beautiful. So now we have three books. I have a fourth one that's already written. All the rough sketches are done by Masami. And Natasha is going to do the finished sketch work starting in May. And it'll probably take about a year. Wow. So the four books, and we Masami and I just finished up a 20-page comic style story. So it's not like most of those books are really. So for your listeners, the books when I say illustrated, just so you understand, there's in this three books, there's 700 full color illustrations, 60,000 words of text. And I can't remember how many pages there are, but these are big books. But as it works out, it's almost one illustration per page. So it's very heavily illustrated. So it's a very heavily illustrated book. So every time you turn the page, you're going to look at something, you're going to see an illustration.

SPEAKER_07 17:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 17:39

So you know, these these books are, you know, so anyway, what we've gotten right, but not really a graphic novel style. Like a graphic com what we used to call a comic when we were kids. But anyway, Masami and I just created a 20-page quote unquote comic or graphic novel style, which is going to have the text embedded into the panels, just like a traditional comic.

SPEAKER_07 18:05

Oh, cool. Is it going to be an existing story or is it going to be a complete departure?

SPEAKER_08 18:09

It's going to be a very complete departure. In fact, this story is going to take place at the same Murnier family farmhouse that you read in the first story. Uh-huh. It's going to take place in the same farmhouse, but in the year 2103. So about 200 years after the other stories. But the house will be there. But it'll be all dilapidated and kind of falling apart. And it'll be inhabited by this cute little robot that's the only inhabitant of the house named Beatrice. And the there's going to be an old man in the story named Thomas Savoy, who actually is a real person. He was just born. Thomas Savoy, my grandnephew, was just born this month, just within the last week. Oh, wow. So in this story, it's him, but it's him at 77 years old. And visiting the old farmhouse. And he's going to have an adventure with this robot. He's going to have an adventure with the trickster animal characters that you remember from the very first book you're reading. So, and uh there'll be some other surprises in there, and some humor. And it's called Bonjour Hello. And we're probably going to publish it initially as a separate release. We're not sure if it's just going to be Kindle only or if I should do it in print because it's not very long. But more than likely we'll add that to the back of the fourth volume when it comes out next year. But I do plan on releasing in some form this 20-page comic this year.

SPEAKER_07 19:39

Oh, that I'm looking forward to that. That'll be cool. And then now knowing the backstory to it.

The Magic Shawl And Continuity

SPEAKER_08 19:45

Yes. So, you know, we talked about folk tales and we talked about the past as you know, stories take place in the 1600s and early 1900s. I deliberately set the stories that I'm writing now, like the fourth volume has a chapter, an epilogue that actually takes place 40 years from now. And also I have, and if you looked at Dance of Creation, is the third book, which you haven't seen yet, that actually takes place a framing story. The narrator is actually set in the year 2126. But he's narrating the creation of the world. He's telling his grandchildren about the creation of the world. But that framing story takes place a hundred years from now. And the reason why I do that or did that is because I want to remind the readers that they are inside the story. The story is around them, the story is unfolding around them. So some parts of the story haven't happened yet. So, in a sense, even then reading the books is part of the story, the immersion of the story itself. And in the fourth volume, at the very end, that you know, the one that the chapter, that final chapter takes place in 2064, one of the characters actually be holding the Dance of Creation book, and she's going to be talking about it. She's going to meet the trickster animal characters. So it's very meta in a way. So it's to remind the readers that hey, you're part of this story. You are in this story, especially if you are a descendant of Ribite Weawag. So that's why I kind of set some of it in the future. But even in the even in the dance of creation book that takes place a hundred years from now, the grandfather is telling the story of the creation of the world. So that circles all the way back to the beginning of the story when the trickster animal animal characters in the first book that you read were created. So the whole series is designed as a big circle. As you go through, it always circles back on itself.

SPEAKER_07 21:49

So book one in a nutshell, what does that set up or explain?

SPEAKER_08 21:56

Well, in the first two books, first two stories, so it's about I don't care. Five stories in there, I think. The first two stories are about Marie Bate Weawagwe. The first story is about how her grandparents worried about her, knowing that it's five years since she's she's been a widow now for five years, believe that she should not be alone and her grief, and not and not just hers, but everyone still grieving for the losses from the attack five years earlier, that her grief is kind of bringing the whole village down. And so he reaches out to her and reaches out to the man that he knows that she loves and knows that he loves her, Pierre Cauch, and he brings them together. And then in this the next story, we'll show their wedding, Pierre Cauch or Mimite Wewagwe's wedding. Yeah. And their wedding night, they're talk, they're kind of pillow talk, so to speak, as they're looking at the stars or camping on their wedding night, and looking at the stars and talking about that. And then the appearance of Asababish as a ghost spirit, the spirit of her first husband. Yeah. Then so that's the first two stories. And then after that, it shifts to the Murnier family farm, where we start shifting like about six generations ahead, and we deal with that part of the family as they kind of discover and start remembering who Marie Matewi Awagua is.

SPEAKER_07 23:20

Now, are you in any of the stories since this is your family's heritage and lineage?

SPEAKER_08 23:26

Not yet. Not yet.

SPEAKER_07 23:29

Well, if your grandnephew is 77 and the one you're working on, I'm thinking you're gonna have to rewrite something to get yourself back in the story.

SPEAKER_08 23:37

Well, I picked, I for example, in the Dance of Creation, there's a very short piece of the story at the very end that shows a trickster animals skiing on Mount Orford in Quebec, where I go skiing. And the date is March 5th, 2064, which is my which will be my 100th birthday. So I do track that. But I am thinking that now that with the new Canadian immigration law, that I've I've gotten the now, I've gotten the uh I'm now a Canadian citizen or people who have like descent ancestors in Canada can be Canadian citizens. So I was thinking that I'm going to have a little cartoon of me opening up my certificate of Canadian citizenship. So I think that way it kind of ties into you know the family leaves Quebec, it leaves Canada, but now we're starting to come back a hundred years after we left. So I think that's probably a way I may put myself in there.

SPEAKER_07 24:36

Oh, very cool. Very cool. Did what what influenced the themes you chose to explore in the folktales?

Three Volumes Plus The Next Wave

SPEAKER_08 24:46

Oh gosh, many, many different themes. Certainly there is some religious aspects in the stories themselves. Um I'm a Catholic, and I do think some Catholic uh thinking does go into the stories, Catholic thinking of, you know, about family, about faith. Interesting enough, the word the word Catholic is nowhere in the books at all. Uh-huh. But I also think that's true to Marie Mateo Wagwe's character because she was baptized a Catholic. And I also think that the priest would not have written that eulogy about her unless she was a you know a devout practicing Catholic when she died. Although the priest doesn't say that, it just seems very common sense that if she wasn't, he probably would not have felt as inspired to write that about her. Right. As yeah, so that was also part of the story. So that is definitely part of faith, is part of it. I think family, family supporting each other. I have one story in the second volume, which you have, you know, when you get a chance to look at it, it's called Brothers and Sisters, and it talks about the relationship between siblings. In the second book, I've got that really focuses on the relationship between Uncle McKeish and his nephew, Poco the Moose. They go on an adventure in the village and get into all sorts of kind of trouble together, but it's kind of a nephew-uncle story, and so we'll talk about that as well. And also talks about transition because at the end of the second volume, my ends with my great-grandmother, Isala Mernier, and her soon-to-be husband, Philius Savoie, are leaving Quebec to go settle in Winsocket, Rhode Island. So that's where that book ends. So it's also about transitions.

SPEAKER_07 26:35

How did you go about researching your family and the territory and the heritage to make this realistic?

SPEAKER_08 26:45

Well, I used modern tools like Ancestry.com and DNA tests to do that. So I what information I had, I didn't know who who my great-great-grandparents were, my French Canadian great-great-grandparents. I knew about where they were, but I didn't know anything about them. But I didn't know anything past that as growing up. But once I got the modern tools like Ancestry.com, Genie.com, I was able to start building that tree and discovering them. The DNA test, though, helped because it helped, for one thing, it showed us that we did have Native American ancestry when we weren't really aware of that in our family. But I gave this DNA test to my mother and five of her siblings, and they all showed this DNA this Native American ancestry. And it took me two years to find them, who they were. But I found four gateway Native American ancestors. One of them was Penoscott from Maine, another was Mick Ma from Nova Scotia, and then there was, of course, Marie Mateo Weawagwe, an Algonquin woman from Twitter of the Air. And then there's one, probably the most mysterious of those native ancestors, and the closest one to me, generation-wise, is my my grandfather's father's grandmother. Okay, if you can think about my my grandfather, his father's grandmother. Okay. She was native, but she wasn't from Quebec. She was from Missouri. When she was a small child, about a year and a half old, the Jesuits who were doing a mission in Missouri sent her to Quebec and she was adopted. So I'm not even certain what tribe she is, but she was adopted into Quebec from Missouri. From my research, knowing which tribes were mostly had most contact with the Jesuits at that time period, she was most likely Osage. But only thing I know about, I don't even know what her original native name was. I just know her French name. The only thing else I know about her was that she was literate, she could write.

SPEAKER_07 28:53

Oh, how do you know how do you know that?

Future Timelines And Meta Story Design

SPEAKER_08 28:54

Did her signatures, yeah, but her husband could not, but she could. Probably what happened, she was either either her parents passed away and the Jesuits sent her back to Quebec, or she was sent to a school to be educated and taught how to you know read and write in Quebec. And but we don't know why. Yeah, was it because she was an orphan? Did the parents willingly give her up, which I have a hard time kind of comprehending that, or was she taken? I don't know. We don't know. It's a mystery, and I I may never get an answer to that. Those were all the answers. So, anyway, that's that's how I kind of did the research. And then research in particular for this book, there was a uh there was there was a lot of research done on Rimatewi Awadway's life that I didn't do, but was already done ahead of time. And there was a gentleman named Norman Lavalle in in Rhode Island, who's also a descendant of her, old grandmother, and he did all this research and he compiled all these records from the Jesuits. It was a valuable resource. Sadly, by the time I found his research and learned all about the information that he had about her in a remarkable life, and it really inspired me. By the time I found that and tried to find him, like where he was located, it turns out he had died like maybe a month or two before I found that. And he only lived, he lived in Rhode Island, so he's only about maybe an hour, hour and a half away drive. And it's a shame that I never met him. But he definitely is an inspiration for the book, his work is. And it's on my website too. So all that research is there so you can look at it yourself. So that's one of the researches we did. And of course, we also, as working with artists, we had to research the period clothing, clothing and and home styles that people lived in, whether they were Native American, Native tribes, Algaguans, or French.

SPEAKER_06 30:55

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_07 30:57

What what uh what from both pieces of your heritage do you incorporate incorporate in your life now?

SPEAKER_08 31:05

You know, it's interesting you say that, because when I first started writing the books, and you probably read my introduction, and I'm in a totally different place from where I wrote that. When I wrote that back in 2022, I was very much like, hey, I have a Native American ancestor, but it's way in the past. Hey, I have French-Canadian ancestry, but I'm an American, I don't live there. I visit there, but I don't really feel totally part of it. You feel connected, but you're not not really totally connected and yet. Now, since that time, I have visited, made connections with the Algonquins up in Pembroke, Ontario through this book. Met other descendants of Mima Tea Waguay up in Pembroke, Ontario. And the director of the Algonquin community there told me, from their perspective, because of your ancestry, you are Algonquin. So that was a real game changer for me to be told, well, you are Algonquin, you are native. Even if it doesn't matter, percentage doesn't matter from their point of view. It's like, are you a descendant? Yes or no. It's a black, it's a simple question. And now with this new immigration law that Canada just came up with, where if you have a Canadian ancestry, in my case, my great-great, my great-grandparents were born in Quebec, then you are Canadian. And so recently I met an immigration lawyer out of Toronto, and she told me, yes, by statutory law, you are a Canadian citizen. So wow. I've gone from an outsider to I am Algoquin and I am Canadian, and all that kind of thought thinking and thoughts are going to go into the introduction to the fourth book.

SPEAKER_07 32:51

Oh, cool. Good. Good. How did you balance the historical accuracy with storytelling artistry?

SPEAKER_08 33:02

I don't think there was like a real conscious trying to balance it. I think I I had the basic facts of, for example, me Matei Wewagwe's life. There were anchor points, and I built a story around it. Uh-huh. And there are, for example, there are a lot of people who have notable ancestors that may write about a historical fiction about their ancestor. But I didn't do that. So this is a totally different style. What I did was use the language of a folk tale to dive deeper into how my ancestors felt and experienced the world around them. Okay. So it was a tool to kind of dig in. So I wasn't concerned about trying I'm not trying to do historical paper. I'm trying to have a story that tells a deeper meaning about their lives and who they were. So that's probably the way, the best way I would describe how I balance that.

SPEAKER_07 34:00

Okay. And and did you have the plan for more books when you wrote the first one? Or oh no.

Themes Of Faith Family And Change

SPEAKER_08 34:12

Oh no. So I had the first story, and then I said, hey, that shawl that my great-grandmother in that La Trope de Sabot, the very first story, she was wearing the back of the shawl. The shawl actually made its appearance there. And then I started thinking about the shaw where it came from. And I said, wait a minute, she's a descendant of this remarkable Algonquin woman. Maybe I can make that shawl that she's wearing the same shaw that belonged to her ancestor, Mimateo Wankwe. So that is the first part it kind of built off that, kind of blossomed off. And so I really just started writing stories, and I had no idea when I was going to finish. And the very first book that we did, the first attempt we did to try to publish it, I tried to publish all the stories in the first two volumes in one massive paperback book. Oh. It was Amazon, the Amazon self-publishing service just kind of spit it right back at me and said, This is too big. Yeah. Split it into two volumes. So I had a volume one and a volume two. But so there's a new kind of insight. If we have a volume one and you have a volume two, well, that means you can do a volume three and a volume four, so forth. So that idea was like, well, now we have two volumes, it's going to be a series. It's not going to be a one-off book.

SPEAKER_07 35:27

See, that was a blessing in disguise.

SPEAKER_08 35:29

Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. Sometimes, you know, a crisis is you know, you can be defined as crisis in with two words, danger and opportunity. That was the opportunity.

SPEAKER_07 35:40

Yep. Yep. Agreed. What was the most challenging part of bringing this book to life?

SPEAKER_08 35:47

It took a lot of work. It took thousands of hours, not hundreds, thousands of hours of work for just me. It took thousands of hours of work for the artist to do that. Trying to, you know, work with manage the artists, their expectations and their work schedule with other projects that they had to work was definitely a challenge. Cost was a tremendous challenge because if you're going to do a book like this, I determined right off in the beginning this book is going to be done right. So I I hired editorial services, I hired a translation service to translate the books into French. So that also all costs money. And uh so you just can't take the story and throw it into Google Translate and then it's not gonna work. So so I didn't go the cheap route. And all the illustrations are beautifully done as you remarked. So there's not a half step there, meticulously designed. So think how much time it takes to go through and design and approve and check 700 illustrations. Yeah. So the scope of the project is massive. And I think that's probably the biggest challenge. It was just very resource intensive. And I think it's one of the reasons why you don't see too many books like this. You don't see an illustrated book. You see graphic novels, but that has a different style. And and they're not as big. No, no, they're not. And this thing is almost at to that level of detail, but there's a lot of text in there too. Yeah. You don't see books, illustrated books this size. It's just not economical to do. It's very difficult to pull it off.

SPEAKER_07 37:33

The only other book I've seen this size is a gentleman I had interviewed. He hiked the Appalachian Trail at the age of 72. And he took pictures along the way. There has to be a thousand pictures in the book of beautiful landscapes, scenery, animals, some of the, you know, results of the falls he had and different things like that. But it's this, it's the same size book. It was a big book, and it was photographs instead of illustrations. And these are the only two books, yours and his, that have ever seen that size.

SPEAKER_08 38:08

Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 38:10

So it it's kind, it's kind of nice. It's almost like a coffee table book that is portable if you have a backpack.

SPEAKER_08 38:19

His book, right?

SPEAKER_07 38:20

Yeah. Yeah, your yours and his because they they are the exact same size.

Research Tools And Indigenous Gateways

SPEAKER_08 38:25

Yeah, they are big. But here's what I gained by doing it this way. These stories, all together now, are ready-made to be produced into like a limited run streaming television show. That's awesome. Because it's already part of the most of the early storyboard work is already done. It's done. Yeah. So if it was just text and you said, hey, make this into a movie, well, first you're going to design all the characters. Yeah. Start going to do some rough illustrations about how the story is going to flow in a visual medium. Well, that part is already done. So the first two couple of steps are already done. So this project is ready to go for and to be made into a streaming service. And I am seriously going to start working on marketing that as such, primarily in Canada, but I'll we'll see, we'll see where it comes. Oh, no, no, no. Don't chip us. What? Don't chip us. Yes. But I do think it's ready. It's just asked to get in front of the right person.

SPEAKER_07 39:32

Yeah. And you know, I'm another happy accident having the book laid out the way it is. For me as a reader, it just helped get swept up even more into the story. And it kind of, you know, for folk, I listen to a lot of podcasts, I listen to a lot of audible books because it's quicker and easier. But if I want to be told the story, I want the book in my hand. And I want to get swept up into the characters and swept up into the storylines. And your book, it's almost like watching a movie as you're reading. It is. It is designed that way.

SPEAKER_08 40:16

And the other interesting thing about how the books are designed is if you had all three volumes, you'd notice this effect more. But the stories, remember, I told you the whole story is written as a circle, kind of circles around. Yep. You can jump into any volume of this book series, and you can start with any story that you want. And you can read those stories in any order that you wish, and it'll still make sense to you. Because every story is designed to stand on its own, even though it will refer to characters and events that happen in other stories. It's not that information is not so it's going to destroy your enjoyment or you can't follow what's going on in that particular story. You do not have to read these stories like in order. You can read them in any order that you wish. And the fun effect of that is if you start reading the stories all over the place in any volume, it's really like you're taking you're taking little pieces of glass and you're pasting on the wall and you're building this mosaic one story at a time. Yeah. As you complete all three volumes in any order that you wish, a much grander story will emerge naturally from that. And that'll that effect will happen no matter what story you start with. So that's the part of the magic of the way these books are designed.

SPEAKER_07 41:38

Very cool. Was there a story, a particular story, or even a piece of a story that was especially emotional for you to write or to write about?

SPEAKER_08 41:54

Well, this of course we're only audio, so everybody can't see, but I'll let you look at it. This is the cover of the fourth book.

SPEAKER_07 42:01

Oh, beautiful Campfires in the Sky.

SPEAKER_08 42:04

Yes. So it's our file. So maybe what I could do is I could read this one section of it. Sure. This so as I'm turning to the page, well, I'll set your readers up. So in this story, Campfires of the Sky, the fourth book that's going to be coming out next year, Marie Mateya Weawagwe is retelling the story of the attack what happened when she was a young woman. And she's telling that story to her granddaughter. And in this section, I'm going to read to you, it's going to be the part where Marimatea Weawagwe discovers that her husband, not only was her husband died, but she quickly discovered right afterward that her children were gone. And this is going to describe how she felt. And this was very emotional. And it also shows you that these all these stories have different tones. Stories in this book series are thoughtful, you know, profound a little profound, make you think, philosophical. Some of these stories are just plain farcical. They're kind of simple. That's okay. But that's how real life is. It has different changes. This is this has sections of the story that are probably a little bit darker because we're talking about a real event and it was rather tragic. So what happens is that when Marine Bate Weawagwe heard that her husband was mortally wounded, she left her care the children in the care of her sister. And she ran to her husband who just died as as she got there. So I'm going to pick up from there and start reading. Okay. After this is her narrating. After I left my children in the care of my sister, I ran to where Asababish had fallen in the fighting. But he died of his wounds, moments. Before I arrived, Asababish died defending your grandfather Pierre, and he himself took the blow that was meant for Pierre. As I stood there in shock, I remembered my children, and I ran back to my house. When I got there, they were gone, along with my sister Kahenta. At that moment, I realized that I had lost everything. My children, my husband, and my sister. There was so much emotion within me, without any outlet or way to express how I felt. I collapsed to the floor and just stared into the dim emptiness in front of me. Her granddaughter responds, I wish. I I don't know how or how I could understand. Her grandmother responded, I pray that you never do understand, my dear one. The grandmother gently placed both her hands on Marguerite's cheeks. I was only a bit older than you are now. And up until that moment, I was a naive and innocent girl who knew nothing of violence or war. That innocent girl, that girl that was me, died on the floor of that empty longhouse, and I have mourned for her for the rest of my life. And kind of it'll you'll you get to see it. I'm sorry, everybody else, but that's her collapsing on the floor of her longhouse while the children and their sister gone.

SPEAKER_07 45:54

Yeah. Holy cow.

SPEAKER_08 45:58

So that's an upcoming vibe that'd be coming up next year.

Identity Shifts Toward Belonging

SPEAKER_07 46:03

Were there moments like that when you're writing that, or maybe even writing another another story where you felt that the the folks you were writing about were guiding you?

SPEAKER_08 46:15

Oh, absolutely. All through this process, all through this process. I remember very early on when we were doing the initial character sketches for Rimatei Weawagwe, old grandmother, my ancestor. And at the time I had found this picture of my great-grandmother, uh Izala Mirny, at her wedding. And on her in her wedding picture, she was wearing just on her neck a little necklace and had a small cross. And she was wearing that in the picture. And as I was looking at it, I heard this voice in my head as I'm looking at this picture of Reima Tiwiwagwe. And the voice said, I want you to draw me with that cross. And so if you look at the illustrations of Marima Tiwagwe, notice that she's wearing a necklace and she has a small cross.

SPEAKER_07 47:08

Wow.

SPEAKER_08 47:10

So that's one example.

SPEAKER_07 47:12

Yeah. Give me another one.

SPEAKER_08 47:15

Another one. Okay. I believe that physically, I think we physically captured her essence. I believe that she tended to be on the shorter side. I believe that she was very strong and loving, you know, strong in the sense of resilience. I also believe that she liked to carve. She liked to carve wood. And that she was an artist. And she was also a healer. And it was also very important to her to pass on her Algonquin heritage to her grandchildren. It was very important to her that she thought of herself as Algonquin even after she married a French settler. And she never lost that feeling and that part pride in her own culture. And she wanted to pass it on to her children. So those are things that I think are definitely in there. The other aspect I felt very strongly inspired by was her this was her first husband, Asababish. The way he is drawn in this book is that he is shown as a very gentle and kind man and compassionate man, a brave man, but he wasn't necessarily a mighty warrior, but he was a very good man. And that's how he is portrayed in these stories as well.

SPEAKER_07 48:29

What what do you hope readers feel when they finish one of the old grandmother stories in any of the volumes? Or maybe even when they finish all of them.

SPEAKER_08 48:40

I think it's better to say when you finished all of them. I think that you're going to feel like you've been immersed inside this magical world of story and you're going to feel like you're part of it. You're also going to feel like you're in you're still within it, and you can pick up the story again and start over. Like a story doesn't really end. Definitely one way you're going to feel. And I also think that if you are not French Canadian or you're not a descendant of Marie Mateoagwa and you read these books, you're going to feel inspired to research your own family heritage as well.

SPEAKER_07 49:15

What have you gotten out of this whole experience? I mean, you're ahead of all of us because you've already gotten that fourth volume written. So you know the next piece to this. But what has this meant to you?

SPEAKER_08 49:30

Well, I think, like I said, you know, earlier, I started out feeling like I was an outsider for these heritage. Uh-huh. I wasn't Algonquin. In fact, I wrote introduction in the very beginning of my first two volumes, says, hey, you know, I just want to let you know I'm not claiming membership in an Algonquin tribe. And, you know, and they have they have every right to determine who is is and is not part of their community. And that and that's still true. But I kind of regret it now because I wrote it as an outsider, and I don't feel like an outsider to that community anymore. I've been very much evolved. That's true. So I think feeling that connection and rediscovering that Algonquin heritage, and I think in that sense, I am fulfilling the desires and the wish for my that my old grandmother, Mimi Taywi Awagwe, had for her children and her descendants, that we would not forget that we are also Algonquin. So I think that's one aspect. And I think it also ties in with with the French Canadian and the Canadian side. I, you know, I talked about how I felt like I was a welcome stranger up in Quebec. Now that I know that I am a Canadian citizen, although I'm still working on the documentation to get that documented, but I am. Right. You know, last time I visited Canada, I said, you know what, I belong here too. So I think I I have finished with a greater understanding of my ancestors and my place. I think also I have a sense of belonging in both those communities that I did not have before.

SPEAKER_07 51:04

That's wonderful. So after the fourth installment comes out, will there be a fifth? Or do you think you may move on to different type of storytelling or explore other aspects of your family or your heritage?

Building Art At Massive Scale

SPEAKER_08 51:17

Well, I mean, I do have this, I had this really good story idea for that Greek mythology, which was something I started way, way, way back and never finished it. But I don't know if I'm ever going to get to it, to be quite honest. I have ideas for two other books that I could put in the old grandmother's tree series. But it's very resource intensive. And at this point, I'm I'm kind of reached the end of my resources that I can put into it. So now that these four books will be done, the next thing is to get it shopped around so that it can be taken up to the next level. And that's really where my effort needs to go. If they do, if and when they are picked up for a series, and that I can get a little bit of the flow of cash coming back to me that'll help resource, I will do other books. But at this point, for financial reasons, I can't really do any more right now. So that's why I really have to say, take a pause. It's a pretty good story as it is. It's kind of has a sense of completeness as it is. So I think it's time to just take it to that, focus on taking it to that next step, which would be a film or a TV show. And that's where my effort's going to be.

SPEAKER_07 52:53

And it's when I can take the time to sit down and just get swept up in it and marvel at the pictures that just so perfectly reflect the written word.

SPEAKER_08 53:04

Oh, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, Natasha did a wonderful job on those.

SPEAKER_07 53:08

So, Joseph, thank you so much for all of your time.

SPEAKER_08 53:11

Oh, thank you. Thank you. And I would just, if I may, just invite people to look up my website, oldcrammotherstree.com.

SPEAKER_07 53:18

Yep.

SPEAKER_08 53:19

And in there you'll find my biography, Natasha's biography. You'll find background information from the first from the research of Norman Lavalli about Rimate Wiague. And I also have a character Wikipedia. So if you really, if you go to the website, you can read a character Wikipedia, give a lot of background information, and also little tidbits that are not in the books.

SPEAKER_07 53:44

So I will make sure to have that linked in the show notes.

SPEAKER_08 53:48

Yes. Yes. So a lot on that on that website. So I encourage you to take a look. And you can also order the books on Amazon.

SPEAKER_07 53:57

Perfect. I'll have links to those as well.

SPEAKER_08 53:59

Great. Great. Thank you.

SPEAKER_07 54:01

All right, Joseph. You have a great night.

SPEAKER_08 54:03

Uh, you too. Thank you. Thank you for having me on.

SPEAKER_07 54:12

What's up to you from this conversation? I love the interest and dedication he has for researching his lineage. He went back decades and many generations to fact-find and bring his ancestors to life. But my favorite part of Joseph's story is the deeper sense of inclusion and connection he now feels with both his Canadian and Native American heritage. You can hear it in his voice that the feeling of belonging and truly understanding the spirits of those that came before him really have an impact on him. If you're interested in learning more about Joseph's work, picking up any or all of his books before the fourth installment comes out, jump down to the show notes for all the links. And while you're there, don't forget to connect with me. All links to my socials are included as well. And there's a new feature available to connect with me. Use the drop-me-a-text link at the beginning of the show notes to say hi or share your thoughts on any of the episodes. I'd love to hear from you. As always, thanks for listening, and I'll see you in two weeks.