Part 7: Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge all our friends and colleagues at the American Museum of Natural History for their incredible contributions, both financial and in-kind, that made our journey a success.

In particular, we'd like to thank:

Eleanor Stirling, Christopher Filardi and Brian Weeks at the Center for Biodiversity and Conservation. Chris is one of our oldest friends and supporters, and together with Eleanor, was a champion of this exchange. They have been incredible partners in what we've undertaken. We thank Brian for his instrumental role in organizing and executing the trip logistics, and also for graciously bringing us into his home. As Heiltsuk people, we appreciated this important gesture, and look forward to showing our gratitude through hospitality.

Peter Whiteley, Laila Williamson, and our friends in Anthropology. We would especially like to thank Laila for her incredible patience and good humour as six towering Heiltsuk boys shook the walls of Anthropology with their singing, and stooped in clumsy awe over works of incredible age, rarity and fragility. We so enjoyed sharing with you.

Barbara Mathe in the photograph archive, and Julie Feinstein in cryogenics. We are so grateful for the incredible access you gave us to the resources at your disposal. Barbara, sifting through the treasures of the archive was an incredible delight, and brought us a new sense of connection to the real people - our ancestors - whose artifacts we held. Julie, we appreciated the opportunity to see the future home of our grizzly bear genetic samples, and your fascinating behind-the-scenes tour of such an amazing facility.

At the High School for Environmental Studies, we'd like to acknowledge Matthew Washington and the teachers and students who invited us into their classrooms to share part of our story. Along with our partners at The Nature Conservancy, you helped to add a new and unexpected highlight to our trip.

Thank you to Paul, Shannon, Phil and Sandy, dear friends whom we felt fortunate to share our time with in New York City.

We acknowledge Ian Jansma for volunteering his photography services to our group, and capturing the spirit of what we were doing so that we can share it with our supporters.

The administrative staff at Qqs would like to express their pride and gratitude to our boys - Rory Housty, William Housty, Collin Reid, Ian Reid and Kevin Starr - for the dignity, strength and power they brought with them to everything we undertook on our journey.

And perhaps most importantly of all, we thank and uplift our ancestors, our family and community in Bella Bella, our Heiltsuk family abroad, and all of our supporters everywhere who followed with us and shared each chapter of our story. We are moved beyond words by your unhesitating support.



Group photo with Brian, Eleanor, Laila and Christopher