Chasing Drumbeats

A Mother, a Daughter, and Montana’s Crow Fair

I have planned entire vacations around pow wows; flights booked, hotels reserved, itineraries built around a single weekend of drumbeats and dust. It’s an odd confession from someone whose family tree is rooted almost entirely in Western Europe. But hey, I’m as entitled to a quirky obsession as the next guy. Besides, I can pinpoint the exact origin: a five-foot-tall, 105-pound adventuress named ‘Mom.’

My Mom went to her first pow wow on the Blackfeet reservation in Browning, Montana, around 1972. In those days, outsiders didn’t venture onto reservations. Under the Indian Appropriation Act of 1851, Native Americans had been pushed out of sight and out of mind, clearing the way for westward expansion by white settlers. Reservations were, by unspoken rule, off-limits to non-Native visitors. Nobody, it seemed, had mentioned this to a curious white woman with a Kodak Instamatic.

The rest of the family declined her invitation, so she went alone. Whatever she found there settled into her soul and never left. Decades later, a 23andMe test would suggest it had been in her DNA all along.

By the time Mum was in her eighties, she’d set her heart on Crow Fair. The great annual gathering of the Crow Nation, the Apsáalooke people, is held near the site where the Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho defeated General Custer and his 7th Cavalry in 1876.

It’s a sprawling, multi-day affair of rodeos, horse races, parades, and powwows, running since 1904 and now one of the longest-standing Native cultural gatherings in the country. Dancers travel from more than fifty tribes across the U.S. and Canada to take part, and the crowds that follow them are not small.

Mum wanted desperately to go. The idea of her navigating those crowds alone terrified me rather more. So we went together. To the small town of Crow Agency, Montana, and within an hour I understood exactly what had claimed her all those years before.

The Drum Beat Beckons

The sound reached me before anything else did: Mother Earth’s heartbeat, and it didn’t ask my own pulse to slow to match it. It simply took over. Powwow drums aren’t treated as instruments so much as living things, spiritual guardians, conduits straight to the earth itself. They’re built from tightly stretched cow, elk, or buffalo hide, large enough that several drummers can play as one, with a lead singer opening each song before the others rise to meet him.

Don’t expect an earworm. The songs are sung in Native languages, layered with vocables; ya, ho, hey-na, much as “fa-la-la-la-la” carries “Deck the Halls” without meaning a word of it. You won’t understand the lyrics, and it won’t matter. The music finds its way into your chest and down through your feet regardless. I kept thinking of old clips of American Bandstand, some perky teenager telling Dick Clark a new single had “a good beat — you can dance to it.” Nobody ever meant it more than this.

The powwow opens with the Grand Entry: tribal leaders, veterans, and dignitaries first, then everyone who will dance that day, trailing in behind them. Entire families take part, toddlers to grandparents, every one of them dressed in full regalia. It is, quite simply, a feast for the eyes.

It looks unscripted, but it isn’t. Sometimes the whole arbor fills for an intertribal dance; other times a single style takes the floor, sorted by age and tradition. Nobody resists the charm of the Tiny Tot Dance, all wobbling toddlers in miniature regalia. Teenagers and young adults bring a kind of electric enthusiasm to the men’s Grass Dance and Fancy Dance, and the women’s Fancy Shawl Dance. Then comes the Traditional Dance, and everything slows; women in beaded moccasins and embellished dresses moving with a quiet, deliberate grace, barely seeming to touch the ground. Whatever the style, the finest dancers make something demanding look effortless, and the very best of them go home with prizes to prove it.

Colour saturates everything. Ribbons and satin shawls, feather bustles and elaborate headdresses, in hues that would put a box of 152 crayons to shame. Look closer, and you’ll find entire symbolic worlds worked into the beading on moccasins, headbands, and purses. Tens of thousands of seed beads, each costume a wearable piece of art built by hand.

Step outside the dancing and the fair carries on regardless. Vendors sell handcrafted jewellery and artwork; food stalls offer everything from chicken chow mein to cotton candy. But if you try only one thing, make it an Indian taco (also called an NDN taco): fry bread standing in for a tortilla, piled with seasoned beef, lettuce, tomato, cheese, and salsa. It is unmanageably messy and entirely worth the napkins.

Nature, or Nurture.

Years later, I took the same 23andMe DNA test as my Mom. My results came back without a trace of Native American ancestry. Whatever draws me back to pow wows year after year is clearly not something in my blood. It was passed down to me another way entirely; Through stories, curiosity, and the enthusiasm of a small but fearless woman who once travelled alone to a pow wow with nothing more than an open mind and a Kodak Instamatic.

Some inherit eye colour. Others inherit mannerisms or a fondness for certain foods. I inherited a love of drumbeats. Thanks, Mom.

Traveller’s Notes

Getting there: Fly into Logan International Airport (BIL) in Billings, Montana. Crow Agency lies about 60 miles southeast via Interstate 90, exit 510. You’ll want a hire car, as there’s no practical way to get there without one.

Where to stay: The closest hotels are in Hardin, about 14 miles north of Crow Agency. The Lariat Motel, a beautifully updated vintage property, is a strong choice. However, it fills early in summer, and with the 150th anniversary of the Little Bighorn falling in 2026, expect it to sell out sooner than usual. https://www.motellariat.com/

Billings itself offers a much wider range of hotels, short-term rentals, and RV parks. Among the best is The Northern Hotel, an historic hotel in the heart of Billings: https://northernhotel.com/

Crow Fair entry fees: Admission is cash-only, running $10–$20 per day depending on the event, or $30 for a full weekend pass. Enrolled tribal members enter free. Photography is welcome with a licence ($35/day or $50/weekend), and it’s considered polite to always ask a dancer’s permission before photographing them outside the arbor.

What to bring: A blanket or portable chair, sunscreen, and more water than you think you’ll need. Your blanket or chair can hold your spot in the arbor while you wander off to the food stalls or vendor stands.

Planning your trip: For upcoming powwows across the U.S. and Canada, visit https://www.powwows.com/