Samuel Damren
“The night was so eerily beautiful I purposefully took the long way around the moon-drenched lakeshore, with its gleaming and jagged mounds of ice looking like frozen waves.”
“Far out over the lake the filmy smoky shafts of the Northern Lights wavered and raced in trailing scarves of light, shifting and melting across the flaming sky in great dripping organ pipes of silent melody.”
These are but two of the poetic descriptions of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula that provided sanctuary and renewal for the young trial lawyer at the center of Robert Traver’s 1965 book, “Laughing Whitefish.”
Robert Traver was the pen name of John Voelker, a justice of the Michigan Supreme Court 1956-60. Despite writing more than 100 opinions while on the court, Voelker is best known by his pen name as the author of “Anatomy of a Murder.” The 1958 book was on the New York Times Bestseller List for 62 weeks and became a celebrated Academy Award nominated movie.
Upon retirement, Voelker returned to Ishpeming where he continued his literary career and greater passion as an avid fisherman. Under the pen name of Robert Traver, he would go on to write eight books and numerous essays.
“Laughing Whitefish” was Voelker’s only historical novel. It is based on a trio of Michigan Supreme Court cases from the 1880s recognized as a “Michigan Legal Milestone” in 1992.
In 1845, as set forth in the “Milestone” text, Marji-Gesick, an Indian Chippewa chief, was hired by the Jackson Iron Company to identify an iron ore deposit known only to indigenous peoples. In return for his work, “he was paid with a Certificate of Deposit entitling him to stock in the company.”
When the mine became profitable decades after Marji’s death, his daughter, Charlotte Kawbawgam, known by her Indian name “Laughing Whitefish,” sought to enforce the ownership interest through a series of court cases and subsequent appeals.
The company refused to honor her as a lawful heir because “she had been born to one of three women to whom her father had been married simultaneously.” The progeny of polygamous unions was not recognized as legitimate heirs under Michigan law.
Notwithstanding, in a “landmark Michigan Supreme Court decision acknowledging that tribal laws and customs govern the legal affairs of Native American families,” the court “concluded that since the marriage was valid under Chippewa law, it must be recognized by Michigan’s courts” and the validity of her claim was upheld.
“Laughing Whitefish,” the novel, received favorable reviews albeit with a few reservations. New York Times critic Allen Drury suggested that “Mr. Traver might have judiciously eliminated an almost impenetrable Cornish dialect” of a local U.P. bartender from the introductory chapter. Noting that the book “becomes a constant delight” thereafter, Drury missed a key aspect of the bartender episode.
The bartender’s Cornish dialect is a great chore for any reader to work through, but it set the table for the true story Traver was about to tell. To penetrate the cultural barrier at the heart of “Laughing Whitefish,” readers would not only have to learn Indian customs, but reorient perspective to understand the impact that “white law” had on Indian culture.
By first presenting the reader in Chapter 1 of the novel with the chore of trying to understand a “white” dialect that could be viewed as equally impenetrable as Indian culture, Traver invited readers to reassess cultural barriers.
The prose in Chapter 2 of “Laughing Whitefish” is the complete opposite. There, we learn about Willy Poe, the 26-year-old law school graduate who moved to the Upper Peninsula alone and without references.
Lawyers will see themselves in Willy’s “doubt and soul-searching” whether law should have been his chosen career. Having been recently fired from his first job, lawyers will also understand the now diminished prospects he faces and fretful fears.
Then, in a moment, those concerns are upended when the most significant case that he, or any practitioner might ever land, finds its way to his doorstep.
Why did that happen? Because no lawyer in the Upper Peninsula other than William Poe, Esq. would be foolish enough to oppose the powerful Jackson Iron Company based on a decades-old ownership claim asserted by the illegitimate daughter of a deceased Indian chief.
In the hands of Robert Traver, this is the recipe for good storytelling. “Laughing Whitefish” is filled with themes of idealism, racial and religious prejudice, corporate greed, and the uncertain process of high stakes litigation and individual integrity. These themes were not of new acquaintance to the life experience of lawyer John Voelker. Being reared in the Upper Peninsula also contributed to other equally compelling themes in the book.
Voelker’s grandparents were two of many German immigrants to Upper Peninsula mining towns. His father was born in Ontonagon in 1860 where he learned to speak the Ojibwe language before learning to speak English. From his earliest days, Voelker saw white prejudice degrade the Indian culture that his family knew and respected.
Idealism, integrity, perseverance shine in Traver’s rendition of the historical events in “Laughing Whitefish.” In the romantic conclusion to the novel, they counterbalance but did not erase the preceding legacy of prejudice, corruption, and deceit in America’s treatment of immigrants, indigenous peoples and persons of color.
Justice Voelker was hopeful that someday they might.
—————
Editor’s Note – Consistent with his wishes, the John Voelker Foundation, established after his death in 1991, sponsors the Native American Law School Scholarship and the Robert Traver Fly Fishing Writing Award.
“Far out over the lake the filmy smoky shafts of the Northern Lights wavered and raced in trailing scarves of light, shifting and melting across the flaming sky in great dripping organ pipes of silent melody.”
These are but two of the poetic descriptions of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula that provided sanctuary and renewal for the young trial lawyer at the center of Robert Traver’s 1965 book, “Laughing Whitefish.”
Robert Traver was the pen name of John Voelker, a justice of the Michigan Supreme Court 1956-60. Despite writing more than 100 opinions while on the court, Voelker is best known by his pen name as the author of “Anatomy of a Murder.” The 1958 book was on the New York Times Bestseller List for 62 weeks and became a celebrated Academy Award nominated movie.
Upon retirement, Voelker returned to Ishpeming where he continued his literary career and greater passion as an avid fisherman. Under the pen name of Robert Traver, he would go on to write eight books and numerous essays.
“Laughing Whitefish” was Voelker’s only historical novel. It is based on a trio of Michigan Supreme Court cases from the 1880s recognized as a “Michigan Legal Milestone” in 1992.
In 1845, as set forth in the “Milestone” text, Marji-Gesick, an Indian Chippewa chief, was hired by the Jackson Iron Company to identify an iron ore deposit known only to indigenous peoples. In return for his work, “he was paid with a Certificate of Deposit entitling him to stock in the company.”
When the mine became profitable decades after Marji’s death, his daughter, Charlotte Kawbawgam, known by her Indian name “Laughing Whitefish,” sought to enforce the ownership interest through a series of court cases and subsequent appeals.
The company refused to honor her as a lawful heir because “she had been born to one of three women to whom her father had been married simultaneously.” The progeny of polygamous unions was not recognized as legitimate heirs under Michigan law.
Notwithstanding, in a “landmark Michigan Supreme Court decision acknowledging that tribal laws and customs govern the legal affairs of Native American families,” the court “concluded that since the marriage was valid under Chippewa law, it must be recognized by Michigan’s courts” and the validity of her claim was upheld.
“Laughing Whitefish,” the novel, received favorable reviews albeit with a few reservations. New York Times critic Allen Drury suggested that “Mr. Traver might have judiciously eliminated an almost impenetrable Cornish dialect” of a local U.P. bartender from the introductory chapter. Noting that the book “becomes a constant delight” thereafter, Drury missed a key aspect of the bartender episode.
The bartender’s Cornish dialect is a great chore for any reader to work through, but it set the table for the true story Traver was about to tell. To penetrate the cultural barrier at the heart of “Laughing Whitefish,” readers would not only have to learn Indian customs, but reorient perspective to understand the impact that “white law” had on Indian culture.
By first presenting the reader in Chapter 1 of the novel with the chore of trying to understand a “white” dialect that could be viewed as equally impenetrable as Indian culture, Traver invited readers to reassess cultural barriers.
The prose in Chapter 2 of “Laughing Whitefish” is the complete opposite. There, we learn about Willy Poe, the 26-year-old law school graduate who moved to the Upper Peninsula alone and without references.
Lawyers will see themselves in Willy’s “doubt and soul-searching” whether law should have been his chosen career. Having been recently fired from his first job, lawyers will also understand the now diminished prospects he faces and fretful fears.
Then, in a moment, those concerns are upended when the most significant case that he, or any practitioner might ever land, finds its way to his doorstep.
Why did that happen? Because no lawyer in the Upper Peninsula other than William Poe, Esq. would be foolish enough to oppose the powerful Jackson Iron Company based on a decades-old ownership claim asserted by the illegitimate daughter of a deceased Indian chief.
In the hands of Robert Traver, this is the recipe for good storytelling. “Laughing Whitefish” is filled with themes of idealism, racial and religious prejudice, corporate greed, and the uncertain process of high stakes litigation and individual integrity. These themes were not of new acquaintance to the life experience of lawyer John Voelker. Being reared in the Upper Peninsula also contributed to other equally compelling themes in the book.
Voelker’s grandparents were two of many German immigrants to Upper Peninsula mining towns. His father was born in Ontonagon in 1860 where he learned to speak the Ojibwe language before learning to speak English. From his earliest days, Voelker saw white prejudice degrade the Indian culture that his family knew and respected.
Idealism, integrity, perseverance shine in Traver’s rendition of the historical events in “Laughing Whitefish.” In the romantic conclusion to the novel, they counterbalance but did not erase the preceding legacy of prejudice, corruption, and deceit in America’s treatment of immigrants, indigenous peoples and persons of color.
Justice Voelker was hopeful that someday they might.
—————
Editor’s Note – Consistent with his wishes, the John Voelker Foundation, established after his death in 1991, sponsors the Native American Law School Scholarship and the Robert Traver Fly Fishing Writing Award.
––––––––––––––––––––
Subscribe to the Legal News!
https://www.legalnews.com/Home/Subscription
Full access to public notices, articles, columns, archives, statistics, calendar and more
Day Pass Only $4.95!
One-County $80/year
Three-County & Full Pass also available
