Aurelia Stacona discusses her journey in beadwork.

Bio: Bio: Throughout her life, Aurelia Stacona has been a dancer and beadwork, and has attended pow-wows nationally. She also opened up a church and ran a 12-step program on the Warm Springs Reservation. She passed away in 2019, three years after the interview was conducted.

Transcript: I used to dance. I started making my own outfit when I was just a teenager. And then one of the outfits that was made was that one that’s in the lobby. And I’ve always did beadwork, it was just one of the things I enjoyed and I started making things more, for sale. You know, beaded bags and that got me started in business for myself. And everyplace I go to a go a pow-wow ‘oh can you make me one like that?’ and I would end up taking an order. And I got word, it was just part of my business to take a contract like that. Which I’m still doing today I have an order for a briefcase that I’m making for somebody. So I try to give it up, but ‘oh I want something you made, something you made’ and here I go again, taking that order. And I think I made outfits pretty much for my whole family and some of them they don’t have anymore, and some of them have theirs. But I have a daughter and son that does beadwork. And they started making their own outfits. I have a daughter that started making her own outfits when she was I think like 14 years old. She always wanted to look nice at the pow-wow. She’d say I have to have a different outfit for every grand entry. Which is like one grand entry at 1 o’clock and one is at 7. She wants to change and put on a different outfit and she started making her own outfits. And then my son started doing that. And he’s got about four or five sets of outfits that he worked on himself too, but I made 2 of them. I kept making outfits for people even when I traveled down to California to the big casino pow-wow’s down there. I was a dancer.