Big Chief Delcour to be inducted in Mardi Gras Hall of Fame

1st August 2011   ·   2 Comments

By Geraldine Wyckoff
Contributing Writer

“To me, Mardi Gras Indians mean a whole lot when it comes down to peace,” says Big Chief Clarence Delcour. Appropriately, the leader of the Creole Osceola will be honored as the 2011 Peace Chief at the Mardi Gras Hall of Fame Memorial, Induction and Awards Ceremony to be held from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, August 7, at the Ashé Cultural Arts Center. Now in its 13th year, the organization, which is headed by founder Cherice Harrison-Nelson, will also recognize others who have contributed to the Black Indian heritage including Chief Romeo Bougere of the Ninth Ward Hunters and Queen Mary Stevenson of the Wild Tchoupitoulas.

“In learning this culture you have to know how to speak to each other, to relate to each other,” Delcour continues. “I’m never too old to learn this culture. There are a lot of good chiefs out here and there are some young chiefs who I’ve learned from because that’s the day and age. So I talk to them to see if there is any negativeness going on.”

Chief Delcour was selected for the special Peace Chief award not only for the caring attitude he’s displayed in his 41 years of masking Indian and his dedication to mentoring but also in recognition of his “ceremonial release of doves to promote peace in our city.” He performs this rite on occasions such as weddings, funerals and community gather ings.

“It comes from my heart,” says the Chief who has been raising pigeons as well as rock doves since he was in his 20s. “We have to find a way to have some kind of peace instead of waking up every morning with something negative on our minds.”

Delcour, 63, was inspired to raise pigeons by Chief Thomas Sparks. He explains that there is a difference between what he calls “peace doves” and rock doves. The former, he says are “stationary” and don’t know how to come home while the latter return back to their loft. After he lost about 160 birds following Katrina, he stopped keeping them but his passion brought him back into what he humorously dubs the “old man’s disease” of raising pigeons.

Chief Delcour, who received the Hall of Fame’s Crystal Feather award in 2005, began masking in his 20s holding the position of Trail Chief with the Yellow Pocahontas under Big Chief Tootie Montana. He became interested in the Indians through his father and uncle who would follow the Yellow Pocahontas gang. He explains that in the Vascoville area of New Orleans, which along with Sugar Hill and Pilotland stands as one of the three villages of Gentilly, there was only one Mardi Gras Indian, the noted Wild Man Rock. Since his grandmother lived across the street from the Montanas, the Delcours would head there on Carnival day.

Delcour remained with Big Chief Tootie for about seven years. While in the midst of making a suit, he realized that it just didn’t look like those of the Yellow Pocahontas. “It was my style,” says Delcour who in 1973 decided to start his own gang, the Creole Osceola.

“I wanted an Indian name so I took the name of Chief Osceola, who was a Seminole chief (in Florida),” Delcour explains. “What impressed me is that he married a slave woman and a lot of the Indians that ran with him were runaway slaves. The ‘Creole’ comes from my area, Vascoville – the 7th Ward.”

The Creole Osceola continues to come out on Mardi Gras day from the family home in Vascoville. Though Chief Delcour has had periods when he hasn’t masked, he has a needle in hand preparing for Carnival 2012.

“When the spirit gets into me, I have to mask and when I mask, I mask from my heart,” Delcour offers with great sincerity. As is tradition, the Chief won’t reveal the color of his suit. “When the community sees you come out on that morning, it’s a surprise for the beauty that they see,” he explains. “Our suits are very different. We always say we wear the ‘tuxedo of Indian suits.’ If anybody’s wearing a suit like that, we know where they got it from. We sew our suits individually. We go from ideas that are in our hearts.”

The generous attitude that helped earn Delcour the Peace Chief award is reflected in the way he embraces and respects more youthful Indians as well as faithful Mardi Gras Indian followers.

“They’re the same as I am,” Delcour says of many of the young chiefs. “They’re for their community and they want to play the game. We are not real Indians, the thing about us is that we play Indian. So you have to know how to play it.”

Delcour also realizes the great knowledge held by the loyal followers of the Black Indians. “You have some guys who have never put on a feather in their life who can teach you more about Mardi Gras Indians than Mardi Gras Indians,” he explains.

“I look at Indians like all Indians – it’s sacred,” Delcour states. “The feeling that I have for Mardi Gras Indians keeps me going – the independence of it, the neighborhood of it. I do it for the community. It has to be in your heart.”

This article was originally published in the August 1, 2011 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper