They decorated the dugouts with special designs. They used the dugouts for slave hunting and exploring. The largest of these canoes could carry at least thirty people. The biggest canoe was sixty meters long and 2.5 meters wide. Totem poles were only made by Native Americans in the Northwest.
Some people believe that totem poles have a religious meaning.
That is not true. Totem poles tell a story about the family. They believed that their ancestors were the animal people. Animals, or totems, were carved on the totem pole. The totem poles were status symbols.