Formerly known as Lewis and Clark Jewelers, Dream Catcher sells homemade Native American tea, dream catchers, clothing, jewelry, and artifacts in Old Town St. Charles.
1. What is your name?
Barbara Schnarr
2. How long have you been in business?
40 years, but only on Main Street for 11 years and in this location for seven years.
3. What makes your store unique?
All of our Native American jewelry arts and crafts are handmade by Native Americans, so they’re authentic.
4. What kinds of customers come into the store?
We have what we call regular customers. They’re either local or they’ve been coming for years. People come in for the Nuwati Herbal Teas and we have tourists, but those are mostly seasonal in the summer.
5. What’s the history of the store?
This is the old David McNair House, built in 1808. We do have several ghosts. It is haunted, but they’re good ghosts, not bad ghosts.
6. Is your family involved in the business at all?
My two 14-year-old twins work here. All my employees have Native American blood. One employee is a Native American elder.
7. Are you a practicing Native American?
Yes. I actually went to my first Cherokee wedding,
8. How was that?
The guy who makes the Nuwati Herbal Teas, Rod Jackson, has been going with this girl, Kimberly, for 11 years and they finally got married. It was at their house, which is built on sacred grounds. Each one wore a separate veil to symbolize their single life and then they put on the same veil to represent their new married life. Then they, and this would freak me out if they did this one of my wedding vases, broke their wedding vase.
9. Do you use the Nuwati Herbals?
Yes. I don’t do any medicines, except blood pressure medicine. This [Nuwati Herbal medicine] is what I do. I have a lot of ailments and was on a lot of different medications but I’m off them now.
10. Is Dreamcatcher on FourSquare?
We’re on Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, Coupon Huge. Oh my gosh, what am I not on these days? And I’m very old school. It was hard for me to adjust to the times.
