Posts By: First Nations Drum

Acclaimed Aboriginal Writer Passes Away

By Lloyd Dolha

Aboriginal author and radio personality Bernelda Wheeler, passed away from cancer on Saturday, September 10, 2005 at the age of 68, at the Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, with her family by her side.

Wheeler was one of the first female aboriginal journalists in Canada and was a pioneer with her work in media.

Born in Saskatchewan on April 3, 1937, of Cree, Assinaboine and Saulteaux heritage, Wheeler left the reserve with her parents in the 1940s and moved to Churchill, Manitoba.

In 1954, at the age of 17, she began her radio career as a disc jockey for CFHC, CBC’s northern service in Churchill.

Much of her success was achieved in Winnipeg between 1972 and 1982, when she was host, producer and investigative journalist for “Our Native Land,” a national CBC radio program dedicated to aboriginal issues.

She was known for the ground breaking work she did for CBC radio, interviewing and covering First Nations people, issues and events.

Wheeler was a pioneer when she began her work in the early 1970s and she was the first indigenous voice many people heard on radio.
In 1982, Wheeler won the ‘First Lady in Native Broadcasting’ award for her work on the national radio show. She was also nominated for two ACTRA awards for Best Writer and Best Radio Program and, in 1991, was nominated to the Order of Canada, for her work in media.

Book CoverWheeler was also the author of numerous short stories and poems and was best known for her four children’s books. She received the Children’s Choice and the Toronto Children’s Book Award for Where Did You Get Your Moccasins and I Can’t Have Bannock but the Beaver has a Dam. The book I Can’t Have Bannock is recommended for all elementary school libraries.

Wheeler was also an actor, acting in the play Someday at Saskatchewan’s Globe Theater and served as an advisor to the Aboriginal Film and Video Alliance.

In her final years, she had a monthly column in Eagle Feather News.
Five days before her death, Wheeler was notified the she was being recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Anskohk Aboriginal Literacy Festival for “her substantial contribution to Aboriginal Literature, her professionalism and leadership as a writer and her dedication to her craft and community.”

“As a pioneer in media and literary circles, Bernelda will always be remembered for her sensitive storytelling of the lives of aboriginal people,” said Eric Robinson, Minister of Culture, Heritage and Tourism, for Maintoba.

Bernelda Wheeler is survived by her daughter, Dr.Winona Wheeler, and her son Jordon Wheeler, and her extended family.

Using Humour to Stop Teenage Suicide

By Lloyd Dolha

It’s nothing short of brilliant. It’s a comic book to teach young aboriginal people of the province about the dangers of suicide.

Thirty-seven year-old Sean Muir, executive director of the Healthy Aboriginal Network, a non-profit society that promotes health, literacy and wellness in the province’s aboriginal community, is spearheading the comic book project.

“The comic book idea came out of the realization that marketing health ideas to people in their 30s, 40s and 50s is very difficult just because they’re not so open-minded; they’re a little more set in their ways. So the idea came to me that we should start going after youth,” said Muir.

Muir firmly believes there is a direct correlation between literacy and health.

“Low literacy equals low health. The terrific thing about comics is that they convey information on two levels – visually and in text form. Plus you get the added benefit of repeat exposures because kids read them over and over again,” he added.

Muir established the society last January and was awarded funding for the comic book project this spring by the Vancouver Coastal Heath Authority and the BC Ministry of Health. HAN will create comic books on issues and challenges that face aboriginal youth today. The first one will address the heartbreakingly high incidence of aboriginal youth suicide attempts in a small number of BC communities.

The creative content will come from professional and emerging aboriginal cartoonists and will be reviewed for authenticity by aboriginal youth focus groups in the fall.

The first comic book on suicide will be an icebreaker to help engage youth in conversation about the dark subject matter. It will help them recognize feelings in themselves, behavior in others and to reach out before an attempt is made.

University backs project
UBC professor of psychology, Michael Chandler finds the concept and project to be sophisticated and well executed.

“It’s a really good initiative. If you can get kids talking about this, that’s good,” said Chandler.

Chandler and UVIC professor Chris Lalonde recently published a definitive study on aboriginal youth suicide in the province. Chandler points out that there will undoubtedly be critics and naysayers who are concerned that addressing the sensitive issue so openly and frankly will exacerbate the problem.

“That’s a faulty point of view,” said Chandler. “I believe, in general, that people are better off talking about problems than trying to obscure them. That’s why I think this is such a good enterprise.”

The Chandler/Lalonde study on aboriginal youth suicide in BC found that 90 percent of the suicides or attempts occur in only ten percent of the province’s aboriginal communities.

Their study further found that First Nations that have taken steps to preserve and build a sense of “cultural continuity” of working to preserve their past while projecting themselves into an unknown future have dramatically lower rates of suicide.

The aboriginal youth suicide prevention comic book is the first of a series and is expected to be released in November 2005. Others will focus on other health issues that aboriginal youth face such as crystal meth, AIDs and diabetes.

The projects have been designed to involve aboriginal youth in every aspect of the process including conception, writing, illustration and review for authenticity. Health professionals and elders will also play an integral role in the evaluation process.

Muir believes the comic book project has great potential because the medium is non-threatening and is something kids really enjoy. HAN has already been approached to do a comic book for the treaty process as well.

“I think we’ve really hit the nail on the head by combining health and literacy,” said Muir.

Native Teens Raise Funds for Downtown Youth Center

By Shauna Lewis

“We don’t need land claims, we are buying Vancouver one building at a time.”
~ Ginger Gosnell, President of UNYA and member of Nisga’a / Kwagiulth Nations

In a desire to provide urban Native youth with a gathering place amidst the backdrop of concrete and mass population, the Urban Native Youth Association is working toward the construction of a multi-purpose Native Youth Center to be located in Vancouver’s bustling eastside.

ConferenceGinger Gosnell, president of the Urban Native Youth Association, and UNYA spokesperson and Board of Directors member, Rivers Stonechild; enthusiastically addressed a crowd of nearly 200 people on April 12. Filling Vancouver’s Native Friendship Center, Elders, youth, community members and governmental and private representatives, gathered to witness the launch of the much-needed youth project.

“Because the Native Youth Center is the first of its kind, we’re making history by doing the work that we are doing here today,” Stonechild stated.

The initial planning stages of the estimated 50,000 square foot center were indicative of what the Native youth desired.

“Years ago when young people were approached and asked what it was they felt they needed in order to be supported and in order to achieve success, they came to UNYA and said ‘We need a place to start this good work, we need a place to start our healing and our growth, and to be able to learn and to be able to evolve.’ And so it came from community, and we’re here today to be apart of the first steps in making this dream a reality,” stated Gosnell.

Three years in the planning, the $30 million project has prompted a myriad of local sponsorship. With private institutions like CIBC contributing 200,000 and PetroCanada donating a generous $1.2 million, the project has already accumulated a sum of $4 million toward construction.

Along with private sponsors, the city of Vancouver has purchased a large lot on the corner of Hastings Street and Commercial drive where the NYC will be built. Also providing their patronage for the project are well known Aboriginal artists and activists, actor Evan Adams, author Lee Maracle and the prominent Chief Leonard George.

The Hon. Larry Campbell, Mayor of Vancouver, also attended the launch gathering and announced that the province of BC will be donating $1 million to the construction process.

“This is an incredible day. To see the project and to have one of the youth describe it to me and what’s going on is absolutely incredible,” Mayor Campbell announced. “It’s not going to be easy to raise $30 million, but you’ve shown leadership to build a partnership with the Aboriginal community, the private sector, the federal government, the province and the city.”

The mayor concluded his address with the realization that the project is 100% in the hands of First Nations people.

“This isn’t a bunch of white guys telling you what to build, this is your project.” Promising to continue to advocate for the project with his friends in Ottawa, Campbell’s words resonated from the podium. ” We demand that it be built, because this will change not only the youth, but our neighborhood.”

Estimated to be up and running by the end of 2007, the Vancouver Native Youth Center will provide First Nations youth with the tools needed to live healthier lives. With Native youth occupying 4 percent of the city’s total youth population, they are all too often over represented in regard to the negative statistics for urban youth.

When 40 percent of street youth in Vancouver are Aboriginal, a project like the NYC is more than a necessity. Possessing a First Nations focus through the incorporation of a Sweat Lodge, ‘Healing’ herbal gardens and a library filled with language resource texts, the NYC will also accommodate the need for informal services through providing youth with artistic outlets, employment resources, counseling and a youth lounge for socializing.

Pimps and Drug Traffickers Target First Nations School Girls

By Jim West

First Nations girls as young as ten years old have been targeted by sex trade recruiters at a Vancouver elementary school says Caroline Krause, principal of the Grandview Elementary School.

“Every spring, active recruitment of our Grade Six and Seven First Nations girl students takes place,” said Krause to the Vancouver city council’s planning and environment committee recently. “We find that groups of traffickers and recruiters try to come onto the school grounds. Sometimes they come into the school trying to lure away our girls.”

In her presentation to the committee, Krause held up a copy of that day’s Vancouver Sun, which displayed photos of the 12 additional women that Robert Pickton is charged with murdering and said, “When young girls are recruited into the sex trade at 10, 11 and 12 (years old), this is very well where they will end up.”

Krause urged the committee not to close the Grandview Highway North between Clark and Commercial Drive as part of a new Millennium Peace Park beside the school because the school would not be able to police it.

“Over the past five years, we have been successful in keeping hundreds of students off the streets and in a safe and caring environment for three hours every day after school. Our concern is if there is a park created by our school with no recreational facilities, just a park, this can undermine everything we have accomplished in the area of prevention.”

In a May 7 letter to the committee, Krause said the school, at Grandview and Woodland, has serious problems with drug users on the school grounds, with people regularly using the school’s First Nations longhouse as a crack house.

“Every morning members of our school staff have to sweep up broken glass, needles, drug paraphernalia, condoms, etc. as a result of evening activities,” she wrote.

If the city created a park beside the school, says Krause, she is worried teachers would not be able to protect students after school despite years of vigilance and the creation of successful prevention programs for at-risk students.

While teachers have been able to deal with recruiters by issuing “no trespassing” orders when recruiters enter the school grounds, Krause said teachers would not have the same authority in a public park.

“We’re worried that our girls will be lured over to the park,” said Krause.

Council members agreed to keep the street open and expressed concern over the hazard faced by the school’s First Nations girl students.

Councillor Ellen Woodsworth said it was “tragic” that the city has to choose between the safety of school children and the creation of a public park.

Mayor Larry Campbell said it makes his blood boil to hear about the solicitation of young girls into the sex trade and said he would take up the matter with the city’s police board.

Almost half of the 190 students at the school are First Nations enrolled in aboriginal programs, according to a Ministry of Education report. The Ministry of Children and Family Development has identified Grandview Elementary students as some of the most vulnerable in the province.

Fraud and Theft of Saskatchewan Lands Uncovered in ICC Investigation Senior government officials of the day involved

By Lloyd Dolha

Senior government officials and land speculators conspired to defraud First Nations of the prairie provinces of thousands of acres of land in the late 1800s after the Northwest Rebellion of 1885.

After five years of a complicated and unique investigation of four separate, but intimately competing claims, the Indian Claims Commission has released recommendations that the federal government negotiate over “the improper removal” of nearly 60,000 acres or 24,000 hectares, of land from two Saskatchewan First Nations in the late 1800s.

It’s quite a story. Just after the Northwest Rebellion of 1885, the federal government negotiated adhesions to Treaty 5 and Treaty 6, early in September 1876 for the formation of Indian reserves, with the then James Smith Band (IR 100), the Cumberland Band (IR 20 and IR 100A), and the Chakastaypasin Band (IR 98), of the Prince Albert area.

The claims, submitted by the James Smith Cree Nation (JSCN) and the Cumberland House Cree Nation (CHCN), involve IR 98, 100 and 100A, as a result of the actions taken by the federal government in the wake of the 1885 Rebellion.

Three of the claims were submitted by the JSCN in the spring of 1999 and the fourth claim for some of the same land was received from the CHCN the following winter.

Some aspects of the claims flowed from the actions resulting from the signing of Treaty 5 and Treaty 6 in the mid-1870s and the allocations of reserve lands, while others involved the circumstances in surrenders later taken from the some of those same lands.

The separate but competing claims of the JSCN and the CHCN concern IR 100A. Indian Reserve 100A was originally surveyed in 1887 and confirmed by an Order-In-Council in 1889, “for the Indians of the Cumberland District (of Treaty No. 5).”

The Cumberland Band, represented by Chief John Cochrane and two headmen, Peter Chapman and Albert Flett, signed an adhesion to Treaty 5 on September 7, 1876.

Within two years of the signing and before they had been assigned reserve land at Cumberland House, the band requested reserve land close to Fort a la Corne, 259 kilometres to the southwest, where the land was more suitable to agriculture. This time the government was reluctant to do as Fort a la Corne was in the Treaty 6 area.

SaskSeven years earlier in 1882, some 2,200 acres were surveyed for the band at Cumberland Lake for IR 20. The lands were well short of the 11,000 acres the band was entitled to under Treaty 5, and there was little or no suitable agricultural land at IR 20. The demand for better land continued; as did concerns about placing Treaty 5 Indians in Treaty 6 territory.

Government gives in
By 1883, the government relented. Recognizing the 8,000-acre shortfall in the Cumberland House Band’s treaty land entitlement and the lack of agricultural land at Cumberland Lake, the government accepted the idea of a Treaty 5 reserve in Treaty 6 territory near Fort a la Corne.

In 1885, two townships were set aside near Fort a la Corne for the “Indians of Cumberland.” By 1887, the land was officially surveyed and 44,160 acres of IR 100A was allocated for the 345 Cumberland Band members using the Treaty 6 formula of 640 acres per family of five.

While the government may have expected the entire band to move to Fort a la Corne, only about one-third of them did, including Peter Chapman, who had resigned as headman of the Cumberland House Band. They settled in the northern portion of IR 100A and the people regarded Chapman as their leader. On a number of occasions, they requested their own chief and council, but were refused by government; their chief and council resided at IR 20.

Before and after the Northwest Rebellion, members of the Chakastaypasin Band from IR 98 were migrating to the new Cumberland reserve including the headman Kahtapiskowat. They set up their camps in the southern portion of IR 100A.

IR 98 was allocated for the Chakastaypasin in 1879. From the outset, there were complaints from nearby settlers over the fact that valuable timber resources on Sugar Island on the South Saskatchewan River were included in the reserve.

Members of the Chakastaypasin were branded as ‘rebels’ during the Northwest Rebellion, though no evidence existed to support that claim. Chief Chakastaypasin and his family as well as three other families were denied annuity payments for four years because they were seen as rebels.

Elders at the time said band members scattered to nearby reserves and their traditional hunting grounds at Carrot River near IR 100A after threats were made by the scouts involved in the uprising.

Though Chakastaypasin members dispersed to a number of bands in the area, Kahtapiskowat and many others relocated to the southern end of IR 100A. These Chakastaypasin members were never properly transferred to the Cumberland House Band, but two of them signed for surrender for the lower portion of IR 100A (20,080 acres) in 1902.

Chakastaypasin members were also involved in an agreement to amalgamate the remainder of IR 100A and the people living there with the James Smith Band at IR 100A. The consent of the entire Cumberland Band, those at IR 20 and IR 100A, was never sought or obtained.

The government of the day encouraged these transfers in the belief that if all Chakastaypasin members were living away from IR 98, they could take the land without the need for a formal surrender.

The improprieties surrounding the loss of the 60,000 acres were attributed to the slow communications of the day by a small and far-removed bureaucracy that did not adhere to the processes and procedures set out by both the treaties and the Indian Act.

But according to a special team of investigative researchers hired by the Federation of Saskatchewan Indians (FSIN), in the late 1800s and early 1900s, government policies encouraged settlement for the purposes of building a national railway and creating the opportunity for settlement and implementing farming strategies that would establish an agricultural economy to replace the fur industry.

This national policy provided the opportunity for speculators and senior government officials to “speculate on Indian Lands by committing major fraud.”

Report uncovered fraud
These were the findings of the Ferguson Royal Commission in the early 1900s that inquired into illegal activities and reported its findings to parliament during World War 1 in 1914.

The Ferguson Commission findings included:

· Speculation and fraud committed by senior government officials including Mr. James A. Smart, Superintendent General of the Department of Interior responsible for Indian Affairs, and;

· Mr. Frank Peddly, Superintendent of Immigration, who was a former law partner of a Mr. Bedford Jones at a law firm in Toronto, Ontario;

· The Associates of Smart and Peddly, included both elected officials and other speculators on Indian lands. They created “dummy companies” in Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluff, Iowa, in the United States, forged tender documents that were supposed to be sent from the two U.S. cities;

· Smart was responsible for declaring which reserves were to be open for “public auction” and the list included: the Pheasant Rump Reserve (Southern Saskatchwan); the Ocean Man Reserve (Southern Saskatchewan); the Chakastatpasin Reserve; the Peter Chapman, Cumberland 100A reserve.

Commissioner Ferguson found the main fraud and theft were committed by the senior government officials and their associates, on Indian lands that included the four reserves, and others in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Through the fraud scam they acquired approximately 412,000 acres of reserve land in Saskatchewan. The senior government officials unlawfully displaced members of bands by unilaterally transferring the members to other bands “Without any consent” from the members of the respective bands and the host bands.

Bedford Jones associate, Mr. Smith, forged all the tender documents for the Chakastatypasin reserve. Mr. Smith also forged several documents for the Cumberland 100A reserve.

The Indian Claims Commission has recommended the federal government accept all claims for negotiation with the James Smith Cree Nation and the Cumberland House Cree Nation. The ICC says none of what happened was legal or valid.

“There were a number of unique circumstances surrounding these claims,” said Chief Commissioner Renee Dupluis, who chaired the panel. ” This was the first time we had two bands bringing claims for the same piece of land. In another case, the claim was submitted on behalf of a band that no longer exists.”

Negotiator for the bands, Sol Sanderson, said it in stronger terms.

“That fraud activity went from Manitoba, Saskatchewan through Alberta,” says Sanderson. “So what the three bands have achieved here today is going to have a major impact on many other bands across this province and in other provinces.”

The Chakastaypasin and the Peter Chapman group want their bands legally reinstated and their separate land claims settled.

Sanderson said none of the bands would be content with only cash; but to see the return of the stolen lands. Those lands are in the diamond-rich Fort a la Corne area. The claims commission says cash is the usual compensation.

Speaking for the Cumberland House Cree Nation, Chief Walter Sewap said, “While Canada agreed that my First Nation had a claim, we could not get Canada to agree on the nature of the claim. Canada now has the report of this independent body agreeing with the points which we have tried to make for years.”

A Soldier’s Story: Frank “Smokey” Stover

By Lloyd Dolha

The Honourable Albina Guarnieri, Minister of Veterans Affairs, has declared 2005 the Year of the Veteran.

“Today, we ask a new generation of Canadians to surrender their time, volunteer their hearts, and take one year to fully remember a century of sacrifice. That year is 2005 – The Year of the Veteran.”
– Minister Guarnieri

As part of the Year of the Veteran, The First Nations Drum will recognize and celebrate the stories of aboriginal veterans who served this country with distinction and pride.

In the summer of 1943, Canadian troops were sent into action in the Mediterranean with British and American forces in the successful assault against Sicily where they carried the campaign to the Italian mainland.

SmokeyAmong the Canadians was a 17-year-old Métis named Frank (Smokey) Stover, from Brooks Alberta.

Stover had spent two years in the militia before he joined the army and, as a result, skipped basic training and went straight to artillery training in Petawawa. Upon completing his artillery training, Stover joined Able Troop, of the 7th Battery, Montreal Second Field Regiment of the 1st Canadian Infantry Division.

Stover was put in charge of No. Two artillery gun. Able Troop was in Scotland doing water-landing exercises when they got the
order to ship out.

After six days at sea, at about 4:00 a.m., the four-gun contingent was loaded onto a landing barge for a water landing on what they thought was Sicily. No. One gun was unloaded, but quickly sank beneath the waves. It was just a small island off the Sicilian coast.

“So the barge pulled back, went around the little island and hit shore. No. Two gun was hit dry land, so I asked the (British) Royal Engineers, ‘Where do I go?'”

The sapper pointed to a small trail to the right that led to a clearing.
“We set our guns up and pointed toward the enemy. When morning came, we were in a fruit orchard. So I was the first Canadian to land on (Mediterranean) enemy shores,” said Smokey.

The 1st Canadian Infantry Division and the 1st Canadian Tank Brigade flanked the 8th British and 5th American armies in the Sicily landing. None other than General George Patton and General Bernard Montgomery commanded those armies.

The first landing craft encountered brisk opposition, but the troops wiped out machine gun nests and other opposition quickly.

After 38 days of fighting, the Allied armies routed Sicily on August 17, 1943. About 500 Canadians from combined operational units participated in the fighting. The majority of the Canadians were veterans of the Dieppe and North African campaigns of the previous summer and included a handful of fresh recruits out of the United Kingdom.

Italian capture
“We captured Sicily and took another barge to the toe of Italy until we were 60 miles out of Rome and we started firing again. We beat the Germans and took Rome. We all had a ten-day leave and I had an audience with Pope Pius XI.”

The capture of Rome took place at the beginning of June 1944, after Allied forces broke through the GUSTAV line, a battle in which 180,000 men were killed or wounded. By June 4th, the Allies on two fronts had linked up and advanced into Rome, as the Germans gave up the ancient city without causing further damage.

As commander of No. Two gun, Smokey was known for his accuracy. One of the things that defined the fighting in Italy was the predominance of valleys and ridges. One day during the battle, the Germans were holding a house on a ridge, keeping the infantry from advancing. Smokey’s captain used to always say, ‘ For accurate shooting, go see No. Two gun.’

“He (the captain) showed me the range. It was approximately 6,000 yards on the map. The first shell hit the house just to the right of the window. The second hit just short of the window. The third shell went right in the window.

“Well, the Germans came running out and our infantry captured them,” chuckled Smokey.

Historic Reunion
By April 1945, the First Canadian Corps, veterans of the Sicilian and Italian campaigns, and the 2nd Canadian Corps, veterans of fighting in France, Belgium and Holland, were reunited under the command of General H.D. G. Crerar, with his 1st Canadian Army.

The two corps – five divisions and two armored brigades – was finally fighting in the same operational theatre.

According to William Boss, Canadian Press War Correspondent, the decision to link all Canadian units in one theatre was doubly historic. For one thing, the enemy knew nothing of the move. The Germans were kept entirely in the dark about the move by the security conscious Canadians.

Shoulder flashes, Canada patches, cap badges and all other insignia were removed. Vehicle tactical signs were painted out. The men were not fully informed, but knew something big was on and kept their mouths tightly shut.

The second reason was, at the time, this was believed to be the first time that a corps, complete with everything required to keep a formation in the field, had been taken out of the front line in one theatre and transferred intact to another front 1,000 miles away, ready for action.

The same guns that smashed the German’s Lamone River line in Italy in December 1944, were in action in northwestern Europe. The same tanks that cleared the enemy from Valle Di Commanchio were pursuing the beaten foe in northwestern Europe.

The climax of the war had already come with the Normandy landings in June 1944, in which the Canadian army played an important part. Instrumental in the capture of Caen, which followed, the Canadians won another major victory in the closing of the Falaise gap later that summer.

False orders in Holland
In northwestern Europe, Able Troop moved through southern France into Holland. In Holland, a young 2nd Lieutenant, fresh out of military academy took command of the 7th Battery.

It was summer and hot. Smokey and his gunnery crew were sitting around in their shorts, with only their boots and dog tags.

Complete with leather gloves and a swagger stick, the 2nd Lieutenant walked up to Smokey’s gunnery crew and demanded,
“Why aren’t you dressed properly?”

Looking up, Smokey replied they were dressed properly. The 2nd Lieutenant had Smokey placed under arrest and took him to the major.

The major acidly told the young officer to leave him and his crew alone.

“They’re good gunners and they keep their gun clean.”

That evening an order came through for 200 rounds of shells per gun. The same 2nd Lieutenant was assigned to load shells in the barrage that lasted all night.

Soon afterward, the division moved up to closer to the Holland/Germany border. Looking out from the armored vehicle, Smoky could see they were ahead of the infantry and called on the driver to stop.

“What’s the matter?” asked one of the officers.

“Somebody’s got their orders all screwed up. We’re ahead of the infantry,” said Smokey.

Able Troop stopped and set up their gun. They had just completed the task when a group of Germans attacked driving them back from their artillery guns.

Calling up British infantry for support, Able Troop recaptured their gun in a four-hour pitched battle. Smokey grabbed his rifle and dove under a truck and began firing.

“They (the guns) were all loaded up and ready to fire except we took the firing pins out. So we turned them around and ejected the cartridges and replaced the firing pins,” said Smoky.

The same young 2nd Lieutenant was court-martialed as a result of the incident.

Normandy Invasion
In June 1944, the Allies invaded Normandy, with the Canadians assigned one of the five landing beaches. They fought across Normandy, up the French coast through Belgium until September, when they were assigned to clear the Schedlt estuary and open up the vital port of Antwerp.

The battle for the Scheldt ended after a month of bitter fighting. The Canadians had suffered almost 6,400 casualties, but the Allies had accomplished their goal. The route to Antwerp was safe, and the way was clear for the final advance into Germany.

General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, declared later that victory over Germany was assured “when the first ship moved unmolested up the Scheldt.”

In February 1945, the 1st Canadian Army opened a drive through the Rhineland and the formidable Hochwald forest and forced the Germans back across the Rhine. The Canadians eventually liberated much of the Netherlands before the war ended in May.

“Then the order came out they wanted volunteers to go to the east because Japan was still fighting, so I volunteered. One of my friends said ‘Christ, Smokey haven’t you had enough!’ I said I want to get home.”

Smokey was on a 30-day leave in Calgary to a hero’s welcome when Japan surrendered after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Sergeant Frank (Smokey) Stover served 22 years in the Canadian Army before retiring and now lives in Vancouver, BC.

“These days I just been enjoying life, spending the government’s money,” said Smokey.

Female Urban Planner Sets Eyes on 2010 Olympics

By Shauna Lewis

The next time you walk through a newly erected building, drive down an expanded highway, or cross a bridge, you may be pleasantly surprised to find that First Nations women are at the reins of urban planning.

In a high-rise office located on Vancouver’s north shore, one woman has achieved noteworthy success in the engineering and project planning business. Jane Atkinson, president of GTM Project Management Company, is proving that women – First Nations women in particular – can not only enter into the corporate world but also can become successful entrepreneurs by working from the ground up.

women”Anything is possible,” said Atkinson, a Thompson First Nations women who grew up in the Fraser Canyon area of BC. “If you see someone out there doing something, know that you can do it yourself. And you don’t have to stop at working for someone, you can actually go out and start a company on your own, there are people out there that will help you.”

Although being the president of a company that witnesses the growth of developing projects from conception to completion is a lot of work, Atkinson is not alone in her successes. With a collaboration of 25 other GTM employees, including a handful of civil engineers, applied science technologists, engineers in training and an administration staff; Atkinson heads a skillful and impressive cohort.

Lynn Figgess, CEO of GTM is undeniably Atkinson’s ‘right-hand woman.’ Established in 1998 from a ‘bare bones’ company that began with just Atkinson and Figgess, GTM has grown into an impressive business worth more than $2 billion. Figgess said that the company has not received any monetary assistance to date that is First Nations specific.

With the 2010 Olympics only five years away, Atkinson and Figgess are excited about the projects that GTM will oversee. Opportunities to work on developments like the Sea to Sky Highway portfolio and other structures that will undoubtedly pop up all over Vancouver will not only add notoriety to Atkinson’s corporation, but will also prove that a First Nations businesswoman will be contributing to the 2010 legacy.

“One of the larger projects that we are pursuing is the Ravline,” stated Figgess. While it is unofficial that GTM will get the opportunity to work on the forthcoming transit deal, Figgess is confident that they will play a part in the process, since GTM had a major role in the planning and execution of Vancouver’s millennium skytrain line. Future endeavors also involve expansion, as GTM consulting has plans of branching out to United States and international markets.

Possessing drive, dedication, an entrepreneurial spirit and skill for project development, Atkinson and Figgess are consequently helping to break down stereotypes and gender-based stigmas. “We have found it challenging to enter into the ‘old boy’s club,” Figgess confessed. “When it comes to First Nations, there are assumptions that the quality of work is lesser than other organizations.”

While Atkinson’s instruction is based solely on entrepreneurial experience, she is a firm advocate of post secondary education. Atkinson has made it a mission to participate in motivational lectures, encouraging First Nations youth to get involved in the business and engineering field.

“It is very important that GTM as a company gives back to First Nations.”

Atkinson knows there are wonderful opportunities for First Nations people in the entrepreneurial sector, and through enlightening youth on such benefits, she hopes that more Aboriginal students will become the next generation of corporate pioneers.

New Cruise Line Visits High Arctic

By Staff Writers

An Inuit-owned cruise line, Cruise North Expeditions, will offer travel to the remote wilderness and breath-taking vistas offered in the Canadian Artic, skirting the polar ice pack past the summering grounds of vast herds of caribou, pre-historic looking shaggy muskox, polar bears and walrus with the stunning backdrop of icebergs, soaring mountain cliffs and fjords.

Northern Quebec’s Makivik Corporation is moving into the cruise ship industry this summer with the launch of its 66-passenger ice ship Ushuaia, which will set sail from Kuujjuaq on July 10, with its first group of tourists on the Koksoak River near the south end of Ungava Bay.

The 85-metre ship, a leased American built ship, will make eight weeklong cruises into the vast territory of northern Quebec to communities on Baffin Island and Nunavik.

Cruise North Expeditions will be headed by Dugald Wells, a professional engineer and cruise industry veteran who began his career 20 years ago in the Artic as a research scientist aboard Canadian icebreakers.

Wells said Cruise north is offering packages unique to the business. The mid-size cruise ship will employ Inuit and will operate from Kuujjuaq, formerly known as Fort Chimo.

“The main difference is basing the ship in Canada using Kuujjuaq as our home port, because it allows us to go out and deliver our Artic program in only a week, which makes it easier and less expensive for our passengers,” he said.

Points of call include the Nunavik communities of Kangiqsujuaq and Inujivik, and Cape Dorset on Baffin Island.

“Passengers traveling with Cruise North will be welcomed as privileged visitors in our home,” said Adamie Aluku, the Inuk chairman of Cruise North Expeditions, “and understand our deep reverence for the natural world.”

Island-Wide Haida Protest May Drag for Months

By Lloyd Dolha

As the island-wide protest on Haida Gwaii enters its fifth week, there appears to be little chance of resolution of the conflict before the writ is dropped for the provincial election on May 17.

“One month before Election Day they (the provincial government) cannot conduct business; they can’t make any commitments. That’s the law,” said Haida Nation media coordinator, Gilbert Parnell.

While the blockade was sparked by the announcement of the pending $1.2 billion sale of Weyerhaeuser’s timber rights and assets to Toronto-based conglomerate Brascan, it is the Council of Haida Nation’s long unheeded demands for greater consultation and sustainable forest practices that has given the blockade its momentum in the movement residents call “Islands Spirit Rising.”

“Weyerhaeuser has been targeting our cedar at an astonishing rate,” said Parnell. “They are logging the profile of the forest. They are not respecting the cultural, environmental and economic values the company has committed to. The company is just trying to maximize profits at our expense.”

Loggers and Ministry of Forests employees have been barred from crossing key checkpoints and since the first days of the 24 hour-a-day protest few have even bothered to try.

The Haida and their supporters say the provincial government and the company have violated a six-point agreement reached in June 2002 between the Haida, Weyerhaeuser and its employees.

That agreement was reached in the aftermath of the BC Court of Appeal ruling that held that third parties, as well as the provincial and federal governments, are bound by a duty to consult and accommodate First Nations wherever resource development impacts First Nations rights or interests.

The agreement reduced the annual allowable cut until a sustainable harvest level was reached, committed the company to harvest the profile of the forest and set out a plan to ensure the long-term viability of Haida cultural needs.

Of the points agreed upon, most were simply ignored or addressed in a superficial manner.

The Haida say both the company Weyerhaeuser and the Ministry of Forests have demonstrated a complete disregard for island residents needs and wishes when it compromised the Haida Land Use Plan by approving cutting in areas that were designated protected.
Moreover, recent changes to the Forest Act have outraged both natives and non-natives residents alike.

New Forest Act wasteful
In a public bulletin distributed at a meeting in Port Clements on March 20 in the village, the council notes that in the last few years, sections of the Forest Act have been rewritten that set the standards and penalties used to control the waste of the public resource.

The new regulations allow timber companies to waste as much timber as they see fit for the ridiculously low penalty of 25¢ per cubic metre for wasted timber. The removal of the regulation also significantly reduces the stumpage fees, lowering company costs even further.

Another section of the act that was completely removed is the “Cut Control” regulations. This regulation offered communities dependant on the forest resource some protection from the boom and bust cycles associated with the industry. The cut control regulated the amount of timber the industry could cut annually and over a five-year period.

A company could cut 50 percent as a minimum and 150 percent as a maximum of its annual allowable cut in any one year as long as at the end of the five-year period, the cut fell within ten percent of the five-year annual allowable cut.

Now, forest corporations can shut down operations indefinitely without penalty, despite disastrous effects on communities that rely on those jobs.

Forest companies can now essentially pick and choose where and when they want to cut, regardless of community needs.

These actions, say the Haida and their supporters, demonstrate that the Ministry of Forests and has been implicit in allowing the industry to dominate and control the entire region.

The Haida estimate that $6 billion worth of timber, mostly old-growth Cedar, has been taken off the islands over the years.
Early in the protest, the Haida seized five barge loads of timber at an estimated value of $50 million at Ferguson Bay. That action was taken under legal consultation because of the breach of the June 2002 agreement.

More recently, the Haida have been meeting with provincial officials privately to consider offers to bring the conflict to a peaceful resolution.

A plan has been put on the table that would see some 200,000 hectares of land taken out of timber harvest licenses.

Inquiry into Slaughter of Dogs Announced

By Lloyd Dolha

They are one of the few original Canadian breeds of dogs. The Inuit of Artic Canada called them “Qimmiq.” They were an integral part of Inuit society and culture for the last 11 centuries; some say the dogs date back 2000 years or more.

Today the Canadian Eskimo dog is all but a vanishing species. The Canadian Kennel Club says the world-wide population of these registered dogs is only 279 as compared to more than 20,000 in 1950.

What happened to these dutiful dogs who stood at both poles, serving nearly all of the famous names in Artic and Antartic exploration? This powerfully built breed that was capable of pulling between 45-50 kilograms (per dog), over distances up to 70 miles per day; they served as hunting dogs as well, able to locate seal breathing holes, hold polar bears at bay and muskox for Innu hunters.

The Canadian government had them slaughtered.

Beginning in the 1950s, up until the 1960s, government authorities undertook the wholesale extermination of Canadian Eskimo dogs – or Inuit huskies as they are better known. What is shocking is that the arbitrary and often dangerous way that the killings were carried out was largely unknown among the general public until the late 1990s.

At that time, Makivik Corporation began holding a series of 200 community meetings to learn about Nunavik community members’ concerns. As the recollections emerged one by one from the disparate communities, a pattern became apparent that was hitherto unnoticed. Until that time, many of the Inuit thought that the killings were isolated instances among the far-flung isolated communities.
Makivik Corp. and the Qikiqtani Inuit Association sent several official complaints to the governments of Canada and Quebec.

Makivik’s collection of interviews with Inuit elders suggested that the police conducted the purposeful slaughter with the stated objective of controlling rabies and ridding the communities of Baffin and the northern region of Quebec of loose sled dogs.

Feds deny killings
But the federal government still refused to acknowledge, let alone admit what had happened. The Canadian Solicitor General’s Office had said that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police records of the era had been destroyed, so there could be no determination of exactly who was responsible.

Nevertheless, from the hundreds of interviews of witnesses, Makivik Corp. officials were led to the conclusion that the RCMP did most of the killings, aided by the Quebec Regional police and Hudson’s Bay trappers. They concluded what many of the elders already suspected: the real goal of the slaughter was to force the Inuit to give up their nomadic way of life and assimilate them, beginning with the establishment of permanent settlements.

Late in 2002, forty residents from the communities of Inukjuak and Puvirnituq, signed a petition asking the federal government to recognize the “significant social, economic and cultural repercussions” the dog slaughter had on Nunavik’s Inuit.

Guy St-Julien, the Liberal member of parliament for northern Quebec (Abitibi-Baie James Nunavik), presented that petition to the house of Commons on October 1, 2002.

Pita Aatami, president of Makivik Corp., said he was pleased St-Julien was supporting the work Makivik had begun nearly four years earlier.

Film convinces government
“Up until now, we haven’t been able to convince the government to do a public inquiry into the RCMP and Suréte de Quebec’s slaughter of the sled dogs,” said Aatami.

But the push for a public inquiry reached its climax on January 19, 2005, at the premier of the film Echo of the Last Howl, at Kuujjuaq, Nunavuk. The film featured documentary footage and re-enactments of the slaughter and was attended by 800 community members and visiting politicians that included Quebec Opposition leader Gilles Duceppe.

The film depicted some of the most heartbreaking instances of the slaughter of the sled dogs and what the loss of the sled dogs meant to the Inuit of Nunavik.

Elders interviewed for the making of the film took to the stage following the film recalling their experiences of watching their beloved sled dogs cut down before their very eyes.

In one instance, the entire community of Kangirsujuaq was ordered to lead all its dogs down to the sea ice to be killed. Even the children were told to bring their puppies down.

The dogs were all shot, their bodies piled up and incinerated.

“The dogs went willingly,” recalled one grieving elder.

Duceppe promised he’d push for a public inquiry by showing the film to other members of parliament.

Early in March 2005, representatives of the Makivik Corporation and the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, appeared before the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs. They spoke of how the slaughter of the sled dogs negatively impacted their livelihood, culture and society.

QIA president Tomussie Aliqqatuqtuq wondered why it took so long for this issue to be acknowledged by the federal government.

“Why is it that since the 1950s those dogs were killed and [we were] never told why? Perhaps it was too painful back then and those RCMP who shot those dogs [understood they] did wrong. Those who should have been there to help, hurt Inuit instead. Now [the Inuit] have a place to turn where they will be believed. Now they can speak. This is open now,” said Aliqqatuqtuq.

Nunavik liberal MP Nancy Karetak Lindell, chair of the standing committee said the testimony was important.

“It’s very moving to hear first hand what people have gone through, different incidents in our history of course we’re not proud of,” said Karetak-Lindell.

The Inuit are seeking an apology and compensation for the slaughter of the sled dogs who were such a critical part of their lives for so long.

Terry Aula, executive director of the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, said the standing committee has recommended to parliament to appoint a superior court judge to look into a public inquiry over the dog slaughter and report on the matter to the House of Commons in three months from April 15, 2005.

“It’s more to bring about answers to why there was a slaughter,” said Aula. “From the outset, we realized that it was happening in all 22 communities at the same time. That tells us it was systematic.”