Coming Home: Honouring the Resiliency of All Survivors of the Indian Residential School Experience

My everyday name is Constance Pearl Humchitt-Tallio and my traditional name is Thalth Gwaith which means Copper Woman, and to many friends and family I have been known as Connie – the name I will use during this presentation.

My parents were Hereditary Chief Wigvi ba Wakas – Chief Eagle Nose, Leslie Humchitt and Umaqs – Emma Humchitt of the Heiltsuk Nation. I am the third child of two brothers and three sisters. My younger brother now holds the Hereditary Chieftainship that my great-grandfather held since the 1800s.

The beginning of my educational journey began in 1950/51 in grade one at our Indian Day School in Bella Bella, and thereafter to the Boarding Home Program since they did not have grade 8, and so we had to leave to progress into Junior High and then again onto to the [Port] Alberni Indian Residential School from 1957 to 1960.

I am currently a Native Language Teacher in my Community of Bella Bella and I teach Kindergarten students aged 4, 5 and 6 years. I have a Language Proficiency Certificate with SFU, for which I can teach under the Ministry of Education, and I am also a Curriculum Resource Coordinator with the Bella Bella Community School. I was a Grandfathered in Social Worker and employed with my Band.

My volunteer time is researching family history, family trees, and anything to do with assisting families in this way. I am a Commissioner for the Province of BC on behalf of the Heiltsuk Nation, a Representative for our Mynuyags – Women’s Council on Joint Leadership for the Band, Treasurer for our Church, and I am active in numerous other entities.

Donna Samuel – nee Marsden is Gitxsan from the village of Gitanyow, BC. Her father, Solomon Marsden, is from Gitanyow, and her mother, Kathleen Wesley, is from Gitsegukla, BC. At the age of 9, Donna and her four younger siblings were taken by train to Edmonton Residential School, a two-day journey of 1500 km from Kitwanga to Edmonton. After two years in Edmonton, Donna and her siblings were further separated. She and two of her siblings were taken to Alberni Indian Residential School, while her two younger brothers were left in Edmonton. She was at Alberni Residential School until June 1965.

Donna has five children—three boys and two girls. One of her sons passed away in 2016. She has 16 grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren. Donna has been married for 57 years to the same wonderful man she met at AIRS. Donna is retired.

Fran was born in Lax Kw’alaams – Port Simpson, BC and she currently lives in Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. Along with her two brothers, Melford Tait and Andrew (Woody) Tait, she was sent to the Alberni Indian Residential School (AIRS) from 1951-1966 from the ages of 5-18 years. She graduated in 1966 from the Alberni District Secondary School. After being sent to AIRS she did not go home until she was 12 years, and she spent 1958-59 in the Port Simpson Day School. At the age of 15 years she was sent to Metlakatla, Alaska to attend school from September through to December before she was sent back to Prince Rupert. She then was asked to be sent back to AIRS for grades 11 and 12 because she knew the school better than she did her home community, and she knew where she would fit in, in the scheme of things and her life. Fran completed Grade 13 at West Vancouver High School in the Department of Indian Affairs home-school program. She attended UBC in 1971- 1972 but did not complete the BA program, and she has no interest to do so now. She was employed by the Malaspina College (Malaspina University College) as an Academic Advisor from 1974 to 2006, when she retired. She is an Elder in the Vancouver Island University Masters’ of Education program. In her retirement she’s an avid Dragon Boat paddler. Fran is actively involved as a Survivor in an advisory capacity with the AIRS Research Team with the Tseshaht First Nation. She also is a supporter of the Alberni Indian Residential School Survivors Art & Education Society.

I am Charlie Elwood Thompson – Buukwilla and I am from the Tsuubaas First Nations, formerly of the Ditidaht First Nation. I have lineage in Nuuchahnulth and Coast Salish.

I was born July 6, 1946, in the state of Washington where my late mother was berry-picking like many First Nations people did back then. I was born in a small shack in a strawberry field.

In 1955, at the age of nine I was brought to the Alberni Indian Residential School (AIRS), along with my two younger brothers – Jack and Arthur. We all spent ten years in that institution not knowing why we were brought there. During those years I lost my language and most importantly my culture. I had no opportunity to know who I really was, and I became an assimilated Indian and left knowing that because I was told the old ways were wrong and I believed it.

A lot changed when Survivors started finally talking about what happened to them, and for a while I was too afraid to speak about my time at AIRS. The turning point for me was when a group of boys took Arthur Henry Plint, a dorm supervisor at AIRS, to criminal court and we won. He was sentenced to eleven years in prison. This action allowed me to talk and start a criminal action to the supervisor who abused me, my brother and a friend. Unfortunately, the supervisor passed away before the court date.

After a few years of doing my best to deal with what happened to me at AIRS I eventually got to a place of being okay. I enrolled in a counselling course at Malaspina College along with other Nuuchahnulth people, and although I struggled in that course I made it through with a certificate. This gave me an opportunity to work with our people who were traumatized at Indian Residential Schools. I enjoyed helping Survivors.

I have seen our community divided so bad that there seems to be an impossibility to get past it or deal with the issues that keep us apart. But, I have hope that the next generation can deal with it and move onto a better future.

George Jackie Thompson was born in Tacoma, Washington on July 31, 1947. I lived my young life in the village of Whyac where we used to play on the beaches all day until it started getting dark. Our mother, Ida Thompson (nee Modeste), used to tell us to get home before it got dark, and we also would visit our great-grandparents Nookwa and Tuxbeek in Clo-oose, and they would feed us when we got hungry. At times we would stay in Duncan with our Grandparents, Elwood and Mabel (nee Good) Modeste, my mother’s parents.

Sadly, we went to the Alberni Indian Residential School in 1955. Our mother wanted us to go to school in Duncan, and in fact already had us registered but our father said we are going to Alberni Indian Residential School, and he said, “So they can make men out of them.” We never had the opportunity to ask him what he meant because he passed away at a young age.

In 1967 I married Nona Margaret Williams and we have 4 beautiful children – Iris, Wendy, Jack, and Colleen, and later on we adopted Barry Patrick our youngest son. In the same year I started learning about our culture and learning to dance from my grandfather George Thompson.

I went to Vocational School in Nanaimo at Malaspina College and took up a Welding Course. After completing the course, I started welding in a Logging Camp at Nimpkish earning $50.00/hr. I moved around to different Logging Camps and finally ended up in Narrows Inlet, Sechelt. In all I welded for 18 years. And crazy me got into Politics with the encouragement of my Uncle Stan, and I was the elected Chief of Ditidaht First Nation for over 20 consecutive years.

I am an Indian residential school survivor. Indian residential school was a horrendous experience where I suffered physical, sexual and mental abuse at Alberni Indian Residential School (AIRS). My kindergarten year was at the First United Church at Koksilah, BC and it was a good experience there. I spent twelve years at the Alberni Indian Residential School, from 1950 to 1962. My Indian residential school experiences spawned within me deep feelings of hurt and anger that I still carry today. These feelings of hurt and anger do not drive my life today, but they still exist, pushed deep down in my self-consciousness. These feelings come to me as I listen to other residential school survivor’s stories.

After twelve years at AIRS, when I returned home, people in my community did not know who I was, except for my family. This Indian residential school education and experience is significant with me having to heal after returning home and with an empty soul, without knowing any of my own culture and traditional language. After years of hard lessons in life, I found balance through my culture, Elders teachings, and with personal counselors. Our cultural heritage plays an important healing avenue as my family’s inheritances and customary property carries so much rich family history. Yet my culture and traditional language was forbidden at AIRS, and we were punished anytime we spoke our traditional language and I was not taught my own culture.

I learned through my tough life lessons and my bad experiences. I did not have any critical and creative thought processes. I was never taught or even allowed to take a position or defend it. Our Indian residential school environment was very strict and regimented. We lined up and marched into the dining room, marched into the auditorium for morning religious services – twice on Sundays. I was slapped in the face so hard by the infamous supervisor, Arthur Henry Plint, because I did not snap to attention.

My Indian residential school experiences included religious indoctrination enforced by corporal punishment and myriad forms of abuse, cultural and bodily shame, alienation from my family, and a disconnection from subsistence economies. Once we were self-sufficient and living without any government assistance, and our pantries were always full of jarred and canned salmon and fruit that brought us through the winter.

Wally was born and raised in the Nuuchahnulth village of Ahousaht. His late father was Daniel Samuel of Ahousaht and he was a commercial fisherman and trolled the west coast of Vancouver Island from Tofino to Kyuquot, where Wally liked to spend most of his summers. His late mother, Hazel Olebar, was from Kyuquot. Wally was born in a time where he observed the Ahousaht language, culture and traditions being practiced. The highlight of his childrearing was listening to stories from the Ahousaht people and Elders who were a part of the rich history and traditions of Ahousaht as it was in the 1800s.

Wally has 35 years of public service, managing, planning and implementing community programs, activities and services. He understands the Ahousaht dialect and can speak some, and he leads the Ahousaht Cultural Group in Port Alberni for the teaching and preservation of Ahousaht songs and dances. Wally knows, respects and practices First Nations culture and protocols. He has also given presentations on Indigenous tourism and First Nations partnerships across BC and Canada, as well as in Australia.

Wally is a Survivor of the Alberni Indian Residential School, and he has done presentations at schools, libraries and public events on his perspectives of the Indian residential school experience.

April is from the Coast Salish community of the Snuneymuxw First Nation uniquely located centrally on Vancouver Island, and she has lineage amongst the Nuuchahnulth people on the west coast. She has worked with children and youth in the local school district in Nanaimo for approximately 15 years, and has dedicated her lifelong community service to the broader First Nations communities in the areas of sports and recreation all in an effort to strengthen culture, identity and belonging for young people. April has three daughters and is a proud grandmother to three granddaughters and two grandsons, and is a child and granddaughter of Indian residential school survivors.

kʷissuuqƛ queer, non-hetero- normative, Transgender hereditary commoner. (They, them, she, her)
Current Regional Coordinator at Nuu-chahnulth Tribal Council. Nicki is from Hesquiaht and Yu?łu Pił?ath. For the past 30 years, they/she have led creatively with cultural best practices focusing on a new economy of the redistribution of knowledge, networks, and compassion.
Nicki has been the National Emcee, and educator for Truth and Reconciliation Canada. They/she has been at the forefront of Indigenous mental health leadership throughout Canada and is a published researcher who has lectured at universities throughout North America. Nicki is a storyteller who brings traditions into the modern world and is a master carver of precontact tools.

ʔukʷaqiłs  yac̓asʔutł. (My name is Step Up)  My English name is Dorothy Burn.  

I am Ditidaht with strong roots in Tla-o-qui-aht, both are nations on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

My biological parents attended the Alberni Indian Residential School (AIRS), as did each of my maternal and paternal grandparents.  I am a child of residential school Survivors.  “I” am a survivor.  

Having been raised by my maternal grandparents in a small, semi-remote village located at Nitinaht Lake on the west coast of Vancouver Island, I was blessed with a strong upbringing in our culture, language, and traditions which are very important to me, and of which I continue to be involved in and strive to be an example of for our future generations.  

After graduating high school in 1997 , I went on to attend Nicola Valley Institute of Technology to study and obtain Diplomas in Natural Resources. However, I went on to a career in the service industry, first in hospitality then as a Health Care Assistant, which is my current profession.

My hobbies include making regalia, general crafts, cooking (which I love to do), reading, and making specialty cakes.

I am very happily married and have a very quirky dog named Sarge.  I endeavour to work hard and live healthily – mentally, physically, and spiritually, as well as to live life to the fullest while caring for those that I love.

Omeasoo Wahpasiw is a nehiyaw iskwew from Treaty 6 territory living on Algonquin Anishinaabe territory currently known as Ottawa, Ontario. Omeasoo teaches in the School of Indigenous and Canadian Studies and the Azrieli School of Architecture and Urbanism, at Carleton University. Her research touches on the pedagogy of the built and natural environments of Indigenous peoples on Turtle Island. Omeasoo received her PhD in 2016 from the University of Saskatchewan, birthed Miyo Kesikaw that same week, and began her academic career at the University of Prince Edward Island and Mi’kma’ki in 2018.

Maastiinuux, Ke-Ke-Inisaksa-Ida Mabel Louise Thompson is from the Ts’uubaa-asatx, Ditidaht, and Quw’utsun people through her father, and the Heiltsuk and Haisla people through her mother. Her parents are Laura Maude (Shaw) and Charlie Elwood Thompson. Her paternal grandparents were Ida (Modeste) and Webster Thompson, and her maternal grandparents were Irene (Larsen) and Micha Shaw. Her paternal great-grandparents were Mary (Chester) and George Thompson from Ditidaht, and Mabel (Good) and Elwood Modeste from Cowichan Tribes. Her maternal great-grandfathers were David Shaw from Kitimaat and Walter Larsen from Bella Bella. Ida is the youngest sister to Bookwilla. She and her spouse, Sean, have three children: Lane, Molly, and Jasper, and one, almost two, grandsons. Newly graduated from Vancouver Island University, Ida’s educational journey has been driven by a profound commitment to addressing the intergenerational impacts of the Indian residential school system. Her passion lies in working with intergenerational survivors, recognizing the resilience of Indigenous communities in leading their own healing processes. Through her continuing studies, Ida aims to contribute to the broader narrative surrounding the true history of Canada, shedding light on the enduring consequences of the Indian residential schools, Indian hospitals, and other historical atrocities that continue to affect her people. With a firm belief that every Canadian has a role to play in truth-telling and healing, she strives to create awareness and understanding, fostering a collective commitment to acknowledging and addressing the historical traumas that have shaped the Indigenous experience in Canada. As she embarks on her professional journey, Ida envisions playing an active role in shaping a future where the strength of each generation contributes to the broader tapestry of healing and reconciliation.

My name is Jacob Hamilton – Kwiispiisiis and I was born in Victoria, BC, 1970, and my parents are Karen Johnson and Ron Hamilton – Haayuups. My ancestral name, Kwiispiisiis, means He goes back and forth between two villages giving feasts, and I have deep ancestral roots in the Nisga’a Village of New Aiyansh and the Hupacasath First Nation. My late mother was a survivor of the Edmonton Indian residential school between 1955 and 1963 when she was only six years old.

I am a proud father of two talented and beautiful sons, Johnson and Jayden Hamilton, and I strive to be the best Dad I can be.

Jenny Gardipy is a mother of six and Kokom (grandmother in Cree) of four. She is from Beardy’s and Okemasis Cree Nation in Treaty 6 Territory. Jenny is currently a third-year PhD candidate in the Indigenous Studies Department at the University of Saskatchewan. Jenny graduated from the University of Saskatchewan in 2011 with a Master’s degree in Public Health. Jenny strongly believes that Indigenous peoples have the capacity and knowledge to make healthy changes in their communities. Jenny’s mother went blind when I was 13-years old and witnessed the lack of health services that many in the disabled community face. Jenny’s late father survived Indian Residential School and believes her late father’s humble and Nêhiyaw (Cree) ways of being continue to be her foundation. Jenny would like her research to contribute to positive health outcomes for Indigenous people.

Ti-te-in | Sound of Thunder – Shane Pointe is a Musqueam Knowledge Keeper, and his motto is Nutsamaht! – We are one. Ti-te-in is a proud member of the Salish Nation, the Pointe family, and the Musqueam Indian Band. In addition to being a proud grandfather and a great-grandfather, he is a facilitator, advisor, traditional speaker, and artist. Shane has worked for five different school boards, Corrections Canada, Simon Fraser University, The University of British Columbia, and the First Nations Health Authority. He provides advice and guidance on ceremonial protocols for local, national and international cultural events.