By Tyler Marr

Orange Shirt Day remembers impacts of residential school system

Sep 29, 2017 | 4:08 PM

When Phyllis Webstab was six years old, she was taken from her home wearing an orange shirt she and her grandmother selected for her wear.

But when she was snatched from her grandparents and ushered away to a St. Joseph Mission residential school, her bright orange shirt was striped from her body and she never saw it again.

In 2013, when the first Orange Shirt Day was held in British Columbia, the colour orange was used to commemorate this recount of the residential school system and to never forget what happened to many Indigenous children. Ever since, Sept. 30 was declared Orange Shirt Day to honour residential school survivors, their families and the ones who passed away from the legacy and consequential harms of the schools.

Friday in Prince Albert, schools across the city alongside the Prince Albert Grand Council hosted events to revisit the history and honour the survivors.

Violet Naytowhow was taken from her grandparents in La Ronge in 1974 when she was six years-old. She was placed in the Prince Albert residential school, which she still has memories of to this day. 

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She recalled her time in the school and being filed around to classes in a regimental style. She described the educators as “not friendly and not nurturing.”

There was “no hugging, no raising up your spirit or nothing like that. Very cold and shut off,” she said.

As Naytowhow walked around the PAGC grounds Friday flanked by a few dozen others wearing orange shirts scribed with #everychildmatters, her thoughts turned to all those who did not survive the system like herself.

“I remember thinking who it was and who didn’t make it all across Canada. I know they are still finding bodies and bones in different places,” she said. “You wonder who didn’t make it because you don’t know the names.”

Working on the grounds for the last 20 years, Naytowhow has worked and overcome her grief and loss, saying she felt, “good I can do that for the memory of my relatives who have passed on and never made it back.”

“I just think of their spirit as happy and we are doing something on their behalf,” she said.

The day at the PAGC grounds was filled with music and speakers telling the tales of resilience and strength, something vital to carry forward, Naytowhow said.

“We went through a great deal…but we are still managing to have young boys singing on the drum and leading a song,” she said adding it’s important to educate youth.

In Colette Daelick’s leadership class at Wesmor Community High School, she urged students to brainstorm words to describe what reconciliation means. Daelick handed the students orange cards and each jotted down a few words and phrases. Strength, faith, fix the bond, original Treaty intent, trust and individuality were inked onto the cards. 

Grade 12 student Naomi VanDamme is Métis and though she did not have any family members go through the system, she has many friends who did. Looking from the outside in, VanDamme said it was critical “to acknowledge what has happened through those years and give my input and get to help people move forward with what happened.”

“It was a big deal and is a big deal now and we need to teach everyone in every culture that that was not OK,” she said.

Eighteen-year-old Richard Flett had grandparents go through the residential school system. He described today as a “remembrance day.”

“Our culture went to war with a different one and they tried to wipe out the child in them and assimilate them into their culture,” he said. “Today, to me, I remember my grandparents used to tell me to not be afraid to be yourself and I got culture in me. I speak Cree and I speak it confidently and I speak it when I can.”

Frett said keeping the tradition alive is necessary for him as he continues his path towards reconciliation.

tyler.marr@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @JournoMarr