This post is part of a series entitled “Land, Memory, and Schooling: Environmental Histories of Colonial Education.” You can find the introduction here.
This post and series discuss Indian residential and day schools. Please take care as you read. If you are a Survivor or intergenerational Survivor of residential or day school and you need help, there’s a free 24-hour support line. Call 1-866-925-4419. Additional resources are available here.
My father attended the Lejac Indian Residential School (IRS) located on Fraser Lake in British Columbia. Lejac officially opened in 1922, but it was preceded by an Oblate mission at Fort St. James. Although I have never been able to academically confirm it, people talk about an earlier IRS existing there too. Lejac is known for the deaths of four boys who ran away from the school on New Year’s Eve in 1937 and then froze to death on Fraser Lake. I have had to look at photographs of their dead bodies numerous times in both the classroom and at conferences when someone decides to use them as an example of how bad residential schools were. It never gets easier. Nor do the accounts of physical and sexual abuse as well as outright murder that exist in community.
We know that via colonial policies, our people went through a lot, and in varying degrees during different time periods. Although residential schools amounted to genocide, on page 266 of my doctoral dissertation I write, “as Tsay Keh Dene Elder Vera Poole would recall, the situation at the forestry camps was so bad that some individuals entertained the idea that residential school was better for their children.” I can easily envision the interview that this information came from, and how readers might interpret what I wrote. This sentiment is especially true as I work on editing my dissertation into two books. The passage can be read many ways, but given the larger context, it is a statement about how the Indian residential school system was one of the many horrors Indigenous peoples faced as a result of the colonial project in Canada.
Vera Poole, or rather Auntie Vera, is not some fringe community member or a naïve amateur when it comes to being interviewed. In her life she has been heavily involved in not only education in Tsay Keh Dene, but also lands claims, litigation, and treaty negotiations. Indeed, she was the nation’s expert witness in the West Moberly case, which established the western boundary of Treaty No. 8.1 She is a careful and thoughtful Tsek’ehne historian. She is no Indian residential school denier or apologist—far from it. As residential school survivor, she knows full well the horrors that took place at these so-called educational institutions. Her statement is perhaps best understood as a testament to the environmental devastation caused by the creation of the Williston Lake reservoir as part of the construction of the WAC Bennett Dam.
The filling of the reservoir in 1968 destroyed about 440,000 acres of land, a significant portion of the Tsek’ehne heartland. The river valleys that formed the various reaches of the new reservoir had once been the nexus of an extensive transportation system as well as the home of the Tsek’ehne. Due to the lack of a meaningful state presence, the Tsek’ehne had largely been able to continue to practice their traditional ways of life, including a traditional land tenure system. Sure, the colonial state had passed laws and implemented policies that in theory affected this system, but given the relative lack of local state control, these laws and policies remained largely unenforced. This incongruity is evident in the example of Indian reserves. The McKenna-McBride Commission created two reserves, but there was no attempt to confine people to them despite the existence of the federal pass system. As such, when the water started rising in 1968, many people—regardless of whether they were Tsek’ehne—saw it for what it was: the abrupt end of a traditional way of life—the way of life Auntie Vera had experienced before attending Lejac. And while the result is identical to the stated goal of the IRS system, it was an accelerated path to cultural destruction. It took place in a matter of days rather than through years at an IRS, and coincided with the destruction of a homeland, the loss of cultural and spiritual/religious sites, and the death of numerous non-human relatives Tsek’ehne youth are told they are responsible for.
“The waters of the Williston Lake reservoir ended these first-hand experiences for all ages and for all time.”
This loss of land also represented epistemicide. Like many other Indigenous groups Tsek’ehne pedagogy includes land-based learning. Many of our teachings are connected to specific places or environments. The loss of land does not does not mean the teachings ended, but it can result in their distortion or diminishment as first-hand experience of the site—including mnemonic devices—especially if the lack of first-hand experience reduces its significance for future generations. By taking children away at a young age, the IRS system was precluding many first-hand experiences at a formative age. The waters of the Williston Lake reservoir ended these first-hand experiences for all ages and for all time.
The creation of the reservoir changed our relations with the entirety of our lands, including areas that weren’t flooded. For example, in the past people had lived more or less equally spread out across the traditional territory. However, the decision of the nation to move to Ingenika in 1971 and the construction of a new village at the northern end of the Williston Lake reservoir in 1989 concentrated settlement in the northern part of our lands. This has changed our first-hand relationships with lands in the south. When combined with the difficulty in travelling in a hydro-affected environment, it has also made it harder to maintain connections with related communities like Kwadacha, McLeod Lake, and Takla Lake. Given how many nations have relied on related communities for cultural revitalization, this has only deepened the disconnection the IRS system initiated. Our communities have actively worked—and continue to work—to undo the harms of IRS. For example, many residential school survivors in Tsay Keh Dene were re-cultured when they returned home. The loss of land and the potential loss of teachings made this process harder. Thus, the Williston Lake reservoir has magnified the impacts of the Lejac IRS, making this a prime example of how seemingly different aspects of the same colonial system worked together to displace and harm our ancestors.
“The construction of the dam and filling of the reservoir robbed people of hope, during a time when hope was hard to come by.”
Finally, the construction of the dam and filling of the reservoir robbed people of hope, during a time when hope was hard to come by. Many IRS survivors have talked about the strength they drew from memories of their home and the hope that one day they could return there. It is one of the reasons why so many tried to escape—often under dangerous conditions. For Tsay Keh Dene, however, this home was now gone, or at least changed to such an extent that it was effectively gone. Adding insult to injury, Indian Affairs simply expected those affected to return to their home reserve, something that would not be possible for Tsay Keh Dene until 1971. Meanwhile, we were expected to simply survive as day by the day the water rose and destroyed more and more of our homeland.
It is in this context that Auntie Vera’s statement is best understood. One could attend an IRS where genocide was the goal, but cloaked in the illusion of education, or one could struggle to survive as they directly witnessed genocide without any illusion of it being something else. Neither was good, but maybe one was a little bit worse.
Feature Image: View of Parsnip Reach of Williston Lake Reservoir from causeway when the water is down. May 13, 2025. Photo credit: Daniel Sims.
Daniel Sims