Mend the Wounds, But Keep the Scars

Brantford, Ontario’s Woodland Cultural Centre on why residential school tourism is an important step ‘towards truth and reconciliation'.

By Julia Laurenne Chambers

COVID-19 sparked massive unrest, but this was not solely due to the global health crisis. The halt in business-as-usual exposed a number of deep-seated ethical issues around the world, fueling multiple spells of activism, such as the Climate Change and Black Lives Matter movements. Ethically, Canada has a reputation for being a pacifistic wallflower. However, the country’s darker secrets were unveiled during the pandemic, proving that it is the quiet ones you need to watch out for.

In May of 2021, the remains of 215 Indigenous children were discovered on the grounds of a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia. This not only shocked the Canadian public, who felt blindsided by their government but, perhaps for the first time, brought Canada’s history of cultural genocide to global attention. Since then, more unmarked mass graves have been uncovered across the country in an ongoing recovery operation. Unable to disregard the evidence, non-Indigenous Canadians are turning to Indigenous voices for the truth. But, it is hard to know how this salted wound should be dressed. An estimated 139 residential schools operated across Canada, and 15 to 20 of those former institutions remain standing today. Now, the question is: What do we do with them?

Residential schools foster distressing memories for Indigenous Canadians. Yet, they offer an opportunity to see where these atrocities against children took place beyond the capacity of textbook images. Some feel these nightmarish institutions should be demolished so that the Indigenous community can heal, while others believe these scars of evidence should be saved to hold history accountable.

Brantford, Ontario’s Woodland Cultural Centre is partial to the latter. The centre—which promotes Indigenous culture, language, art, and history—opened in 1972 upon the closure of Brantford’s Mohawk Institute Residential School. Having opened its doors in 1828 to between 90 to 200 children aged 4 to 16 each year until its closure in 1970, the Mohawk Institute was one of the oldest and longest-running residential schools in Canada. It is also one of the only former residential school sites to offer tours to the public, provided by WCC, to ensure that history is not forgotten. “This is the first step towards truth and reconciliation,” said WCC’s Associate Director Chris Ashkewe.

Former Mohawk Institute Residential School (Woodland Cultural Centre)

The Canadian Residential School System was run by the Church with the financial support of the federal government, facilitating the cultural abolition of approximately 150,000 Indigenous children from the 1820s until the last school closed in 1996. These children were taken from their families and stripped of their cultural identities. Many were physically and sexually abused, and thousands died from disease, neglect, and suicide.

Ashkewe, whose relatives attended the Mohawk Institute, acknowledged the heaviness of the tour’s subject matter. “This is difficult stuff we need to see,” he said. “But we don’t want this experience to scar anyone going forward, we want it to be a source of education.”

Over the last six years, WCC raised $26 million through their Save the Evidence campaign to restore and revitalize the former residential school. Currently undergoing construction and renovations, the school will reopen in 2024 as a fully-realized Interpretive Historic Centre. Until then, WCC is offering virtual tours with a Q&A session for a $10 tax-deductible donation.

The tour started at the school’s front entrance. “The kids… would’ve used this entrance that day and never again until they left,” said tour guide Lorrie Gallant. Everything the children came with was taken from them. Their hair was cut, they were scrubbed with lye, and they were given a uniform and a number. “They never would be referred to by their name again,” said Gallant.

The tour transports visitors through the children’s dormitories laden with bunk beds, the lavatories—where children had to share the same bathwater during their weekly wash—the prison-like ‘playrooms,’ and the cafeteria–where the malnourished children were almost exclusively served watery porridge, which earned the institution its nickname: ‘Mush Hall.’ The most horrific room—the noisy boiler room—was where sexual abuse could transpire without being heard.

For some survivors, residential schools are dormant cancers. In 2015, St. Michael’s Residential School in Vancouver Island, British Columbia, was demolished by request of the local Indigenous community. “It has been a constant reminder of the experiences,” said 83-year-old Chief Robert Joseph to The Globe and Mail. Joseph, who attended St. Michael’s from age 6 to 19, considered its demolition a major step toward healing survivors’ wounds. “Symbolically, it’s a liberation from the haunting past,” he said.

Contrarily, Geronimo Henry—a board member of the Survivors’ Secretariat and survivor of the Mohawk Institute—supports the preservation of residential school buildings. “It’s better than reading it in a book on paper,” he said. “Words don’t have feelings.”

The 86-year-old survivor, who attended the Mohawk Institute for 11 years, now volunteers as a tour guide. Since the Kamloops discovery, Henry has witnessed a surge in Canadian visitors, but also in international attendees. “I told them to just put it on Facebook–[to] tell people what happened to the children,” he said. “I was so inclined to get the word out to the world.”

Geronimo Henry (Woodland Cultural Centre)

Henry admitted that some scars are permanent. “I was there for so long, I forgot so much of my culture,” he said. “I’ve tried to learn the language… but it’s hard.” At one point in his life, Henry was married with six kids. Having never experienced family himself, though, raising one of his own proved difficult. “When I was at school, nobody said ‘I love you,’” said Henry. “I didn’t know how to love somebody… I didn’t even know what the word meant.”

Just as his scars will never disappear, Henry wants evidence of residential schools to remain visible. “Not only for myself,” he said. “But mostly I want justice for the kids that never made it home.” According to Henry, the current generation of young people who have access to residential school tours and educational resources will be the ones who continue to hold history accountable. “They are finding out about the truth… and want to make it right,” he said. “They want reconciliation.”

The evidence of residential schools and the children who suffered within their four walls was concealed for so many years. Now exposed, Canada’s history of cultural genocide cannot be ignored. “I think it’s about time,” said Henry.