Thursday, July 15, 2021
By Doug George-Kanentiio
On July 1, the Akwesasne community demonstrated in the most powerful way its desire to address the terrible effects residential schools have had on the people and to support those who survived the trauma of being ripped from their homes and placed in institutions designed to beat the Native out of them.
Equally compelling to the 1,000 people who marched was the finding of mass graves of Native children, buried on the grounds of the schools. Over a thousand have been located to date with many more to be found. Canada had at one time 139 residential schools across the nation, many operated under contract by the federal government with the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches. The oldest of these was the Mohawk Institute located in the city of Brantford on land owned by the Six Nations-Ohsweken people.