Starting in the 1800’s the government of Canada made attempts to force the assimilation of First Nations people in the way of Residential Schools. The belief was that if the government took the children of First Nations, they could better remove the culture and beliefs and replace them with Christian Euro-Canadian beliefs. The schools were government sponsored and were run by Christian churches. These schools left mental scars on the children who survived them and have impacts felt throughout generations. The last residential schools closed in 1996 and many of the students have fought for restitution and won. It is estimated that 150,000 first nations children attended residential schools in Canada. Some of the Residential school buildings were destroyed to try and erase a painful scar from the past. Other however have preserved to teach people about the past and be used as a renaissance of the First Nations culture. (Miller & Marshall, 2019)
For example, the Mohawk Institute. Established in 1836, the Mohawk Institute took children from the Six Nations of The Grand River and other surrounding native communities like Oneida of the Thames and Walpole Island Indian Reservation. The experience of the residential schools for the children were not good. Mohawk Institute began as day school and by 1831 began taking boarding students. Tribe elders often believed that sending their youth to these schools would help them learn and be educated. However, what happened at these schools was truly the worst of the human conditions. The children were unable to use their native first language. They were stripped of their uncivilized names and given new civilian names. The children sent half the day being educated and the other half working jobs that given base on their gender. The girls performed housekeeping duties and the boys worked in the fields or did construction.
The abuse at residential institutes ran rampant. Corrections often went to far and resulted in physical abuse with children being severely beaten and restrained. Some survivors have detailed accounts of sexual abuse cases. These cases when brought up to authority were often not investigated and left to happen repeatedly. Many cases resulted in pregnancies of young girls that often died in child birth or received dangerous abortions. Often perpetrators were allowed to stay at the institute and keep abusing the students. During the time that residential schools were open in Canada, 3200 students died from disease. Often, they were underfed ad left vulnerable to diseases like tuberculosis and influenza, which were exceptionally deadly at that time. When the Mohawk Institute closed its doors in 1970 it was one of the last residential schools to close in Canada. (Miller & Marshall, 2019)
Apart from many of these institutions that were closed, were eventually destroyed. However, the Mohawk institute became part of the Woodland Cultural center and was left open and used as a museum to converge history, education, and art. They give tours and an opportunity to teach people about the history of the first nations people of the area.
The people of the area consist of many people who lived there and have experienced what it was like to live at the Mohawk Institute while it was open.
Beverly Bomberry-Albrecht, residential school survivor, says,
"If you have a building, you can go in there and you can feel. Like some people are very sensitive; they can feel what the young children felt. So that's why I think it's better to show. Because even people in Brantford still don't believe this was [a] residential school."
(Goodes, 2018)
The Woodland Cultural Center cultural interpreter, Kaley Rueben attests to the impact that Residential schools has on her community, she says,
“I'm a byproduct of it, in that I'm here beside you, I'm Mohawk and I'm Cree, and I'm only going to speak English to you. That's an effect of it, because I don't have my language and I don't have my culture, and it's made me into everything I am today.”
(Goodes, 2018)
The importance of preserving the culture of the First Nations people is of great importance to the them, and that is evident in the testimonies of the people working to preserve it.
The residential schools act as reminder of the atrocities of mankind and how cruel we really can be. Some believe that the building is haunted by spirits. I myself have encountered, what I believe to be, spirit activity at the Mohawk Institute. Encounters in the way of shadows moving with nothing to cast them, figures in the windows and even cold climate in an area of the building. When it comes to buildings being haunted, it most often due to something that had happened there in the past. An especially heinous act leaves its mark on an area. The energy from that is trapped in the location or object. This is referred to a residual haunting. (TAPS, 2019) The atrocities committed at the Mohawk institute haunt its walls it what could seen as a literal haunting by ghosts but also in the figurative sense for those that have agnostic beliefs a reminder of the horrendous things that happened there. People believe that spirits of the children who were abused and died at the residential schools. In some of the images I have captured from the school have what is believe to be spirit caught in photographs.
References
Goodes, J. (2018, November 11). Why a Mohawk community chose to preserve a residential school building. Retrieved from CBC Radio: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/tapestry/preserve-or-destroy-1.4162162/why-a-mohawk-community-chose-to-preserve-a-residential-school-building-1.4162177
Miller, J., & Marshall, T. (2019, June 7). Residential Schools in Canada. Retrieved from The Canadian Encyclopedia: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/residential-schools
TAPS. (2019, June 15). Types of Human Hauntings. Retrieved from TAPS: http://the-atlantic-paranormal-society.com/types-of-hauntings/
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