Healing the Past




Welcome to Alert Bay

 

Alert Bay on Cormorant Island is easily accessed by ferry from Port McNeill and is well known for the ceremonial wooden masks and other dance regalia on display at the U’mista Cultural Centre, dedicated to preserving the heritage of the Kwakwaka’wakw culture.  In 1921 the Government of Canada confiscated many of these items in an effort to stop the potlatch custom.  

U'mista Cultural Centre

Negotiations during the 1970’s and 80’s resulted in regaining many of these possessions which are now housed in two Native museums, one of which is the U’mista Centre at Alert Bay. 

Potlatch Regalia

Equally interesting are the photographs of Native school children along with their written remembrances and experiences while attending the early local school.  

Photos and Testimonials

St. Michael’s Residential School once stood behind the current day U’mista Cultural Centre; two-hundred children lived here during the 1920’s and 30’s.  Students were prohibited from speaking their own language and kept away from their families for years.  

Historic Photo, St Michael's School

There were accounts of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse that no doubt took place elsewhere but not disclosed or discussed in our history books.  St. Michael’s School was mostly self-sufficient with a dairy and extensive gardens often maintained by student labor.  Recently in February of 2015, the then crumbling red-brick school house was demolished.  Over 700 people stood on the site and “participated in emotional healing ceremonies as the building was taken apart piece by piece.”  The school had held classes from 1929-1974.  

Village of Alert Bay

The town of Alert Bay began in 1870 when two businessmen leased Cormorant Island from the government to establish a salmon saltery on the waterfront.  In need of labor, they convinced the Namgis (Kwakwaka’wakw) to relocate their village to the island, which had been used as a seasonal home and sacred resting place.  A cannery was established a decade later along with a store, sawmill, and post office.  The cannery closed during the Great Depression but the economy rebounded after WWII. The village of Alert Bay was incorporated in 1946 when the fishing and logging industries were booming.  Today, Alert Bay is a quiet town best known for its Cultural Centre.  In the months of July and August, visitors can attend Native dance performances at the Longhouse located north of the Culture Centre.  Above the main part of town is an Ecological Park which we visited for the first time. 

Ecological Park Boardwalk

The park is definitely worth a visit with a network of forest trails and a boardwalk through marshland with old snags frequented by Eagles and other birds.



Eagle atop a Snag