Canada Travelogue 6 - History lessons

The third floor of the Glenbow museum had the 'Mavericks' collection - details about people who had made an impact in Alberta; people who did things differently. There were stories about people from the oil industry - Alberta advanced greatly due to the discovery of oil and gas and there were pioneers in this area. Jack Gallaher said, "You  only go through life once," and took risks. When he founded his oil company, for the first two years he was the only employee. He believed the oil business was 90% luck - you had to be lucky to strike oil. He had the vision of searching for oil in the Arctic and his company was the first to undertake this venture.

First Nations

Art on display in Glenbox museum

More interesting exhibits on this floor was about the original residents of Alberta - they were the 'Indians', now called First Nations. They lived in peace and joy. The bison was the most important animal in this period. There were primarily 3 groups of First Nations and the exhibits on display focussed on their lives and how it changed slowly with the landing of immigrants in other parts of Canada. In the 1800s, the buffalos/bisons started disappearing. This was a problem for the First Nations in Alberta since they didn't do much farming. This was the ideal time for the Government formed by the British to take over - they had been present in few parts of Canada prior to this. Treaties were established between the government and the First Nations - the government taking over the lands and promising to teach the First Nations farming, providing them with education and medicine. Medicine was required because the First Nations lost a number of people to diseases which they believe came from the Europeans. The First Nations really didn't have any choice but to sign the treaties. 

The treaties were abused - First Nations people claim that residential schools destroyed their family structures and identity; children were sent to schools far away from their parents so that they would forget all ties to their community and culture. Physical abuse was common - one of their comments says, "We learned how to bully the weak; we learned to treat each other with contempt and violence; institutional behaviour replaced traditional values."

Interesting but sad comment if you reflect at what is happening in India as well; instead of absorbing the goodness of another culture we end up replacing what existed; and we destroy the goodness that existed.

Betrayal repeatedly

The First Nations people were heavily regulated; rations provided to them by the Government were sub-standard; the government which promised to take care of them while signing the treaties, later cut down on food supplies saying it was costly to feed them. The people were used to traditional foods; the commercial foods supplied to them made them sick - diet changes wrecked their health. The First Nations leaders say they never agreed to transfer land to the government in the treaty; they agreed to live peacefully with the immigrants in return for adjusting to a new way of life since the buffalo disappeared. An Indian Act was passed which the First Nations were not even aware of - this gave more control to the government over the Indians. 

Before this event, the US government wanted to ensure safe passage of US migrants from their lands to the First Nations; they signed treaties with the First Nations for this - to provide protection to First Nations from others in return for safety of US migrants. But soon the US themselves started encroaching into the First Nations area - they started mining for their benefit.

Along with this there was trading that was happening with another tribe; they gave whiskey in return for buffalo hides. People who never knew about alcohol began drinking; they fought with one another and beat their wives. The alcohol was a combination of rum, gunpowder and other toxic ingredients - it slowly killed or blinded the First Nations people but it was addictive.

It is sad to read how the First Nations were taken advantage of - the powerful taking advantage of the weak. There are numerous stories in history of such events; and it's not just at the macro level -  we see such things even in our day to day lives, be it in school, college or office.