I was born on a bay, at a place called The Swirling Narrows
(Opachuanau), near People’s Lake (South Indian Lake), on October 24, 1916. I
don’t remember my early childhood, but when I was about ten years old I
accompanied my grandmother to trap muskrats in the spring, just like long
ago. Boy, there were lots of muskrats in that place. It was along the
Missinippi River that flows here, you know, and we did not have to go far
before we found muskrat burrows, where my grandmother had set a trap.
We set up camp nearby, and whenever we detected a little stick moving,
we knew we had caught a muskrat. It was the anchor stick that told us when a
muskrat had been caught. Immediately, my grandmother would go and get the
muskrat and hit it. Then we roasted and ate the muskrat, all the while
watching to see if another one had been caught in a trap.

That’s how we were brought up. We set nets, too. There were a lot of
sturgeons, too, in the Missinippi. Anyone who set a net would catch a
sturgeon right away. Nowadays, there are no sturgeon left, but back then,
boy, they were plentiful. It was like today, when anyone sets a net, he
catches fish. At that time, if anybody set a sturgeon net, he had caught four
or five sturgeons by the next morning. That’s how abundant the sturgeons were
long ago. And that’s how life was for the people then.

I finally went to school when I was about ten years old, when the
residential school at Sturgeon Landing opened up in 1926. I attended that
school at Sturgeon Landing, eighty miles to the west. Back then, the Sturgeon
River was really wild and isolated. It felt like uncharted territory when we
first went to school there, but now a road leads there and anybody can drive
in. It is so different now.

After I finished school, I went trapping with my father. We trapped
here at Old Man’s Bay, his favourite trapping spot. We went out into the
bush, camping wherever we stopped, but we did not use a tent at all. We slept
out in the open, and, boy was it cold! It was not like today, when if it is
twenty-five below we think it’s cold. It was fifty or sixty below back then,
and we slept on the open ground! Many people lived like that long ago. There
are not many of us left today who experienced that, for example, Adam Castel,
Emile Sinclair. There are only about three of us now who experienced that
cold. And now, the younger generation does not want to believe how cold it
was. They say that we are lying. But no, Pete Mitchell experienced it, too.
He tells about the time he camped outdoors while working for the Department
of Natural Resources. He used to sleep outdoors then. He said it was like
somebody hitting the trees, which just split. It was so cold that the trees
would split open, he said. That’s the way it was.

Eventually, I started to trap on my own, but I used a tent and a small
wood stove. Fortunately, I made a good living, although the times were hard.
I used to stay outdoors all day, no matter how cold it was. I went to bed
only when it got dark. I was comfortable there until close to dawn, when I
felt the cold. When you lived like that, you just had to get up and eat, only
first you had to thaw your food. Your food was always frozen until it was
cooked. Only where you had set up camp did you eat something nice and warm.
Imagine this! You travel out in the bush all day, and meanwhile all your food
freezes up. When you want to eat, you thaw just enough to eat. It was a
difficult life back then, when our generation was growing up.

Now, old age has caught up with me and I receive social assistance, an
old age pension. Now I think I am a “king,” especially when I think back to the
hard times of long ago, when I was about thirty-five. I reflect on my past life
and compare it with life today, and, boy, I think I am a king. How time changes
lots of things, compared to the past. That’s all I have to say.

Oh, one more thing! I’ll tell about my late grandfather Mathias Colomb.
He came from somewhere over there to the south. He was not born around here
in the north, but lived somewhere down south. In his time, those white people
were pushing inland towards the north. They were always fighting each other,
and the whites and Natives were not levelling with each other. That’s when my
grandfather thought of coming up north. He used to travel by canoe. Maybe he
paddled along from Winnipeg and then, eventually, to The Pas and Cumberland
House, and then to Sturgeon River and Pelican Narrows. Then, maybe, he stayed
for a while at Pelican Narrows, but he did not like it there. He thought of
looking for a place where he would be able to make a good living. So, he
paddled out from Pelican Narrows and travelled along what is now called Sandy
Bay. He crossed Loon Lake and eventually came to Duck Lake, where he stayed
for quite a while, to sightsee and check out the land. When he was satisfied,
he thought, “I will continue my journey down the river.”

Soon, he paddled into Pukatawagan, over here. He stayed here, looked
around, and boy, was he pleased with these rivers, the four rivers that flow
into one. And here, boy, they caught lots of fish. People used to fish here
at the narrows. There was this church at the narrows. Today, a road connects
to the other side, and that’s where they set their nets. Back then, boy, they
caught a lot of fish. And that’s how Pukatawagan got its name, “fishing
spot,” named after the narrows where they set their nets. The four rivers
that are located here all have names, like the Pukatawagan River here, Leech
River, and the Hanging-Upside-Down Place, and Between-the-Two-Rivers. Towards
the Hanging-Upside-Down Place and, halfway to the Hanging-Upside-Down Place
is Between-the-Two-Rivers, Chaschawaweyask. Then, after that time, my
grandfather made camp at Pukatawagan.

It was one hundred and thirty-one years ago, and that was when the
settlement of Pukatawagan was established. And it was then that the Hudson’s
Bay Company set up a trading post. They brought in food here. The people had
to paddle from here with a canoe to The Pas to get provisions, the things
they needed. They would go to The Pas to get flour, lard, sugar and tea. They
paddled, maybe, four hundred miles. In June, the “egg-hatching month,” they
would go out, and they would be back in July, the “flying-up month.” They
travelled out again until September, the “rutting month.” Then they came
back home. They travelled by canoe only twice a summer, and that was all they
could manage. Those people of long ago were fit and agile. They had no
difficulty paddling to The Pas twice a summer. If we were to paddle all the
way to The Pas today, we would probably never make it back, we would
probably… maybe we would freeze! The people today are so different from the
way they were then. Back then, they ate only moose meat, fish, duck, berries;
everything they ate came from the land. They ate these things, and that’s why
they were so strong.

I have one more thing to tell, but I don’t remember much. Oh, when we
went to school at Sturgeon Landing, we travelled there from Pukatawagan for
the first time in 1926. There were about ten of us when we first went out
there to school, when it first opened up. All the children had to paddle. We
paddled in, but we did not have an outboard motor then. There was no such
thing. We just paddled, and at a portage everyone had to carry something
over, the provisions and gear. And that’s how we travelled.
Eventually, by the time I finished school, a train was running here at
Sherridon, where a mine had opened up. That’s where the train stopped. One
time, in 1931, after I had got out of school (for the year), I finally went
on the train. It was the first time I had taken a train. Before the train
started running, I had to paddle home every July, July first, when the school
year ended. They gave us holidays, right? They would release us then, and if
anyone had children attending school at Sturgeon Landing, the parents had to
go and pick them up to take them home for the holidays. But the last time was
quite different. (The school had not yet burned down.) The children just had
to go by plane. In the fall, they were flown to school. They just had to go
by airplane, and boy, we had a hard time at school the first time. Those
children who flew were, boy, like kings. They only had to sit and look out
the window. Now, I’m going too far, lying too much.

When the first church was built here... Actually, there were four
churches. I saw two of them, but the first two were before my time. One time,
back in The Pas, you know, there was a church bell that was used to call
people to service. Then, the priest wanted somebody to transport the bell to
Pukatawagan. Four men went with two canoes to get it. They paddled two in a
canoe, Julien Bighetty, an elder, Alex Dumas, another elder, my father, and
my uncle Solomon Colomb. These were the men who went out and got the bell
from The Pas. The paddled along by Cumberland House, and then Sturgeon River.
Continuing their journey, they finally reached Kississing Lake, as we call
it. They passed also by Cold River, as it was called. Boy, they travelled a
long time, because there were many portages to carry the bell over. It was
very heavy, they said. At the portages, they tied two sticks onto it and
carried it at each end, by themselves, the four men. The last portage was
Jack Pine Portage, a very long portage. They carried the bell over, stopping
halfway. There, the elder Julien said, “Yes, we managed it, to bring in the
bell. Boy, was it heavy! We should be happy,” he said. “And we made it,” said
Alexander Dumas, “and.... but wait, man, I will ring the bell.” Boy, they
stopped there a while at the portage just to ring the bell! That is how happy
they were to bring in the bell for Pukatawagan. And that is how my father
used to tell it. He would talk about it and laugh. Alexander Dumas is the one
who rang the bell.

Okay, now I’m sure that is all I want to tell, what I had in mind to
tell about.

[End of recording]