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Probe into Alberta residential school links unpasteurized milk to children’s deaths

Published

2 years ago

January 25, 2023

Alberta residential school links unpasteurized milk

A new report from a group looking into children who died and went missing at a residential school northeast of Edmonton says unpasteurized milk was responsible for the deaths of Indigenous children at the institution.

The preliminary report was released Tuesday by the Acimowin Opaspiw Society, formed by the Saddle Lake Cree Nation in 2021 to investigate the Blue Quills residential school.

“I definitely see genocide at play,” said Leah Redcrow, executive director for the society.

Researchers went through historical records from school administrators, nurses and the church. They found that doctors would check the children to make sure they were healthy entering the school, the report said, but many became sick soon after.

Redcrow estimates up to 400 children died while attending the school between 1898 and when it closed in 1990.

The school was started by Roman Catholic missionaries in Lac la Biche but later moved to the Saddle Lake Cree Nation. It was relocated again in 1931 to St. Paul, about 150 kilometres northeast of Edmonton.

In 1970, parents of children at the Blue Quills school occupied the institution and demanded its operation be turned over to the First Nation. It became Canada’s first residence and school controlled by First Nations people.

Survivors told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which looked into the legacy of residential schools across the country, about humiliation, labour and physical and sexual abuse at the Blue Quills residential school. They also spoke about hunger, disgusting food and being forced to eat everything they were given.

For decades, the school had its own milking cows that were purchased by the Department of Indian Affairs. The animals were not being tested for bovine tuberculosis or other diseases, the new report said, even when concerns were raised.

The report found the children were being fed the unpasteurized milk at three meals each day and later many developed tuberculosis and other diseases.

School staff and administrators had their own pasteurized dairy products, Redcrow said, and they were healthy.

“They are playing Russian roulette with these kids’ lives,” she said.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s report on missing children and unmarked graves found that Alberta residential schools had the highest number of student deaths. Half of the deaths didn’t have a cause identified. When it did, many were due to infectious disease.

“I know that they knew,” Redcrow said about school staff. “How I know that they knew was because they weren’t drinking that milk and they weren’t getting sick.”

Redcrow said an important discovery for researchers was learning that records of the children’s deaths were not held within the residential school’s files, but instead with the local parish. Their local parish, Sacred Heart, provided the documentation and researchers began to find names of students, she said.

Redcrow said oftentimes records showed that when a child died, their parents weren’t notified.

The discovery about where records are held will give researchers the ability to tell living family members what happened to the students who never returned home, Redcrow said.

She added, however, that some children just disappeared from school records, including a member of her own family.

Redcrow said her great-grandfather Edward Redcrow, who was also sent to residential school, had 14 children with his first wife. Only four of their children came home from the institution.

One of the children, Eva, was last recorded alive in the residential school. Redcrow said there are no burial records nor vital statistics that say Eva died. But she never made it home.

The society’s report also said a mass grave was identified 200 metres north of the residential school site by an accidental excavation in 2004. It was confirmed by ground-penetrating radar last year. There were no records of it in church or school documents that could explain its location, the report said.

Additionally, community members have identified two other sites of possible graves which will be prioritized for investigation later this year when weather allows for fieldwork. Community members have also found loose children’s bones in a graveyard in areas where they shouldn’t be, the report said.

Redcrow said there is still a significant amount of work to be done, including translating decades of church documents and further on-site excavation. But finding answers for families and giving voice to missing children motivates the work, she said.

“It’s vital,” she said. “It’s so important.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 25, 2023.

— By Kelly Geraldine Malone in Saskatoon

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Team Rachel Homan picking up where it left off after dominant curling season

Published

1 min ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

As one of the top women’s rinks in the world over the last decade, expectations are usually quite high for the members of Team Rachel Homan.

The season after one of the most dominant campaigns in curling history is no exception.

Homan, Tracy Fleury, Emma Miskew and Sarah Wilkes remain the top-ranked team in the world after going 67-7 in 2023-24 and claiming national and world championships.

“We’re not looking to have to surpass what we did last year in order to have a successful season,” Miskew said. “We’re trying to build off all of the work that we put in and try to be as consistent as we can out there.

“That’s all that we can really control. We’re going to try our best and that’s all we can do.”

The Ottawa-based team picked up where it left off last weekend by running the table at the AMJ Campbell Shorty Jenkins Classic.

Homan’s side — guided by new coach Brendan Bottcher — completed an 8-0 performance with a 6-5 final victory over second-ranked Silvana Tirinzoni of Switzerland at the Cornwall Curling Club.

The squad outscored the opposition 51-23 overall.

Bottcher, who split with his four-player men’s team last spring, is also playing mixed doubles with Homan this season. He succeeded Don Bartlett as coach of Homan’s four-player team and is off to a perfect start.

“He’s got just a wealth of knowledge in strategy,” Homan said. “Obviously he was No. 1 or 2 in the world on the men’s side and that’s pretty tough to do. He’s got a few things that he thinks can help us.

“We’re trying to find a few percentage points here and there. He’s just such a positive person and just really great to be around.”

The team will return to the ice as defending champions at the Sept. 25-29 PointsBet Invitational in Calgary.

Bartlett decided to step back from his coaching role and do some travelling this winter. Bottcher is expected to be on the coach’s bench at most events this season.

Homan and Bottcher are also off to a good start on the mixed doubles front. They won a competition earlier this month in Saskatoon and plan to play several events this fall as they aim to secure a berth in the Canadian Mixed Doubles Trials.

Five teams, including reigning national champions Kadriana Lott and Colton Lott, have qualified for the Dec. 30-Jan. 4 playdowns in Liverpool, N.S. The winner will represent Canada at the Milan Olympics in February 2026.

Direct-entry qualifying events are set for Oct. 31-Nov. 3 in Abbotsford, B.C., Nov. 21-24 in Guelph, Ont., and Dec. 5-8 in Banff/Canmore, Alta. National rankings will then be used to complete the 16-team field.

The previous mixed doubles trials were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Curling Canada named Homan and John Morris as the Canadian duo for the Beijing Games in 2022, but they did not make the playoffs.

Morris won gold with Kaitlyn Lawes when the discipline made its Olympic debut at the 2018 Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

BIG SMOKE

The Grand Slam of Curling will hold its season-ending competition — the Princess Auto Players’ Championship — at its usual Toronto venue after all.

The circuit’s five-event calendar will conclude April 8-13 at the Mattamy Athletic Centre, according to the tour’s website.

The Players’ Championship dates and arena were marked as TBA earlier this month.

COACH HOWARD

Glenn Howard will remain as busy as ever on the curling scene even though he ended his four-decade playing career at the end of last season.

Howard will serve as coach of Team Chelsea Carey and Team Scott Howard for the upcoming campaign.

Carey, from Winnipeg, holds the No. 5 position in the women’s world rankings. Howard, from Tiny, Ont., has the No. 31 spot in the men’s rankings.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

Follow @GregoryStrongCP on X.

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TD CEO to retire next year, takes responsibility for money laundering failures

Published

2 mins ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

TORONTO – TD Bank Group, which is mired in a money laundering scandal in the U.S., says chief executive Bharat Masrani will retire next year.

Masrani, who will retire officially on April 10, 2025, says the bank’s, “anti-money laundering challenges,” took place on his watch and he takes full responsibility.

The bank named Raymond Chun, TD’s group head, Canadian personal banking, as his successor.

As part of a transition plan, Chun will become chief operating officer on Nov. 1 before taking over the top job when Masrani steps down at the bank’s annual meeting next year.

TD also announced that Riaz Ahmed, group head, wholesale banking and president and CEO of TD Securities, will retire at the end of January 2025.

TD has taken billions in charges related to ongoing U.S. investigations into the failure of its anti-money laundering program.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

Companies in this story: (TSX:TD)

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Voters head to polls in quickly called eastern Ontario byelection

Published

2 mins ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

BELLEVILLE, Ont. – Polls are set to soon open in the eastern Ontario riding of Bay of Quinte, where voters will pick their next representative in the provincial legislature.

It’s a byelection with a quick turnaround, as it takes place just one month after cabinet minister Todd Smith resigned the seat.

Smith won four successive elections in the region, securing nearly 50 per cent of the vote in the last two elections, but some experts and polls suggest it may be a closer race this time around.

The top two contenders appear to be Progressive Conservative candidate Tyler Allsopp and Liberal candidate Sean Kelly, both municipal councillors in Belleville.

The Tories did not make Allsopp available for an interview, but both Kelly and NDP candidate Amanda Robertson said the top issue they are hearing about in the riding is health care, in particular a shortage of family doctors.

Just over eight per cent of eligible voters in Bay of Quinte cast their ballot in advance, compared to 13 per cent in advance voting for the 2022 general election.

Respiratory therapist Lori Borthwick is running for the Greens.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

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