Tag Archives: Tla'amin history

History, Indigenous Nations History

Gumbooting Through The History Of Mansons Lagoon

Once or twice a year, visitors are given an opportunity to ‘gumboot’ into the natural and human history of Mansons Lagoon. This is a joint event put on by the Cortes Island Museum and Friends of Cortes Island (FOCI). Jane Newman provides the glimpse into the lagoon’s past. In the following article, Cortes Currents supplemented her account with materials from the Museum and additional genealogical records found on the web. 

Jane’s account started with a description of Mansons Spit during the precolonial era. 

Continue reading Gumbooting Through The History Of Mansons Lagoon →
Indigenous Nations History

Tla’amin Nation set to reclaim village of tiskʷat 151 years after it was taken: ‘It’s like a long lost relative’

Indiginews, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

For the Tla’amin Nation, the loss of their village site tiskʷat has been like “a missing limb” for the community, according to Dillon Johnson.

Their home and salmon fishing site was stolen and sold by “British Columbia” 151 years ago at a time when the community’s population was decimated by disease.

For the next seven generations, Tla’amin people were separated from tiskʷat. People were moved onto reserves, salmon runs were all but wiped out by construction of a new dam, and a paper mill began operating on the site.

Continue reading Tla’amin Nation set to reclaim village of tiskʷat 151 years after it was taken: ‘It’s like a long lost relative’ →
Indigenous Nations, Politics

SRD acknowledges Kwiakah and Tla’amin First Nations

The Kwiakah and Tla’amin First Nations are now recognized in Strathcona Regional District (SRD) territorial acknowledgements. The SRD added their names in response to strong requests from both nations. A series of motions to this effect were passed at the July 19 SRD Board meeting, in Campbell River.  

Continue reading SRD acknowledges Kwiakah and Tla’amin First Nations →
History, Rivers & Oceans

The origins of Cortes Island’s Shellfish Industry

In the most recent of her interviews about Cortes History, Lynne Jordan, former President of the Cortes Island Museum, traces one of the Island’s foremost industries from its pre-contact beginnings up until recent times.  

Lynne Jordan: “ The First Nations cultivated clam gardens on this coast for 3,000 to 5,000 years, maybe even longer. One on Quadra Island was recently dated at being around 3,500 years old.”

Continue reading The origins of Cortes Island’s Shellfish Industry →
History

Birth of Whaletown as a community abt. 1885-1914

2 Comments

Whaletown may get its name from an old whaling station, but Europeans really did not settle in the area for another 15 years or so. In today’s program Lynne Jordan, former President of the Cortes Island Museum, traces the modern community back to a logger named Moses Ireland.

First Nations people were using Whaletown Bay before that and a fish trap is believed to have once stretched across the entrance of the lagoon.

The whalers came for 18 months, in 1869 and 70.

“It wasn’t very many years after the whaling station left, in the mid 1880s,  that Moses Ireland moved into the area as a logger and set up camp where the whaling station had been,” explained Jordan.

Continue reading Birth of Whaletown as a community abt. 1885-1914 →