Cold Lake First Nations

The Cold Lake First Nations form one of the First Nations of the Canadian Province of Alberta. In May 2008 2,342 people were members of this tribe, of which 1,189 lived within five reserves, about 220 km² large.

History

Early History

Oral traditions of the Cold Lake First Nations reach back in time and in traditions similar to those we can expect at the end of the last ice-age .^[1]

Fur trade

In 1716, the peoples in the Cold Lake Area were supposedly attacked for the first time by fur trading Cree, who had become owners of weapons by trading with Europeans. Not before 1800 the groups around Cold Lake started to trade with Europeans on their own, but then they traveled to the trading posts on the Hudson Bay and even to Hochilaga on the Saint-Laurence-River.

Treaty No. 6 of the Numbered Treaties

In 1876 the Dominion of Canada negotiated with Woodland and Plains Cree, and some Nakota as well as with the peoples around Cold Lake. Uldahi (Matthias Janvier-Jackfish) decided to go to a piece of land at Willow Point, a territory reaching about 20 miles south and westwards. It included the Cold Lake, which they called Luwe Chok Tuwe and where they spent the summers, while the winters were spent on Primrose Lake.

Métis Rebellion

Forced Assimilation

The Canadian residential school system, introduced everywhere in Canada, was also introduced for the Cold Lake First Nations. The children hat to attend schools like Onion Lake or Blue Quills Residential School. They were "successive" in so far as they destroyed the local languages and culture.

When chief Uldahi died in June 1882, he had no successor. Consequently the group dwelling at Heart Lake elected its own chiefs and headmen. They also tried to get a reserve of their own. On a hill above Reiter Creek they gathered in the summer of 1913 and elected Alexi Janvier (Nanuchele) as their chief. At the end of World War I people coming back from Europe's battlefields brought with them the Spanish flu. Nearly half of the population died.

The Cold Lake Nations had been forced to give up their nomadic lifestyle. At the beginning they were quite successful farmers but meanwhile a large part of the land is leased to white farmers with more money.

Cold War and Cold Lake Air Weapons Range

In 1930 the Alberta and Saskatchewan Acts were inaugurated, which allowed confiscation of any militarily important area. During the Cold War the airforce was looking for a test area and found it around Primrose Lake. The people living there were offered a small compensation for twenty years.

While the most modern technique was introduced on the Air Base, the first power line was not installed before 1964. The residential schools were not closed before 1971, a system for which Primeminister Stephen Harper apologized in 2008.

Reserves

The largest reserve today is Cold Lake 149 in the east of Bonnyville (145.281 km²). There are other reserves, like the one of 4134 ha on the Beaver Creek (149B), 96.2 ha of the territory of the Blue Quills First Nation, 71.6 ha on the southern shore of Cold Lake (149A) and 149C, and the land meant as a kind of compensation for the Air Base, which consists of 2023.5 ha.

References

1. ^ Cp. (PDF, 88 kB): N. A. Janvier: The Dene of Cold Lake, o. J.

External links

• Website of the Cold Lake First Nations
• traditional territory