All pictures and interviews were done by the project team with the help of Jimmy Beardy the translator. The project team would like to give a big thanks to Jimmy for all of his help conducting the elder interviews and interpretations . We would also like to thank all of the elders for taking the time to answer all of our questions.

I trapped at Mistikokan River with my father-in-law and David Massan for one year. We trapped all inland in the bush. I see a lot of difference from York Factory and York Landing. In York Landing they are only living on a small portion of land as compared to York Factory where they had a lot of land. When we left York Factory we only had one child his name is Wayne.

Most of my children went to school in Dauphin, Wayne, Roy, Louisa, Terry, Georgina, Randy, and Margery. They started to attend at the age of six. They left because there was no school here. Just recently they got schools here. We used to have to take them to the railroad tracks by boat to Landing River to get on the train to get to the Residential School. We had to paddle to get there. They lost their language because they left when they were young and they only came home for a little while.

We ate what we killed we hardly used the store. I still live they way I lived in York Factory I eat what I fish, trap, and hunt. It's only last winter I stopped doing this because I have problems with my leg.

It's just recently we heard of Powwows, we never had them in York Factory, and we never heard of them before in York Factory.

There was healers but they were called people who practiced witchcraft. I know of one man who healed people, many of those people are still alive today. They gave medicine out that's how powerful their witchcraft was in healing. They do not practice that any more not up north. I seen what people call the sweat lodges where they vision, Thomas Redhead, that was one of them men I seen that had a Sweatlodge. The last one I know of that had one was Sammy Beardy. These kind of people that practice this could do a lot of things or anything. These kind of people could also kill you. I never seen or heard of sickness, I seen really old people with lots of wrinkles on their faces and they were still strong. Now today when someone gets older they start to get sick and then they die.

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To read more of Archie's interview click here.

That's where I lived at Wa-ne-thou-haak (Crooked Bank). We didn't live right at the town of York Factory Trading Post. We seldom went there except on Sundays, when we went to church with my father. We came home on Mondays. We just started living there before we relocated here.

We trapped for a living. As soon as we learned to trap, my older brother and I started trapping with my father. We were with him all the time while he trapped. We went right near Shamattawa from York Factory to trap. We survived off trapping. We didn't have anything else. Only sometimes my father went to the trading post to get groceries. We only used dog teams.

We left York Factory in 1957 to here. We used a boat and motor and came up river to Ke-she-me-chish-ka-nec (Weir River) and landed at mile 374. I traveled with my late father, we traveled with two boats, one of them I pulled with our boat our boat and motor. We stayed at mile 374 for about two weeks, then we used the railroad train and moved to Gilliam where we stayed longer. We also moved to Ilford. It wasn't until late August or the middle of August that we arrived here (York Landing). We started building houses in August when we got here. We put up twelve houses from September and finished them before freeze-up. We moved into all these houses when we finished them. We didn't use money but we were given groceries, which they called welfare. We received this from Ilford. We didn't receive any pay for all our work. We did all the brush clearing when we arrived here we started building houses.

I know about the relocation. We had a meeting in York Factory. The Indian Agent came there and with the help of the Conservation officer they helped arrange the relocation. They told us that the price of fur wasn't going to be much so they weren't going to take any pelts (fur). Like for instance, the last spring we trapped there, we got five beaver, one otter and some muskrats, the payment for them didn't even come near $200.00. They Company boss (manager) told the people that the price of fur was going to be low and there would be no use of buying pelts (fur). That was the last time I trapped in York Factory. I was with George Beardy, who lives here now. That was the last time, him and I went inland to trap in the spring.

I lived a long time in York Factory, but I spent my childhood in Shamatawa.

We survived from hunting and fishing. This is how we lived, but sometimes we got some things from the store.

We lived inland towards the bush, near the store (fort).

I liked living in York Factory. There was a lot of wild food to eat, compared to here (York Landing) there's hardly anything. The wild food here tastes awful today compared to when we first got here. The wild food seems to get worse. The food tasted better in York Factory. The water here tastes awful.

I heard of witchcraft (healing) only and but didn't see this happening. I only heard stories about it through my mother.

When one of my children was born, his name is Floyd, an old lady helped deliver him. The elder woman did this kind of thing (mid wife)

I never heard of much sickness when we lived in York Factory.

We were told, move from York Factory in 1957. The Indian Agent told us we couldn't live there anymore because they were going to close the store (fort) down. That's what he told us. We left in June. My children were small. One of them, his name is Albert, was just learning how to crawl. He works at the airport today. We get there (York Landing) in August. We had a hard time relocating to here. Nobody helped us with anything. The men had to pull the boats along the shores. The hardest part of traveling was that the all the ice had not thawed out yet. Near 352, where the ice accumulates was the hardest part. We had to travel by foot on top of the riverbanks. We could see below the hanging ice, where the gravel was. We walked under these hanging ice. We arrived at 352 and some other people arrived at 374. We came with late Joseph Saunders, and Archie Redhead. We used four boats. We left all our belongings behind in York Factory. They told us that we would receive other things when we get to York Landing. The children left with only two sets of clothing plus our kitchenware like plates, cups and utensils. That's all we left York Factory with, all the big stuff we owned, we left behind. When we got here, all I received was a winter parka nothing was given to my children. I had five children already when we relocated to here.

Thompson - We trapped and hunted to survive in York Factory. We liked Caribou, in the fall and spring, we killed geese and trapped also. Right 'til I got married, we were told we had to leave York Factory. I don't have any regrets of leaving York Factory because of what I saw happening there today. All of the houses have fallen into the water because of erosion. The only building left that hasn't fallen because of erosion is the store (fort). It's not going to take long before it falls into the water. When we left York Factory, they only gave us gasoline. Before I talk about the relocation, I'd like to talk about my father and the way he brought us up. My father didn't supply food to us all the time, there was many of us. We only ate when our father went hunting. This is before we learned how to hunt for ourselves. When we did learn how to hunt, my brothers Albert and George, life got better. Then we learned how to trap and learned how to do other things. One time, we had over three hundred snow geese before freeze up. That's why the snow geese use to leave late in the Fall. Today, they go right through when they get there.

We trapped along the Hudson Bay crest all the way to Kaskatamagun. Kaskatamagun is 129 miles from York Factory. We trapped inland at Kaskatamagun. I went four trips return one winter and I only used four sleigh dogs to do this. I didn't do any trapping 'til I went inland to Kaskatamagun. That's when they set up trap lines.

Marion - I only had one child in York Factory. That's Marie that was born in York Factory. The rest of my children were born here. There was no doctors in York Factory when we were there. When a woman gave birth, the elder women delivered the child. There was nothing around like today for children to use like pampers. Moss was used with cloth for diapers. That's what I saw, I didn't mind leaving York Factory.