The Swanson family has been an active part of the Upper Great Lakes and Abitibi Inland regions for generations. As Hudson’s Bay Company employees and community advocates, they left a significant mark on the region, though not without facing resistance along the way. While six of William Swanson and Frances Robinson’s Métis sons travelled throughout the region and beyond, continuing the family’s work with the HBC, their Métis daughters remained in the Abitibi Inland area. Ther

Christmas and New Year’s celebrations were important for many Métis families and communities. Unsurprisingly, many shared and well-loved Métis holiday traditions exist across the Homeland. One such annual tradition was Métis Christmas kissing, which was particularly well-loved in the Métis community at Sault Ste. Marie. In 1951, settler Christy Ann Simons recorded her memoirs about her life growing up in the Upper Great Lakes during the late 1800s, in which the vibrant region

The Labatte family’s story of relocation from Drummond Island to Penetanguishene was filled with years of movement, adaptability, and resilience.  Originally departing Drummond Island for Penetanguishene in 1827, the Labattes once again boarded a steamer, the Penetanguishene , in 1834 intending to take up a nearby land grant that they had been awarded for military service during the War of 1812.  But the unpredictable late-autumn waters of Georgian Bay had other plans. A stor

Michael Labatte’s life reflected the patterns of travel, endurance, and kinship that have long defined Métis families across the Upper Great Lakes and the larger North-West. The circumstances of his birth are themselves a testament to that resilience. Michael’s parents were Louisa Cadotte and Louis George Labatte, who along with other Métis families had established their home next to the naval base on Drummond Island. A veteran of the War of 1812, Louis George maintained long

The Métis families of Agawa Bay, along the shores of Lake Superior, share a rich and enduring history shaped by deep love, kinship, and a collective way of life.  For more than sixty years, these Métis families—the Davieauxs, Roussains, Bussineaus, and Mirons—lived closely together, building homes, raising children, and sustaining each other through hunting, fishing, and harvesting from the land and water. Their way of life was rooted in cooperation, shared responsibility, an

Métis communities have long been known for their generosity in peoples’ times of need, even when facing immense hardships themselves. Despite the Treaty commissioner’s promise to protect the Sault Ste. Marie Métis Community’s rights, for example, Métis families were displaced from their lands on the St. Mary’s River following their exclusion from the 1850 Robinson-Huron Treaty. Many were forced to relocate over the next decades as Canada and Ontario opened the region to settl