The Hudson’s Bay Company’s post at Rat Portage was the northernmost outpost at Lake of the Woods, near present-day Kenora. For generations, it served as the bridge between the traders of the Red River and the Upper Great Lakes. George L. Huyshe, a solider in Colonel Garnet Wolseley’s 1870 expeditionary force to the Red River, described the post at Rat Portage as: “a small affair, three log houses roofed with bark and enclosed by a high wooden palisading. The Company maintain

As the fur trade declined, fishing became the primary occupation of many Métis in the Upper Great Lakes. This included the “little” Métis village at Killarney that relied upon the bountiful surrounding waters to feed their community and generate an ongoing income. Over the generations, many visitors to the area described the Métis fishing economy in Killarney, including their collective advocacy around the protection of Métis fishing rights that date back to as early as 1838.

While the term “Métis” is most commonly used today to recognize the culturally and politically distinct communities that emerged from Ontario westward beginning in the late 1700s, other terms such as “Halfbreed” or variations of it have also been used historically by both outsiders and the Métis communities themselves, particularly when advocating against Canadian territorial expansion. In many cases, throughout history, the terms “Métis” and “Halfbreed” have been used inte

The Labattes were among the Métis families who were relocated to Penetanguishene from Drummond Island following the British ceding the island to the United States after the War of 1812. Antoine Labatte, son of Métis War of 1812 veteran Louis George Labatte and his Métis wife Julia Frances Grouette, later recounted details of their family’s 1828 journey to Penetanguishene: “We left Drummond Island in August, in a bateau, towed by the schooner Alice… We came by the outer c

Many Métis communities across the Métis Nation Homeland had a distinctive way of building and designing their homes. Métis in the Upper Great Lakes, for example, including Sault Ste. Marie and Georgian Bay, generally lived in detached wooden houses built from cedar bark and logs. A home of the prominent Métis Cadotte family, for instance, located on Mackinaw Island, was described as, “Made of logs covered in cedar bark.” It is thought the materials used in these hou