Dear Editor:

Judging from the letters published in the April 15 edition of the Osoyoos Times, the historical remembrances of those living off and on the reserve are still quite different in substantive ways.

That should not be surprising given that one culture essentially moved in and forced its way of living from the land over that of another that had been here for many centuries.

Each side sees this from fundamentally different perspectives.

In her defence of the Haynes family, Elizabeth Haynes has given a brief history of the harmonious relationships between her family and members of the Osoyoos Indian Band (OIB). While working for the OIB many years ago, I also heard stories of how Chief Baptiste George helped out non-natives in similar fashion.

By and large, the records show that both communities have attempted to reach out to each other for better or worse.

But this one-on-one living together, common or uncommon, masks the fundamental issue of how the Haynes Family obtained their property.

Ms. Haynes is correct in pointing out that her family, and many others, benefitted from laws that they had no direct responsibility in enacting.  However, European settlers and people like myself, who came here much later, have benefitted from the world view that the Americas were an uninhabited land that belonged to whatever European immigrant that claimed it.

It is the notion expressed in a somewhat different context by the Canadian-American semanticist I.S. Hayakawa who when defending the American possession of the Panama Canal said, “We should keep the Panama Canal.  After all, we stole it fair and square.”

This world view, of course, is one that is almost entirely shared by all of the newcomers to the Okanagan Valley, whether it be in the 19th or 21st century.

Unpublished material, primarily available on microfilm from the Department of Indian Affairs, documents why members of the OIB would consider John C. Haynes to have stolen the property he obtained.

As well, Professor Duncan Duane Thomson has largely provided the historical context in a number of published and unpublished articles available at the University of British Columbia libraries.

He wrote most extensively about this region’s history in his 1985 PhD thesis, “A History of the Okanagan Indians and Whites in the Settlement Era, 1860-1920.”

Thomson documents that by 1875, John C. Haynes and W.H. Lowe, who were both government officials, and others had long coveted the rich meadow lands east of the river and north of Osoyoos Lake.

He narrates the rather ugly history of the “clerical error” (to put it in the language of a photo caption of the Haynes Ranch in the Osoyoos Times a few years ago) that ended up with Haynes as owner of a large section of property that had been agreed by provincial and federal commissioners would be part of the reserve.

Thomson summarizes this narrative in language far kinder to Haynes than I would use.

He wrote, “The evidence seems to lead to only one conclusion – the Inkamip Indians were cheated out of land which had been assigned to them by the Indian Reserve Commissioners and Commissioner Sproat by an unholy combination of a dishonest and grasping landowner and government official, J.C. Haynes, acting with a government which condoned the illegal sale and afterward steadfastly refused to amend their action. While one man dominated the main trench of the Okanagan, nearby, the Indians with 34 adult males were restricted to a dry, rocky and sandy area with little access to water.”

The reader can go to Professor Thomson’s dissertation for the details.

John Haynes was no innocent “bystander” in all of this.

As a sidebar, Department of Indian Affairs’ files for these early times document that the federal authorities promised or seemed to promise the local Okanagan people that they would retain access to fishing, hunting and rangeland (in some cases in the form of common land) after they signed the original treaties.

Quickly and consistently, “these “agreements” were vetoed by the actions of local settlers (more often than not, read cattle barons) and legislated by provincial authority, leaving practice and legacy that continues to the present day.

John Brent Musgrave

Osoyoos, B.C.