Dale Boyd 

Oliver Chronicle

Youth, Indigenous community leaders, local politicians and more joined the hundreds who marched down Main Street in Oliver Monday to ensure the suffering endured at residential schools is not forgotten.

Hellen Gallagher, residential school survivor, opened the speeches at Oliver Town Hall Monday afternoon. She shared the story of her sister Doris’ experience in the schools, reading her written recollection to the crowd.

Doris was sent to St. Eugene’s residential school in Cranbrook at the age of six.

“Today I drive by that train station and feel those emotions I’ve kept down for so long. I’m sure it was pretty heartbreaking for our parents also to leave their children at the residential schools,” Doris wrote.

Attending residential schools for 13 years, Gallagher recounted her sister’s story, being separated most times from her male siblings and cousins.

“Over the years I’ve witnessed many terrible things,” Doris wrote. “The treatment by the nuns to other students, students against students. You can imagine the satisfaction we felt when a teacher at the high school came out once a week for Brownies, and later on in high school for Girl Guides, so we could get away for an evening to meet in town.”

Doris recounted harsh discipline, chores and severe punishment during her time at the school.

“If someone did not own up to something, everyone was punished. I was strapped with a leather strap when I was caught smoking at age 14. We wore uniforms to class every day. We lived by the bell, a cow bell.”

Orange shirt day began in 2012 remembering the story of Phyllis Webstad, who was stripped of her Orange shirt her grandmother bought her when attending residential school in Mission at the age of six.

“Residential schools is something we should never forget. We should always remind ourselves of what the government in Canada did to the native people and the native kids for 100 years,” said Chief Clarence Louie of the Osoyoos Indian Band.

“I know the government … they apologized, which is good. But that’s not the end of it,” Louie said.

The date also marked the 50th anniversary of the shutdown of the St. Eugene’s residential school in Cranbrook, and remembers the time of year when Indigenous youth were sent away from their families.

A memorial wall will be built this year by the OIB, Louie said.