A National Day for Truth and Reconciliation event will feature a first for Salt Spring, according to a Penelakut Tribe member whose family has called this island home for generations.
On Monday, Sept. 30, as the community gathers at Fernwood Dock to honour the culture and history the Penelakut share on Salt Spring, islander Kurt Irwin — recently elected as a Penelakut councillor — will be there to welcome them, alongside the voices and drums of the Coastal Blood Singers Penelakut Elders and tribal leadership.
“Our chief’s going to attend this year,” Irwin told Salt Spring’s Local Community Commission (LCC) at its meeting Thursday, Sept. 19. “So that’s the first time in his- tory that our chief and Elders and our singers will be coming to Salt Spring.”
Irwin’s connection to Salt Spring and Fernwood is deep and personal, he told the Driftwood, and an invitation for the community to join the event is an opportunity not only for meaningful steps toward reconciliation, but also to learn some foundational stories about the island. Irwin is a member of Salt Spring’s Sampson family, a descendant of England-born Henry Sampson and wife Lucy Peatson, daughter of Penelakut Island warrior Hulkalatkstun; Kurt’s late mother Lil Irwin was born a Sampson.
“Under that dock, that’s my family, that’s my mom,” said Irwin. “And the artwork on that headstone, that’s my mom’s artwork on the plaque down there for the Sampson family.”
Among the first to settle on Salt Spring in the late 1800s, Sampson and Peatson had 14 children and a farm that reached from the area around where Fernwood Dock sits today to St. Mary Lake. A family reunion in the 1980s hosted nearly
400 descendants. Irwin said last year’s event to celebrate unveiling of Penelakut interpretive signage went particularly well, and support from Salt Spring con- tinues to be enthusiastic. He’s received help for this event from the Hen and Hound Brasserie, Thrifty Foods, Transition Salt Spring, the Salt Spring Public Library and the Capital Regional District (CRD).
“This year, I’ve invited our elders to come to Salt Spring to do some talks about Truth and Reconciliation,” said Irwin. “We’re going to have our drummers and dancers; we’ll have Chris Arnett there to do some talking about the territories and different nations. It’s going to be a great event for people to come out and listen.”
The gathering will begin at 11 a.m., with the North End’s own DJ Rave Coach bringing music to the Hen & Hound Brasserie as they host a BBQ fundraiser. At noon, the Coastal Blood Singers will begin a drumming ceremony at the dock. Volunteers to help at the event are always welcome, Irwin said, saying anyone looking to help out with cooking and serving could reach out to the Hen and Hound, or to Transition Salt Spring’s Natasha Kong at natasha@transitionsaltspring.com.
Monetary donations to help offset equip- ment and travel costs would also be appre- ciated; Irwin said some of the fundraising last year ultimately went toward sending Coastal Blood Singers to greet a young boy returning home from a long hospital stay, after having been badly burned in a house fire.
“They travelled to his house, on the request of his mother,” said Irwin, “and they greeted him with drumming and dancing. We’d like to continue that sort of thing. I mean, what little bit we are getting for them, they’re giving it right back again.”
Considering Penelakut’s ties to Salt Spring — connections, history and roots all over the island — Irwin said the Elders share his concern that “they don’t officially own any land here.”
“That’s not a very good thing,” said Irwin, “because a lot of our ancestors are getting washed up on shore, and we have no place to rebury them properly on Salt Spring Island.”
For the Sept. 30 event, according to CRD staff, while the LCC’s grants-in-aid funding was between cycles, the regional district was able to quickly provide some financial help through government-to-government funding.
“We did refer that request to our First Nations department, and they were able to provide them some support,” said CRD senior manager Stephen Henderson, adding that while he was hesitant to speak to a dollar value as it was still being “firmed up,” it was seemingly a good substitute for grant-in-aid funding.
Fernwood Dock is near the intersection of Walker’s Hook and Fernwood roads. Monday’s family-friendly event will run until 3 p.m.