Sometimes, parts of the news, and parts of history, hit just a bit too devastatingly close to home. It’s easy to say things didn’t happen here, or that we personally weren’t a part of it. Yet, one of the difficult – and important – parts of working in the Archives can be seeing and helping those truths come to light. That is exactly what we need, to recognize those truths, and move forward to a reconciled future, together. I am talking about the recent discoveries of unmarked graves at residential schools across Canada, and how that relates to the truth that Medicine Hat had its own residential school built.
In 1888, Anglican minister Reverend H. Wilson was in Medicine Hat promoting the idea of a “school for Indian children.” The Medicine Hat Times wrote in May 29, 1888 that securing an institution such as the residential school would aid in the enlargement and prosperity of the relatively new town of Medicine Hat. There was a feeling of excitement for such a large project coming to our area and it attracted widespread attention. A promotor of the project, Reverend W. T. Wilson from Sault Ste. Marie, travelled to Medicine Hat and selected the site for the residential school on the north side of the river. The school would eventually consist of three large buildings, and pupils for the Medicine Hat school would have been taken from the Siksika (Blackfoot), Kainai (Blood), Piikani (Peigan), Stoney-Nakoda and Tsuut’ina (Sarcee) peoples, and housed in the residential school. This was no small project, and by July of 1890, Mr. H. Yuill began construction on the Medicine Hat Indian Industrial School.
The large building was 38-by-40 feet and two stories high, and was to be named the Sokitahpe Home. The August 27, 1891 edition of the Medicine Hat Times had a large editorial about residential schools, and wrote “the task of civilizing and educating our Indian tribes is looked upon as a sort of duty by the government” and that “the Government ought to feel grateful to any church of community which voluntarily comes to its assistance in this most difficult work of education of its Indian wards.”
Yet, due to changes in government policy, Medicine Hat and promotors of the “Indian Industrial School” project were unsuccessful in gaining federal funds for the residential school’s operation. The federal government was leaning towards larger schools, more isolated from reserve lands, and the Medicine Hat Sokitahpe Home didn’t suit the project. Greatly disappointed by this news, the large, foreboding building was dismantled and removed in 1898. The school never saw any students, and the land that the residential school was on was sold in 1906 for $11,000. The lumber from the failed residential school was repurposed and reused to build a small building behind St. Barnabas Church. That building was still called the “Indian School,” possibly as homage to its reused materials, though it was never used as such.
Medicine Hat citizens at the time were disappointed and angry at the government for not approving the funds for operation of the residential school. The public perception was one of disappointment in not having the building completed. Medicine Hat never did have an operating residential school, but it is only through circumstance that it did not come to be. If you would like to find out more information about the residential school, or about other local history or current events, please contact us by email at archives@medicinehat.ca, by phone at 403.502.8582, or visit us during hours of operations Tuesday-Friday noon-5 p.m.
We are honoured to share truth and work toward a reconciled future, together.
Jenni Utrera Barrientos is Assistant Archivist at the Esplanade
