Sixty-one percent of Bay Mills Township has Native heritage. I came across that fact when I helped craft a recreation plan for the township. It startled me, and then it startled me again that I was surprised.
It should be like that, I reasoned. Most of the Bay Mills Indian Community, particularly the housing, is in the township. Even more succinctly, the whole area has traditionally been settled and used by tribal fishermen, loggers, and farmers. Still is.
It's a strong number, with a lot of positive implications.
Over the winter many people, young and old, have been commenting on their heritage, and another heritage ... their relationship with non-Native neighbors. I've been impressed, and again, sort of surprised at the deep and continuing dialogue that has been going on in this newspaper, and at tables and desks over the winter. Early in the winter a school board member in Brimley denigrated a Native tradition, and when she did that two things happened; on her part, she thought she did nothing wrong, and likely still believes that, and secondly, her lack of understanding awakened, and has re-awakened, a hurt and a fact.
I've read several people's thoughtful pieces explaining why this comment meant so much, coming from a school board member at a school that, like the township, has a preponderance of Native heritage kids. We've re-visited decades of hurt, understanding, forgiveness, and resentment over the past four months, and I for one, have learned a lot.
When the township recreation committee found this "demographic statistic," I thought about how fortunate the township was from a political and grant-approving point. Simple fact: it's a competition advantage. But this continuing dialogue has changed that, amplified it, and given it a much more human dimension.
I hope parents are explaining this Brimley School flap to their kids, and taking them back a generation or two so that this generation can understand the seed that lies in so many people. It's like digging up sediment, and watching it flow again through a water system, as if the original poison were fresh and new. It's not. Not to the degree and the depth it has been, but its real nonetheless.
I, for one, appreciate the effort people have made to write down and explain what happened this winter and why it is so important. It continues something that needs to be understood, and understood by 100 percent of the "demographic".
Pat Egan is the former publisher of the Sault Evening News. He is a recipient of the William Allen White award for editorial writing. He and his wife Debra live at Salt Point.
