'Like a big jail': Yukoners reflect on painful residential school legacy on Orange Shirt Day

Residential school was "like a big jail" for Carcross Elder Johnny Johns.

Johns, a student at Choutla School in Carcross in the 1960s, remembers being frequently hungry and cold, and barred from seeing his sister.

"To this day it was the worst incarceration I have ever had in my entire life," he told CBC's Yukon Morning.

Canadians are remembering the painful legacy of residential schools Wednesday with the annual Orange Shirt Day, which has the slogan "every child matters." The day is meant to raise awareness of residential school history, and honour survivors and victims. 

Inclusion Yukon says it hosted an Orange Shirt Day discussion and beading event Tuesday evening with Indigenous facilitators Bobbi Rose Koe and Carissa Waugh, with support from the Assembly of First Nations. The idea was for participants to learn more about the impacts of residential schools and make crafts in recognition of the day.

Yukon had residential schools in Carcross, Whitehorse, Dawson and Shingle Point, and one school in northern British Columbia for Yukon Indigenous students, according to the Yukon Residential Schools Bibliography. The territory's last school closed in the 1970s.

The Choutla School was run by the Anglican church from 1911 to 1969. The Carcross/Tagish First Nation helped tear down the building in 1993. Last year, survivors discussed what to do with the former school site. 

Johns said he had vision problems while at school and couldn't see the blackboard, so "according to them I was the laziest kid ever," he said.

"At night, kids are crying all night long. Hungry, cold. They gave us one blanket," he said.

Johns said children got a second blanket, but were not allowed to use it unless there was a fire. Some children used the blanket for warmth and got in trouble, he said.

"Amazing how they can treat people that way," said Johns.

The Anglican Diocese of Yukon made a public apology to former Choutla residential school students last year at the request of the Carcross/Tagish First Nation. 

Johns said he was put in a group home at age 14 after getting in trouble at the school. He said he was often in jail for drinking as a teen, where he saw many other people from the residential school.

Johns says Orange Shirt Day is "just another day" for him.

The school "makes you not care," he said.

Assembly of First Nations Yukon Regional Chief Kluane Adamek released a statement Wednesday in honour of the day.

"We feel this legacy of the abuses residential school survivors endured, and we recognize the continuing  intergenerational trauma that continues to impact Indigenous people to this day," she said.

Adamek said abuse and injustice in residential schools led to Indigenous children being over-represented in the child welfare system, as well as Indigenous women and girls facing "unacceptable rates of violence across the country."

"We honour and uphold their resiliency and send strength to the families of the students who did not make it home."

Adamek said the Assembly of First Nations welcomes the federal bill tabled to establish a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.