99-year-old Yukon elder Pearl Keenan has died

Pearl Keenan, a respected Teslin Tlingit elder of the Dakl'awedi clan, has died. She was 99 years old.

Her family says Keenan died early Wednesday morning at Whistle Bend Place in Whitehorse, where she had been living in recent years. 

Keenan was known as a tireless advocate for education and the Tlingit language and culture. 

"Basically she had a great wealth of information to share, and she shared that very willingly with anybody that wanted to listen to her," said her son Dave Keenan, a former Yukon MLA.

She was born in 1920 on the banks of the Nisutlin River, and according to her son, she spent the first 30 years or so of her life there. 

"She did many things that a person I guess of that generation would be doing to survive in the Yukon, from mink ranching to just delivering mail," her son said.  

She was a young woman when the Alaska Highway was built through the area. Speaking to a local historian a few years ago, she recalled walking to Teslin one day in 1942 and being startled by a survey party marking a trail for the highway.

Keenan said his mother always believed strongly in education, and encouraged young people to always expand their horizons.

"I think she was an extreme example of what education can do for you," he said.

"Mother only had really two weeks of education in her whole life, and she self-taught herself mathematics and English and writing and the ABCs."

Pearl Keenan served as chancellor of Yukon College, from 1993 to 2000. She is the college's longest-serving chancellor.

Over the years, she also worked with the Yukon Human Rights Commission, the Council of Yukon First Nations' Elder Advisory Committee, the Skookum Jim Friendship Centre and the First Nations Education Commission.

In 2006, she was awarded the Order of Canada for her work to preserve and teach the Tlingit language and culture.

In a statement on Wednesday, Yukon Premier Sandy Silver said the elder Keenan "selflessly contributed her time, energy and wisdom to many important causes."

"Pearl Keenan's important contributions to our territory will continue to be felt for many generations, and all Yukoners are better off as a result of them," said Silver.