Perry River
In 1998, a group of people in Gjoa Haven wrote to Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. Vice-President James Eetoolook, “In regards to the Hudson’s Bay trading post which was established at the location known as Perry River.” The letter was signed by six people, representing the larger group who, in 1967, moved from Perry River to Gjoa Haven. In their words, “This was a very difficult time for the people of Perry River. We are not angry or anything [but] we would just like people to know our story, and how difficult it really was.”
In 2003, NTI hired oral-history specialist David Pelly to conduct a thorough set of interviews in Gjoa Haven. That process took two years and several visits, first to meet the survivors, to develop the plan with them, then to do interviews and follow-ups, and finally to confirm the transcriptions were accurate. The final product was a 200-page volume with interview transcripts from six informants in three languages: English, Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun. Their story, as they wished, is well recorded. At one of the group meetings, as the process ended, there were tears and hugs, but above all there was a satisfaction that the journey of their lives would be remembered by others for years to come.
By David Pelly
Sarah Ullikattaq
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
Sarah Ullikattaq (English version - edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
Peter Apiana
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
Peter Apiana (English version - edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
David & Alice Siksik
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
David & Alice Siksik (English version -edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
David Siksik
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
David Siksik (English version -edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
Perry River Group
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
Perry River Group (English version -edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
Don & Annie Magaknak
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
Don & Annie Magaknak (English version - edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
Lucy Nimiqtaqtuq
Perry River Project Taped at Gjoa Haven September 2003
Lucy Nimiqtaqtuq (English version - edited)
Interviewer: David Pelly Interpreter: David Qirqut Transcribed by: Ben Kogvik
Story of Perry River
Don and Annie Magaknak were a young couple, not yet 20 years old, in the spring of 1967. “We had a small child and I was expecting another,” remembers Annie. Both their families lived in the general area of Perry River on the Queen Maud coast of the Arctic Ocean, where the Hudson’s Bay Company had established a trading post many years before in 1926. People in the area – roughly 75 in all, during the 1950s – travelled widely, inland toward the Back River in search of caribou and out onto the sea ice in search of seals. Like others of this era, they had become accustomed to the added security of supplies from the HBC, provided in return for white fox pelts. Don’s father, Ullikattaq, had a reputation in the region as a fine hunter and a good traveller. “Every year, he would go by dog team to Gjoa Haven,” remembers Magaknak. The trip required about five sleeps each way. That’s exactly what he was doing in May, 1967, while his young son was out seal hunting with his even younger wife. “When Annie and I just started staying together, we were hunting seals somewhere around Qikiqtaqjuaq [Jenny Lind Island],” recalls Don. Another family, Peter Apiana and his wife Susie, were camped at the mouth of the Ellice River, the next major river to the west of the Perry River post. Among other things, Ellice River was known for its abundance of Arctic char. In May of 1967, they were awaiting the return of their daughter from residential school in Inuvik. The students would be flown back to the Perry River trading post, where their families would gather for the happy reunion. It was time, Apiana was thinking, to leave for Perry River in order to meet the plane. Another of the students coming on the plane, Alice Halluktalik, a young girl of 12, was returning from her fifth year at Inuvik, as was her younger sister, both part of the first generation of Inuit to receive a formal education. Their parents, Tommy and Emily Halluktalik, were no doubt looking forward to seeing their daughters again after the long and painful absence. What they did not know, is that this would be the last year their daughters would go away to school. David Siksik, a young man of 25 in 1967, who would later marry Alice Halluktalik, lived at Ellice River with his uncle, Kupluguk, after his own father died. This May, they had travelled to hunt seals at Putulik (Hat Island), 170 kilometres to the northeast. Within days, all of these people received the same startling news: life in the Perry River district was about to change forever – the trading post at Perry River had closed and James Chapman, the last manager, had left. “While we were at Putulik, Apiana came to us from Perry River and said that the store was closed,” recalls Siksik. Apiana remembers his brother-in-law arriving in camp at Ellice River, en route to Cambridge Bay, bearing news that the post had closed. Several families headed for Cambridge Bay, and in many cases they and their descendants live there still. Apiana considered that option but, in his mind, he “had to follow” his in-laws. Sarah Ullikattaq, for her part, remembers arriving back from Gjoa Haven with her husband by dog team, to find the Perry River post abandoned. After a week of seal-hunting at Qikiqtaqjuaq, Don and Annie Magaknak came back to Perry River for supplies, only to find the post was closed. “It was open when we left. We had no idea that it was closed.” They had left their tents up, out at the hunting camp, expecting to be back shortly with fresh supplies. They learned the news from Annie’s father, Patsy Topilikot, who planned to head west to Bathurst Inlet. “I won’t be able to support you,” he warned, advising them to follow Ullikattaq, Don’s father. “When I came home from Inuvik, after I got out of the plane, my parents brought me home,” remembers Alice Halluktalik. “They were all packed up when I went inside the tent. They said that there was no more white person, so the store was closed.” The scene was set. Five extended families, a band of about 60 people, following the older men, Kupluguk and Ullikattaq, as their leaders, were about to set off for Gjoa Haven on the journey of their lives. From their perspective, it was a flight for survival. Before leaving (vanishing, as the Inuit saw it at the time) the HBC manager left a box of basic supplies for each family group. “There were a few cans of milk, though I don’t recall how many, and we had a child,” is Annie Magaknak’s first thought. “There wasn’t much of anything,” interjects her husband, Don, thinking back nearly 40 years. “There was some flour, some tea, sugar. There was ten gallons of outboard motor gas. There was a bit of gas [naptha] for the stove. There was no ammunition, no fish nets, nothing for hunting supplies.” Suddenly, and without warning, these Inuit families found themselves entirely dependent – as their grandparents had once been – on their own resources, their own ability to survive on the land. It was late spring, not too late for travel by dog team, although carrying a heavy load was out of the question in the soft snow. Fox traps, and heavy equipment, were left behind. It was all they could do for the dogs to pull the sleds loaded with the boats the men knew would be needed once the ice melted. The boats were piled high with tents, caribou-skin bedding, hunting equipment, the box of HBC supplies, and young children. Looking like a band of old-time Inuit families, on the move with all their worldly possessions, the nomadic group made their way slowly across the sea ice along the Queen Maud coast, headed east into uncertainty. While southern Canada readied itself for centennial celebrations and Expo 67, these people were facing the biggest challenge of their lives. There were several children. Two of the women were pregnant. The season was advanced and travel was becoming difficult. Emotionally too, it was heart-rending for some who had parted from close relatives. Annie Magaknak remembers her feelings clearly: “I started from Perry River when I was 19. I was pregnant. I was quite young. I was leaving my parents. So I was crying when I was traveling.” Despite all the hardships, they made steady progress initially. But as they approached Tulguqtitiivik, near the mouth of Simpson River, after an advance of about 80 kilometres, the ice had deteriorated to the point where Kupluguk and Ullikattaq felt it was unsafe to continue. The group made camp to await open water, so their journey could continue by boat. That too proved perilous, with their way blocked by the ice pack during the summer, and myriad problems with the boats, so that it was October before they finally reached the DEW-Line station on King William Island. Several of the people who made this five-month journey have passed away. Those who survived to tell their stories in Gjoa Haven, for the most part, look back upon their struggle philosophically. At the time, said Annie Magaknak, “We didn’t think anything of it.” They managed on country food, and took the difficulties of travel in stride. It seems that the emotional wrenching, out of their familiar country, away from family and friends, was the most difficult of all to endure. “I start thinking of what we went through sometimes,” Annie adds, with tears forming in her warm eyes. “It was extremely difficult coming from Perry River, when I think back about it.” Nonetheless, they now have the satisfaction of knowing the story of their flight for survival is recorded for posterity.
© David F. Pelly www.davidpelly.com