Tribute to David and Dorothy Aglukark -- Strength and Wisdom Endures Through the Years!

Arviat (formerly called Eskimo Point) is the second most southern community in Nunavut, located approximately 260 kilometres north of Churchill, Manitoba. On the west coast of the Hudson Bay, Arviat is the third largest community in Nunavut, with a fast growing population of 2100 people, 92% of which are Inuit.

A sign that welcomes you to the community tells you that this is the "Home of Susan Aglukark." Susan is a three-time Juno Award winning Aboriginal recording artist. Her songwriting, mostly inspired by her culture and her people, the Inuit, is socially driven and addresses many of the issues facing Canadian Aboriginal people. Her speaking also addresses the social problems on reserves and communities across Northern Canada, shedding light on the "hows" and "whys" of the problems, and encouraging the people to move forward.
This picture of Susan's great grandmother, Tahiuq, was taken in March of 1950 by photographer Richard Harrington at an Inuit settlement some 40 miles northwest Padlei, which was a satellite post for the Hudson Bay Company trader in Arviat. Tahiuq was the grandmother of Susan's mother, Dorothy Aglukark, who was five years of age when this picture was taken. Dorothy stayed primarily with Tahiuq during her growing up years.

Dorothy Aglukark's Inuit name was Taqtu, and Dorothy says of her grandmother, "She looked after me. She gave me her wisdom. I'm proud of her." That strength and wisdom has endured in the family line.

Today, Dorothy's (Taqtu's) children include not only Susan, the well-known recording artist, but Lillian, a lawyer, Esther, a nurse, David Jr., an RCMP officer, and Brian, Barbara, and Nancy all with government jobs.

When Richard Harrington came across this settlement in 1950 where Taqtu (Dorothy) lived with her grandmother Tahiuq, he observed a drum dance held that evening in the igloo where twelve people were crowded together. In the above photo taken inside the igloo, there is one of the drummers, Agaaq, with his wife Ikiqtaq, who has their baby boy Evano in her amautiq.

Ikiqtaq was Taqtu's (Dorothy's) mother as well, but while Taqtu was present in the camp as a 5-year-old at the time, she stayed primarily with her grandmother Tahiuq.

Taqtu (Dorothy Aglukark) is one of those living Inuit who knew the traditional way of life for the Inuit, having been born in an igloo. She spent her earliest years in the Padlei area, a satellite post for the Hudson Bay Company trader in Arviat, then known as Eskimo Point.

She remembers very little from those years, but recognizes that her family truly struggled to survive.

She says, "When you are a child, your life seems normal, whatever it is, and all you care about is that someone loves you." Their life, or course, was anything but normal by today's measure. And for her family, Dorothy is the bridge between that extraordinary time for Inuit, and the modern world in which we live today.

The intergenerational story of Dorothy (Taqtu) and her grandmother Tahiuq is told in the September/October 2010 issue of Canada's Arctic Journal, Above and Beyond, which is published by First Air, the Airline of the North. This article written by David F. Pelly is entitled, "Tahiuq & Three Generations On."

Dorothy relates, "One day we were hungry during the time there was no caribou (in the mid-1950s). There was even hardly any fish." A man arrived in camp from the coast with some seal meat, which kept them going for a few days. Then the family struck out to walk, hoping to find help. It was clearly a desperate push for survival. Dorothy was 10 or 11 at the time.

She remembers, "It got really stormy. We did not have much food. My uncle was snow-blinded. We went to a lake and my uncle tried to make a hole (for fishing), but he couldn't. We went back to the igloo. I noticed my grandmother (Tahiuq) cutting up dried sinew, used for sewing. I wondered, what's happening, but I didn't say anything.

"She said to me, 'Eat this.' Right away, I thought to myself, maybe there is no food in the igloo. I ate very small pieces. She gave me another drink of the warm water my uncle made. I remember I wanted to cry.

"But I thought, may be I'm going to make it harder for them. I can still see that igloo. I went to sleep in the caribou skin blankets. Under the skins, I cried--I didn't want them to know I was crying."

"When we woke up, same thing: some little bits of sinew and warm water. We got ready to go to Arviat. Then it got whiteout. My uncle said, 'I can hardly see anymore, so you have to be my eyes--watch for tracks.' My grandmother said, 'Just leave me here--try to find somebody so you might not starve.' I thought to myself, I don't want to leave her

"My uncle said, 'Mother, I'm not going to leave you here. Stay on the qamutik. Taqtu and I are going to walk.' Then I saw some tracks. He told me to follow the tracks and walk in front of the dogs. I saw something moving up ahead in the whiteout. It was a person in camp with their family. They had lots of caribou.

"So we had food and tea. My uncle made an igloo for us to stay overnight. When we woke up in the morning, it was a big storm. This family gave us everything we needed. We stayed for three days, not moving"

By the time the weather cleared, dogs and humans alike were revived and ready to travel. The dogs were so strong now they could pull the qamutik with all three people sitting on top of the load. Suddenly, the trip seemed a pleasure. Taqtu's uncle even suggested she try to shoot a ptarmigan. Before long, they arrived in Arviat.

Re-supplied, the family moved back out on the land, near Maguse Lake, not so far inland from Arviat. That fall, an airplane flew in, doing a circuit of the camps, picking up children for the new school near Arviat, at the mouth of the Maguse River.

A missionary said that Dorothy and her younger brother Evano (the little boy in the amautiq in Harrington's photo) must come in for school, so they boarded the plane and flew away. The contrast in her mind with the previous trip to Arviat is unimaginable to most of us today.

She remembers it well. That night was the first she ever spent inside a house. She did not want to stay. So after all was quiet, she left and walked into the darkness. Once out of sight, she stopped, and slept against a big rock on the land.

In the morning, Dorothy continued walking toward a familiar looking hill. From the hilltop, she saw her family's camp. When she arrived, her grandmother Tahiuq asked simply, "How did you come here?"

Dorothy answered, "I walked," and her grandmother told her, "Don't ever do that again." But that was the end of Dorothy's school career. She stayed with Tahiuq. The extended family, including Ikiqtaq and Agaaq, moved to Rankin Inlet, attracted by the opportunity of employment at the new nickel mine. Tahiuq died there when her granddaughter Dorothy was 16.

Some years later, Dorothy married David Aglukark. And despite her brief and rather negative experience with school, they were determined that their children (Susan, Lillian, Esther, David Jr., Brian, Barbara and Nancy) would get the best education possible--that became one of the most important goals of their life.

Looking at the array of family photos in the living room of their Arviat home today, one sees ample evidence of the success which came from that decision. They are very thankful to God, and from time to time must wonder just what Tahiuq might think if she saw her great grandchildren today.

At the very least, it is a maternal lineage of significance:
1. Tahiuq

2. Ikiqtaq

3. Taqtu, aka Dorothy

4. Lillian (a lawyer, pictured above), aka Agaaq (and six other children of David and Dorothy's)

"For a long time," explains Lillian, "I did not understand why my mother named me after her stepfather Agaaq, but she finally explained to me that he had taken her and Tahiuq into their family and provided for them through the harsh, starvation period. She was very grateful to him for providing them with shelter and food. So she wanted to name one of her children after him."

Names are very meaningful, and apparently Lillian has the compassion of her namesake.

This is an aerial picture of Arviat, Nunavut, today, the place where David and Dorothy Aglukark still live, and as the sign that welcomes one into the community says, "the Home of Susan Aglukark."

David Aglukark was the co-chief negotiator for the Inuit Land Claims Agreement, which is the largest Aboriginal land claim settlement in Canadian history. This agreement was signed on July 9, 1993 between the Inuit of the Nunavut Settlement Area (then part of the Northwest Territories) and the Government of Canada, and was the basis for creating the new territory of Nunavut, which was officially established on April 1, 1999.

The agreement led to a political accord which established dates for introducing legislation to Parliament for the eventual creation of the territory, the Government of Nunavut, and a transition process. Under the terms of the Agreement, jurisdiction over some territorial matters were transferred to the new government, among them wildlife management, land use planning and development, property taxation, and natural resource management.

Though the creation of the territory of Nunavut is a new chapter in Canada's confederation, the story of Nunavut and the Inuit who make their lives there is an ancient one, going back over thousands of years. This land, which Canadian government officials initially saw as "an unexplored frontier" was seen by the Inuit as "their ancestral homeland" from time immemorial.

Strangely, during the negotiations, the Canadian government officials expressed concern that if the Inuit were given more autonomy for wildlife management, that they might overhunt, and deplete the wildlife. David Aglukark reminded them that the Inuit have a traditional knowledge, and know something about wildlife management that they have proven from antiquity that the Canadian government (who had been completely controlling the Inuit as if they were children) had yet to learn.

So while David Aglukark has been vitally involved in the legal and political aspects of land claims, and land management, both he and Dorothy are even more aware of the spiritual connection that there is to the land through human beings. Ever since the summer of 2006, they have teamed up with Canada Awakening Ministries in a healing the land process wherever it is welcomed in Nunavut. Healing the land is not a political, but rather a spiritual process.
Here is David Aglukark (left) with the Hon. Tagak Curley (right) inside of a circle of rocks that marked the tent pegs of one of the original dwellings in Rankin Inlet. As a descendant of the original inhabitants of this region, David released forgiveness to the later people groups who came and settled in this area, often by-passing protocol and honor for the wisdom and values of those elders who lived on this land from the first. This ceremony took place on a Monday afternoon on July 10, 2006.

By early Wednesday morning of July 12, some 15,000 caribou showed up at this very spot where the ceremony took place. Some of the caribou were circling endlessly around the very circle of rocks where the repentance and forgiveness had taken place. It is as if those animals knew that something significant had happened right at this spot, and that there had been a cleansing of the land from past defilements.

Here, David and Dorothy Aglukark are with a Canada Awakening Healing the Land Team at the Anglican Church in Pond Inlet, Nunavut, in July of 2008. This was the spot where the Holy Spirit once entered into a service like a mighty waterfall in February of 1999, and the people of Pond Inlet have seen their land blessed to a greater degree since 2008.

This is David Aglukark (with guitar), participating in a healing ceremony at the site of the original Royal Canadian Mounted Police facility in Pond Inlet where the first criminal trial that tried to establish Canadian Justice in the North Baffin region took place in August of 1923.

This ceremony was conducted with the blessing of Mayor Abraham Kublu, and local elders, ministers and community leaders. Dealing with issues such as this which have built invisible walls between Inuit and Qallanaat (non-Inuit) for decades is resulting in walls of division coming down, with reconcilation through Christ, and a stronger community spirit, and a flowing together.

Here, David and Dorothy Aglukark are with Tommy Tatatuapik, the head spokesperson for the Elder's Committee in Arctic Bay, Nunavut, after a powerful healing the land ceremony at the site of the original settlement near Arctic Bay in August of 2008.

After Tommy Tatatuapik made a powerful statement on behalf of the elders which touched the hearts of the people who were gathered on the land in a deep way, David Aglukark is seen here praying for Tommy Tatatuapik for God's blessing upon the people and on the land.

I have met with Tommy in November of 2010, and he had a wonderful praise report on how the blessings of the Lord have continued upon the people and the land of Arctic Bay unto this day.

Here, David Aglukark (centre) is leading out in prayer at a ceremony for the healing of the land in Cape Dorset, Nunavut, in August of 2010. The person on the right (holding the bottle) is Qimiataaq, the deputy mayor of Cape Dorset who gave his blessing to the ceremony along with other community leaders.

Here David (centre) and Dorothy (left) Aglukark are addressing a crowd from the Cape Dorset region who went out on the land for a healing ceremony at a spot where reconciliation took place between the mother and family of a young man who had been murdered, and the family of the one who was accused of committing the murder.

Here, David Aglukark (centre) is listening while one of the respected elders from Cape Dorset (seated with blue jacket on) is describing what has happened on another site that needed to be cleansed.

In this picture, David Aglukark is translating and interpreting to the oldest living descendant of the original inhabitants of Cape Dorset, as Ray Totorewa, a Maori brother from New Zealand, is doing proper protocol in offering her a Maori patu, traditionally used as a weapon of war, but now as an offering of peace and goodwill. It is also an expression of the solidarity of the Maori from the southern ends of the earth in New Zealand with the Inuit at the northern ends of the earth in Nunavut.
Here, David Aglukark is translating for Roger Armbruster in the Anglican Church in Cape Dorset as the healing the land process is being explained, and the elders are encouraged to tell their story, and to help the team to identify the issues in the community that need to be addressed and cleansed at their roots.

Another member of the Canada Awakening Healing the Land Team that was in Cape Dorset, Nunavut, in August of 2010, was Isi Masi, a brother from Fiji, who is seen here with Peter Mansbridge, the news anchor of the CBC's The National, who "happened" to be in Cape Dorset at the same time.

This occasion also gave David Aglukark an opportunity to chat personally with Peter Mansbridge. It so happens that Peter Mansbridge began his career in journalism in Churchill, Manitoba, which, as was shared at the very beginning of this report, is some 260 kilometres south of Arviat, Nunavut.

David was able to ask Peter if he remembered meeting him when he was in Churchill many years ago, and amazingly, Peter Mansbridge remembered. What an amazing time that they had recounting old stories. He was also able to share with Peter Mansbridge the purpose for which he was in Cape Dorset at this time, and that was to help the community to address the root issues that were in need of healing, and that had adversely affected both the people and the land in this area.

The testimony and the legacy of David and Dorothy Aglukark speaks for itself. Their's is a legacy of strength and wisdom that has endured through the years, and it is deeply rooted in the strengths of past generations, and that has built upon that, and gone even further, and left the next generation better off as a result. Truly, they have served their generation well.

"A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children" (Proverbs 13:22).

"Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, who delights greatly in His commandments. His descendants will be mighty on earth; the generation of the upright will be blessed" (Psalm 112:1, 2).