The Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation recently celebrated the 30th anniversary of the Three Fires Homecoming Powwow, keeping the flame of tradition alive.

Reconnecting to history

Quinton Sault could dance before he could walk. For the 19-year-old head youth dancer from the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation, powwows have always been a fact of life.

“When I was younger my dad used to make all my regalia. It would take him all summer just to make one,” Sault says.

An honour and a privilege

“To be up there dancing is a great honour,” Sault said, carefully securing twin eagle feathers to his headdress. On a Saturday morning, Sault was preparing to dance at his community’s 30th annual homecoming fire powwow. Eagle features are sacred, as is the powwow itself.

“You’re dancing not for yourself, but for everyone around you,” Sault said. “You’re showing everyone what it was like to be part of Mother Earth and one with everything around you.”

Preparing for the future

Sault is starting college classes in diesel mechanics this month. While he’s years away from having kids, he said powwow dancing is something he wants to pass on to his children one day, as his parents passed it to him.

“Everyone here has a history, everyone here has their own story; it’s just a matter of listening to them when they dance,” he said.

A weighty responsibility

Sault was one of only two dancers to perform at last summer’s PanAm Games Gala. The Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation was a co-host for the games, and Sault said he takes the duty of sharing his nation’s culture seriously.

“It makes me feel responsible,” he said. “Knowing that you’re representing your nation, it’s like being an athlete representing your country in the Olympics.”

A culture in revival

There was a time when no drums beat along the Credit River. Toronto is the Mississaugas’ traditional territory. They were moved to their current reserve in 1847, and the dislocation left an indelible trauma on the community, said former chief Carolyn King.

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“It’s been a struggle,” King said. “We thought we had an agreement with the governments of the day. They thought they had an agreement with us. Both of us have lived a lie.”

A tradition rekindled

King helped re-establish her nation’s annual powwow in 1987. The community lit three fires at the mouth of the Credit River, representing the Three Fires Confederacy, a long-standing Anishinaabe alliance between the Odawa, Ojibway and Potawatomi tribes.

Embers from those fires were placed into metal barrels and transported to the community’s new home on the New Credit reserve.

“It was smoking away like crazy,” King said. “The whole way from Mississauga to New Credit, people on the highway were like ‘Your truck’s on fire!’”

Medicine and healing

“The powwow is a place of culture and tradition, but it’s also a place of medicine and healing, and our communities have a lot of healing left to do,” said New Credit chief Stacey LaForme.

Whether it’s the suicide crisis in remote communities or missing and murdered indigenous women, LaForme said for his nation, maintaining the annual powwow is an important step along the path of healing.

Open invitation

Members of the Mississauga Chiefs girls’ hockey team were given an honoured place in the powwow’s grand entry.

“As an Ojibway person myself, to me this is reconciliation through sport and culture,” said the Chiefs’ league president, Marian Jacko.

The girls’ coach, Jessica Turi, agreed.

“Many of the players don't know the history and origin behind the name and therefore don't really grasp the concept of the cultural significance. This partnership and connection is extremely important for us,” she said.

Looking forward

King said the first powwow took place on a dusty ball diamond instead of the lush grove where it’s been held for years. Dancers called it the two-moccasin powwow, because the gritty sand was so hard on their moccasins.

“We’ve been looking to bring it back and have our people be aware of who they are as Mississaugas people, Anishinaabe people, and then they can choose to be what they want. But they should start out by knowing who they are.”

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