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UASHAT — That there is still an Innu community at the heart of Sept-Îles is a testament to its resilience.

When the iron mines first came to Quebec’s Côte-Nord in the 1940s, the order of the day was to force the Innu off their land and into 10 reserves scattered across the densely forested region.

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In Sept-Îles, local clergy joined an effort to muscle the Innu into a reserve about eight kilometres outside of town. White settlers wanted the land to house prospectors and refineries.

But the people resisted.

Local legend has it, parish priests — who’d been in the area for decades — refused to baptize the children of Innu who wouldn’t leave town. Eventually, they stopped allowing them to bury their dead in the local Catholic cemetery.

“The Innu would have nighttime burials so they wouldn’t get caught by the priests,” said Jean-Claude Therrien Pinette, an Innu and lifetime resident of the area. “The history of our people here is one of resistance.”