A memorial planned Monday evening at the Wellington County Museum and Archives property is an opportunity for the community to express grief over the unearthing of at least 215 Indigenous children’s bodies at a former residential school site.
The memorial, featuring children’s shoes, will be set up after 6 p.m. Monday at the WCMA gates and will remain there for 24 hours.
Similar to other vigils around Canada, organizers say people can leave gently used or new children’s shoes in honour of those discovered at a mass grave in Kamloops, BC. The shoes will be donated to Indigenous organizations afterwards.
Diane Ballantyne, one of the organizers of the vigil, said this was initiated as a chance for the community to grieve. She said many people, including Indigenous people, were consulted in creating this memorial.
She stressed she is a multi-generation Canadian who cannot speak to the impacts on Indigenous people but the problem needs to be acknowledged before it can begin to be fixed.
“I hope that we, as a community and a country, grieve this heartbreaking discovery (I fear there will be many more such discoveries as other former sites are searched) and then actively engage in the political process, demanding politicians fulfil their promises and take concrete and meaningful actions to redress the harms enacted upon Indigenous peoples in this country,” Ballantyne said via email.
