Potlotek First Nation, also known as Chapel Island, [1] is a Mi'kmaw community in northeastern Nova Scotia. The community is situated in Richmond County, Nova Scotia, Canada. As of August 2023, the First Nation has approximately 837 band members living on and off reserve. [2]
Chapel Island First Nation is composed of two parts as shown:
Community | Area | Location | Population | Date established |
---|---|---|---|---|
Chapel Island 5 | 592.5 hectares (1,464 acres) | 69 km. southwest of Sydney | 837 | July 1, 1792 |
Malagawatch 4 (1/5 share) | 661.3 hectares (1,634 acres) | 62 km. southwest of Sydney | 0 | August 2, 1833 |
The Mi'kmaq are a First Nations people of the Northeastern Woodlands, indigenous to the areas of Canada's Atlantic Provinces, primarily Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland, and the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec as well as Native Americans in the northeastern region of Maine. The traditional national territory of the Mi'kmaq is named Miꞌkmaꞌki.
Miꞌkmaw hieroglyphic writing or Suckerfish script was a writing system for the Miꞌkmaw language, later superseded by various Latin scripts which are currently in use. Mi'kmaw are a Canadian First Nation whose homeland, called Mi'kma'ki, overlaps much of the Maritime provinces, specifically all of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and parts of New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador.
Clare, officially named the Municipality of the District of Clare, is a district municipality in western Nova Scotia, Canada. Statistics Canada classifies the district municipality as a municipal district.
Edward Cornwallis was a British career military officer and was a member of the aristocratic Cornwallis family, who reached the rank of Lieutenant General. After Cornwallis fought in Scotland, putting down the Jacobite rebellion of 1745, he was appointed Groom of the Chamber for King George II. He was then made Governor of Nova Scotia (1749–1752), one of the colonies in North America, and assigned to establish the new town of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Later Cornwallis returned to London, where he was elected as MP for Westminster and married the niece of Robert Walpole, Great Britain's first Prime Minister. Cornwallis was next appointed as Governor of Gibraltar.
Shubenacadie is a village located in Hants County, in central Nova Scotia, Canada. As of 2021, the population was 411.
Christmas Island, Nova Scotia (Scottish Gaelic: Eilean na Nollaig) is a Canadian community of the Cape Breton Regional Municipality on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. It has a post office, a firehall and a very small population. It has a beach with access to the Bras d'Or Lake. A small island just off shore, also named Christmas Island, encloses Christmas Island Pond, a pond that runs into the lake.
Tufts Cove is an urban neighbourhood in the community of Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. It is situated on the eastern shore of Halifax Harbour in the North End of Dartmouth. The neighbourhood boundaries of Tufts Cove are approximately from Albro Lake Road in the south to Highway 111 in the north, and from Victoria Road in the east with the harbour to the west.
The Sipekne'katik First Nation is composed of four Mi'kmaq First Nation reserves located in central Nova Scotia. As of 2012, the Mi'kmaq population is 1,195 on-Reserve, and approximately 1,190 off-Reserve. The First Nation includes Indian Brook 14, Nova Scotia, near Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia. The band was known as the Shubenacadie First Nation until 2014 when the traditional spelling and pronunciation of its name was officially adopted.
Paqtnkek Mi’kmaw Nation is a Mi'kmaq Band in northeastern Nova Scotia. Its populated reserve is Paqtnkek-Niktuek 23. As of December 2019 the total registered population was 598. It is a member of the Confederacy of Mainland Mi'kmaq. The name Paqtnkek means “by the bay” or "Above the water ". The area has long been important to Mi'kmaq for the fishing of eel and other species.
Jerry Lonecloud served as an entertainer, ethnographer, and medicine man among the Mi'kmaq people in Nova Scotia. His oral memoirs, comprising Mi'kmaw oral histories and legends, were documented from 1923 to 1929. These memoirs were later compiled into a book—Tracking Dr. Lonecloud: Showman to Legend Keeper—by ethnographer and historian Ruth Holmes Whitehead at the Nova Scotia Museum in Halifax in 2002. These recordings laid the foundation for the 2002 biography, the first known Mi'kmaq memoir. According to Whitehead, Lonecloud could "rightly" be called the "ethnographer of the Micmac nation."
Gabriel Sylliboy was the first Mi'kmaq elected as Grand Chief (1919) and the first to fight for the recognition by the state of Canada of the treaties between the government and the First Nations people.
Ursula Johnson is a multidisciplinary Mi’kmaq artist based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Her work combines the Mi’kmaq tradition of basket weaving with sculpture, installation, and performance art. In all its manifestations her work operates as didactic intervention, seeking to both confront and educate her viewers about issues of identity, colonial history, tradition, and cultural practice. In 2017, she won the Sobey Art Award.
The Miꞌkmaq–Nova Scotia–Canada Tripartite Forum was established in 1997 to provide the Miꞌkmaq, Nova Scotia and Canada a place to resolve issues of mutual concern. The Forum's vision is to develop Mi'kmaw communities and foster positive relationships with other Nova Scotians.
Marie Ann Battiste is an author and educator working as a professor in Canada at the University of Saskatchewan in the Department of Educational Foundations. From the Potlotek First Nation in Nova Scotia, Battiste is the daughter of Mi'kmaq parents John and Annie Battiste and is one of four children. Battiste was raised in Houlton, Maine, where she attended high school graduating in 1967. From there she went on to the University of Maine graduating from the Farmington campus in 1971 with her teaching certificate and a bachelor of science in both elementary and junior high education. She went on to attend Harvard University graduating in 1974 with a master of education in administration and social policy as well as Stanford University, where in 1984 she graduated with a doctor of education in curriculum and teacher education.
Daniel Christmas is a former Canadian Senator who represented Nova Scotia from 2016 to 2023.
The Union of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq is a Tribal Council in Nova Scotia, Canada. It was created in 1969, and known as the Union of Nova Scotia Indians until being renamed in 2019. Since Acadia First Nation left to join the Confederacy of Mainland Mi'kmaq in 2019, the UNSM has five member communities: Eskasoni, Membertou, Potlotek, Wagmatcook, and We'koqma'q.
CIYR-FM is a Canadian radio station, broadcasting at 93.7 FM serving the Potlotek First Nation, Nova Scotia. The station broadcasts a First Nations-oriented community radio format branded as Mniku Radio.
Norman Sylliboy of the Eskasoni First Nation in Nova Scotia was named Grand Chief of the Mi’kmaq Grand Council. Sylliboy was elected in 2019, two years after the death of his predecessor, Ben Sylliboy. Norman Sylliboy's grandfather Gabriel Sylliboy was elected in 1918 to the position of Grand Chief.
Alexander Denny, otherwise known as Kji-keptin Alex Denny of the Mi'kmaq Grand Council, both a founding member and two-term president of the UNSI, was most prominently known for the role he played in the ongoing battle for recognition of Mi'kmaq treaties and Aboriginal rights. Born to the Eskasoni First Nation and raised by two elders in the community, Denny was taught the importance of Mi'kmaq treaties from a young age. His passion for and knowledge of his community ultimately led Denny to be credited with attaining linguistic and political rights for the Mi'kmaq Nation at an international level. Additionally, It was Denny and the UNSI that organized the very first Treaty Day.
shalan joudry is a Mi'kmaw writer, storyteller, and ecologist. She is known for her poetry collections, including the multi-award nominated Waking Ground.