This is an excerpt from Eileen's latest work, Geography of Memory: Reclaiming the Cultural, Natural, and Spiritual History of the Snayackstx (Sinixt) First People. It was published in 2022 by Rocky Mountain Books. Find it at your local independent bookseller.
The Christian family's story is a reminder that calling a place “home” is a political act, but also one motivated by the urging of a soul. Despite this unbending attachment to the landscape, circumstances had shifted to challenge them even more. Townsites were under construction, farm parcels were marked out. The village on a bluff overlooking the [confluence of the Kootenay and Columbia rivers] was no longer widely known as Kp̓iƛ̓ l̓s. It was now 198 acres of Crown land marked out as “District Lot 9, Group
