“LONG AGO THERE WAS NO VILLAGE here at Stoney Creek. Tatchik, down about a mile, Nulki, at the end of Nulki Lake, and Laketown, four miles up the lake—these were the only places people lived. They lived in these places because of the fish. This was before 1890. All there was, was a trail going through where Stoney Creek is now.
“One man made a residing place just below where the graveyard is now and from then on, people started moving into the village of Stoney Creek, one at a time.
“They all started moving in from Tatchik and Nulki Lake on account of the fish spawning up Stoney Creek. People were dependent for their livelihood on fish and that is why, you see, every Indian village is by a lake or a river wherever there is fish.
“At Stoney Creek, year after year, as the season comes and goes, the people were preparing the food, like berries in the summer and the fish, and the hunting went on.
“Years and years ago, even before my time, the children were educated to make a living. The boys went everywhere with their fathers and when the girl is old enough, her too, the mother takes over and starts training that child. How are they going to preserve the food, because food was very important, so it doesn’t get spoiled—that is what the boys and girls are learning.
“So the girls are learning to preserve the food and prepare the food for drying, and the boys are in the bushes learning how to preserve and to skin—that is what the boys are doing. And when these young people are old enough and are married, they just know exactly what to do, so they don’t depend on parents anymore.
“That is how it was, from generation to generation.”
—ADNAS ALEXIS, age eighty-
five, speaking many years
ago in the Carrier language