“Perceptions,” by Gerry Warner

Op-Ed Commentary

Before we kill off Sam Steele Days for good and end Cranbrook’s longest running festival, I’d like to raise a few more points. Quite a few actually.

“Spirit of the Rockies,” is the proposed uninspired replacement this summer for Sam Steele Days which has been with us for more than 50 years. You’ve got to be kidding. I hate to break this to many of you, but Cranbrook isn’t even located in the Rocky Mountains.

Like Kimberley, Cranbrook sits geographically in the Purcell Range on the western edge of the famed Rockies. The Purcell Range is more than 100 million years older than the Rockies and every bit as spectacular. But what’s a hundred million years to people that think marketing is more important than telling the geographic truth?

But there are many other truths being glossed over in this slick PR exercise. Several legends too. Don’t you think it’s important to keep the record straight when you’re tying the name of Cranbrook to some of the most momentous events in the history of our fair city? It’s these events and history that form Cranbrook’s mythology, not the inanimate peaks that tower over us impressive as they are. And if you look in an atlas, you’ll see that we are but one of many “rocky” mountain ranges in the world.

So, let’s get real!

I wasn’t there when Sergeant Sam Benton Steele’s revered name was chosen as title for Cranbrook’s major civic festival. But I commend those who made the decision for recognizing an outstanding leader with statesmanship qualities who along with another leader with similar qualities played a key role in Cranbrook developing as the “Key City” of the Kootenays when it very easily could have gone another way.

The other leader I’m referring to, of course, is Chief Isadore whose Ktunaxa people occupied the region for thousands of years before any Europeans showed up on the scene. And the two were destined to meet at a tense time when momentous changes were sweeping over the East Kootenay valley that could have led to war and bloodshed or a “Kootenay Uprising” as the historians describe it.

In 1863 gold was discovered in what we now call Wildhorse Creek. Prospectors, mostly Americans lusting for the precious metal, poured into the isolated area and they cared little for boundaries and borders.

Colonial authorities and the indigenous Ktunaxa people in the  isolated area greatly feared the mad rush for gold because they knew there was nothing to stop the interlopers from replacing them as happened so many times in the US just to the south. Feelings ran high and they ran even higher when two American prospectors were murdered and a Ktunaxa man blamed for the crime and jailed by the local authorities.

This enraged Chief Isadore who organized a vigilante gang that freed the Ktunaxa man and in turn panicked the colonial authorities who feared an aboriginal uprising that would lead to a war in the area and the possibility of an American takeover. This resulted in Sergeant Steele being sent into the area with 75 soldiers to preserve peace and to somehow pacify the Ktunaxa who rightfully feared their land would be overrun and taken away from them.

In fact, this is ultimately what happened to the besieged Ktunaxa, who were greatly angered by losing their traditional lands, which is why they refer to them as “unceded” to this very day. But, and this is a very big “but,” war was avoided and many lives were saved, both Canadian and Ktunaxa.

It was not a perfect solution because the Ktunaxa people lost most of their lands which are only now being partially restored. But if war had broken out at that dangerous time the consequences could have been much greater with many more lives lost. And it’s only thanks to the wisdom displayed by Steele and the great Ktunaxa Chief Isadore that the accused was released because of “inconclusive” evidence and war was averted.

Don’t you think this outcome is something much more worthy of memorializing in our history than a superficial and vacuous Hollywood-style tribute to a mountain range already well-known? Please allow me to make a modest suggestion.

What I suggest, in line with our history, is to reject the trite Spirit of the Rockies proposal and instead draw up a plan to revitalize Sam Steele Days. How should this be done? I’m glad you asked.

I suggest erecting a bronze statue of Sam Steele and Chief Isadore making peace and erect it at a suitable spot at Fort Steele. Such a statue would be unique in Canada and might go a long way to assuage hurt feelings that have plagued our wonderful community and country for years.

– Gerry Warner is a retired journalist, who has always had a yen for history.

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