Elder remembered for strong values, humility

Edith Josie will be remembered by many across the globe for bringing her home of Old Crow to them, but to those who knew her personally, she will be remembered for much, much more.

Edith Josie will be remembered by many across the globe for bringing her home of Old Crow to them, but to those who knew her personally, she will be remembered for much, much more.

Josie died shortly after 10 a.m. Sunday at the age of 88.

“She’s going to be very sorely missed, but her legacy lives on,” Vuntut Gwitchin MLA Darius Elias said in an interview this morning.

He remembered a strong Gwitchin woman who provided a gentle guidance to all in her community.

Josie was born to Paul and Elizabeth Nukon Josie on Dec. 8, 1921 in Eagle, Alaska. It wasn’t until the 1940s that Josie and her family moved to Old Crow after her uncle died in the community.

In her 88 years, Josie accumulated a long list of formal accomplishments, from aboriginal achievement awards to being appointed as a member to the Order of Canada in 1995.

And much of the recognition that came her way was for bringing her community of Old Crow to the rest of the world.

Through decades of writing her Here Are The News column in the Star as well as getting air time in years past on the CBC’s Gwitchin radio show, Elias noted the elder held a love of her culture and the land. At the same time, she embraced the inevitable changes that came to Old Crow, from the building of the airport to trading to the Internet.

“She valued our culture and she couldn’t wait to share it with the rest of the world,” Elias said.

A profile of Josie on the oldcrow.ca website is one format that in recent years has allowed elders like Josie to pass on their knowledge to the rest of the world.

“Everyone should go school and learn more things. You’re not too old to learn… lol,” reads a section titled Knowledgeable Words in her elder profile on the website.

Before the Internet though, in 1962 Star publisher Harry Boyle asked Sarah Simon, the wife of Rev. James Simon, who had arrived to serve in Old Crow, to find someone from the territory’s northern-most community who could work as an Old Crow correspondent for the paper.

Simon ended up asking Josie.

“Since 1962, Edith’s observations on day-to-day life in Old Crow have appeared in the Whitehorse Star exactly as written,” it’s noted in the publication The Best of Edith Josie, Here Are The News, Old Crow 1963-1964. “Over the years, these columns have been translated into many languages – German, Italian, Spanish, and Finnish, to name a few – with the result that Miss Josie and Old Crow became very familiar to a great many people world wide.”

The columns recorded the happenings of the community, from caribou hunts to airplane arrivals.

“It is a very small village here at Old Crow, but the news is getting better every week,” she wrote in her April 23,1963 column. “I’m sure glad everyone gets my news and know everything what people are doing.

“A few will go up river for cutting wood. Just one or two families will move up river for drying meat and same time cut wood for sale.

“Even now the spring has come cause it is daylight around 11 o’clock p.m. Pretty soon we won’t use light for night time. Everyone glad to see plane every day. Even the same plane come in one day, they all have to go down to see what is going on and what come in on plane.

“Some of the people were sick with cold and now they have been sick with flu and bad headache.”

By the time the book of columns was published in 1993, Josie had been profiled in Life magazine and received the Canada Centennial Medal for her “contribution to the nation”.

Her final column ran in 2005.

Her observational skills proved not only good for her column, but also for a young Elias winning at bingo.

As the Liberal MLA remembers, he was playing radio bingo with his grandmother and Josie when all of the sudden Josie looked over at his bingo cards and said: “Watch what you’re doing,” after noticing he had a bingo that he hadn’t seen yet.

Beyond the formal recognition that came her way over the years, there was much work Josie did in the community as a lay reader for the Anglican Church in Old Crow and teaching Gwitchin at the Yukon College campus in Old Crow, not to mention upgrading her own skills at the school and offering that “gentle guidance” to those in the community like Elias.

That guidance extended to all in the community. As Elias recalled during land claim negotiations, it was Josie who encouraged negotiators for the Vuntut Gwitchin to keep moving forward on the land claims.

There was an honesty to Josie that was appreciated by many, Elias added.

“I always respected her honesty,” he said as he remembered Josie continually telling him to make sure he went out on the land with his family.

It was listening to the CBC Gwitchin show when he was with his family on the land that he continued to hear Josie sending well-wishes to all the Gwitchin folk out there.

And while Josie took her cultural roots very seriously, both Elias and Josie’s granddaughter Tammy remember the woman’s constant smile and laughter.

“She was a very upbeat woman,” Tammy said this morning, recalling her grandmother’s sense of humour to her last days.

As late as Saturday, Josie, who wasn’t able to see but could hear visitors, would ask who was coming in to see her and then joke that “they were just messing with her” when they identified themselves.

Tammy spent many of her childhood years growing up next door to her grandmother in the community 1,000 kilometres north of Whitehorse.

In the evenings, Josie would come over to the house and share stories with Tammy and Paul (Tammy’s brother).

It’s those same traditional tales that Tammy now shares with others, learning both the stories and the performance skills from her grandmother.

Tammy was just 14 when she joined her grandmother on stage to share stories.

Josie was performing at the annual storytelling festival in Whitehorse that year and announced her granddaughter would be joining her on stage.

With that, she pushed Tammy into it.

“Thank God for bright lights shining on you because I couldn’t see anyone,” Tammy said with a laugh, adding if it hadn’t been for her grandmother, she wouldn’t have made it on stage to share the traditional stories.

Josie was unique in many ways, but like many grandmothers, she couldn’t keep away from spoiling her grand kids in some way.

While the evenings were reserved for stories, many mornings Tammy and her brother would wake up, much to their mother’s dismay, to find that Josie had snuck over and placed a can of pop, candy bar and bag of chips next to their beds.

“My mom would go crazy,” Tammy recalled.

As the years passed, her grandmother taught her many life lessons guiding her to be patient, have respect for others and gratitude for what you have. It was also important to welcome all guests.

“You be a good host,” Tammy said, adding for her grandmother, and now for herself, that meant offering your guests food and drink – whatever you have available even if that’s all you have – and then talking to them.

Josie is survived by her three grandchildren and two of her three children, William and Jane and their spouses. Another son, Kevin, died a number of years ago.

“She’s with him now,” Tammy said. “I think that’s why she’s smiling.”

A funeral for Josie is set for at 2 p.m. Wednesday at St. Luke’s Anglican Church in Old Crow.