Whitewater Lake First Nation

Located northwest of Lake Nipigon, is the Whitewater Lake First Nation. There are 35 other Anishinabe first nations that are closely alligned with this Anishinabe Nation. Their huge country is surrounded by vasts forests and lakes. Few non Indians live in that region because the earth there is not well suited for agriculture operations. It is of northern Anishinabe origins. It was from north of Lake Superior where the ancestors of the Whitewater Lake First Nation came from. A treaty was signed between the aroland ogimak and Canada, in the 1870s, which in the words of the agreements (passed down by mouth to the present Anishinabe citizens of the whitewater lake indian reserve), was an agreement in which Canada recognized that the Whitewater Lake Anishinabe Nation owned a huge area of land. They didn't surrender any land to Canada is a better way of putting it! They likely own a country that covers more than 100,000s sq. mi. Their citizens frequently venture out to fish, hunt and trap (exploit their country) for a subsistence. Tourism is also an important enterprise of the Whitewater Lake First Nation, as is art and crafts.

Their history is one that originates at where Sault Ste. Marie (Canada and Michigan) is located. After the Algonquins reached the Sault Ste. Marie region they split up into three groups. One group went down into northern Michigan where they became known as the Potawatomi. Another group went to occupy Manitoulin Island (the Ottawa's), while the main group spread out around Lake Superiors southern and northern shores. They are the Chippewa's or Ojibwa's. It was from the Ojibwa's who lived north of Lake Superior, where the Whitewater Lake Anishinini came. After the arrival of the whites in the early 16th century, the Anishinabek followed the prophesy which the Meda Priests held. They commenced to wage war on the invading whites (the French) around the 1540s, after the French established trading posts along the eastern Saint Lawrence and down at Albany, which is in New York now, but in the early 16th century the whites (Dutch and French) were first to build trading posts there. They were really military fortifications and the Anishinabek knew it.

The Anishinabek who lived between what is now Albany and Quebec City, in the 1530s, were likely driven off by the whites. However, within a short while the Algonquins probably received military support from the other Anishinabek who lived in the Lake Superior region, then assembled their brave soldiers to wage war on the whites who had driven the eastern Anishinabek (the Algonquins) from the region between Albany and Quebec City. In the war that followed the whites were driven out. Afterwards, the Algonquins returned to their original lands between Albany and Quebec City. It would only get worse as the 17th century came. The whites successfully forced their way into the eastern portion of the Anishinabek land (Montreal and Quebec City), and by the late 17th century the principle ogimak from the capital of the Anishinabe Nation located at what is now La Pointe, Wisconsin, ordered their brave soldiers to resume their westward migration. What followed was not good. The Anishinabek had to wage war on their Nakota kinfolk who lived to their north (they originally lived in northwestern Ontario, on over to the eastern shores of huge Lake Winnipeg) and the Dakotas of northern Minnesota.

The present population of their nation is only 150. There is a huge land area around the region which has almost no non Indians, which means that land is not developed. Since it is not developed it offers the Anishinabek of that region the opportunity to exploit that land (fish, hunt and trap), which means they have more than enough resources it can allow for a large Anishinabe population to exist there. They speak in the Anishinini dialect of the Ojibwa language.