Analysis Of Stoney Creek Wom The Story Of Mary John

Stoney Creek Woman: The Story of Mary John is a memoir co-written between the central character and Bridget Moran focusing on Mary John’s experiences in the family, as a member of the Carrier tribe, residential school student and President of the Homemakers Club. Helen, a daughter of Mary John, wrote to Bridget Moran with the idea that “her mother’s life was the story of many Aboriginal women of Mary’s generation.” A strength of this book is that it does portray the typical life of an Aboriginal woman born in the early 1900s. Many Aboriginal women experienced similar ways of being used by men “in the family way” without voice. Contrary to the similarities that Aboriginal women of Mary’s generation would have experienced, many of them have

It recalls Mary’s long, hard days at Mission School in Fort St. James, a residential school and the joys and struggles of bearing 12 children. Mary John joined the Homemakers Club, which tried to “make life better for [the reserve] families and … village” through knitting, quilting, and crocheting, but as injustices rose within the reserve, they felt that they “could no longer … leave Native politics to others.” The club took a political standpoint and fought for Aboriginal rights and justice involving the deaths of Aboriginal peoples on Mary John’s reserve and the overall living conditions. Mary’s story is a personal account of the discrimination, poor health conditions, living conditions and laws that Aboriginal peoples

One particular situation that shows the difference between the advantages she experienced and the probable situations others experienced was when Mary visited the doctor at the hospital for “bad chest pains” many years later. (163) The doctor told the nurses to “…just give her lots of moosemeat!” and told Mary, “you must like this hotel, nice hotel, eh?” (163) Mary had worked in the hospital. Her familiarity with the hospital and staff offered her influence not afforded other Aboriginal women at the