Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. [English translation not provided.]
Today I would like to talk about an elder and a friend who passed recently. Louis McKay passed away on March 19th in Fort Resolution at the age of 78. Louis was born in Fort Resolution in 1931 and from a very young age began working and didn’t stop until he was forced to retire at age 65.
Louis first started working when he was a young man, by selling blocks of ice to the Hudson Bay Company and the Ministry of Transportation. Later he started working for the Hudson Bay Company as a stock boy and then became a forest ranger and firefighter, and then moved on to work for the Northern Canada Power Commission for about five or six years. At around that time, the Pine Point Mine was starting up, so Louis packed up his family and moved to Pine Point to work for the mine. He spent the next 17 and a half years there and that’s where his two daughters, Margaret and Dolores, were raised.
After the mine shut down in 1988, Louis and his wife, Mary, moved back to Fort Resolution where he started his career with the local housing authority, working as a tradesman until his retirement. With only limited formal education, Louis managed to become proficient as a painter, carpenter, electrician, and plumber. Even in his retirement, Louis kept busy around the house and helping others with small jobs here and there. He was always fixing things.
In his spare time Louis enjoyed playing the fiddle. He taught himself to play at a young age and perfected his playing throughout his life. Some of today’s younger fiddlers say that Louis’s style was unique and that the way he played was very complex, his music is very difficult to cover.
Louis is survived by his wife of 53 years, Mary, his son, Donald, his two daughters, Margaret and Dolores, and he had 15 grandchildren, 15 great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews and in-laws.
I would like to thank the family for allowing me to do this. It’s comforting to know that Louis’s legacy lives on through his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
