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DENINU KU'E/FORT RESOLUTION
A Fort Resolution-born Metis elder in Alberta has received the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal for her exceptional volunteer work over many years.

Angelina (Angie) Mercredi-Crerar, Fort Resolution-born resident of Grande Prairie, Alta., who was recently awarded the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal. - photo courtesy of Brenda Crerar-Lowen

Angelina (Angie) Mercredi-Crerar has lived in Grande Prairie since 1966 and has made an impressive contribution to the Alberta city.

However, the 76-year-old still considers herself a Northerner.

"Once a Northerner, always a Northerner," she said. "Of course, my roots are there. I never forget the North. I put my foot in Great Slave Lake when I was a child and they say when you do that you always come back."

In fact, she does come North every two years to visit family and friends.

"My heart will always be in the North," she said. "That's home."

Mercredi-Crerar received the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal during the Metis Nation of Alberta assembly in Athabasca last month.

She was not aware she was to receive the medal and called the announcement "the biggest surprise of my life."

She said the award makes her feel very humble. "Because I have received a lot of awards in my life, but a lot of people don't understand that I never have worked alone."

For over 35 years, Mercredi-Crerar has volunteered in numerous ways in Grande Prairie, including with the Grande Prairie Friendship Centre, Native Counselling Services of Alberta, Grande Prairie Regional College, the Children's Services Authority and many other groups.

One of her most notable endeavours was spearheading the creation of the Elder Caring Shelter.

Mercredi-Crerar has been recognized over the years for her efforts. Among other honours, she has been named a volunteer of the year at the Grande Prairie Friendship Centre and a hometown hero by the City of Grande Prairie, along with receiving the Governor General's Award.

She credits her upbringing in the North with instilling in her the need for people to help each other.

"That has never left me," she said. "That was something we were taught as children."

However, Mercredi-Crerar and her two sisters spent many years in residential school after their mother died.

"While I was there, I learned a lot," she recalled. "I learned that people could be cruel. I learned that people could be hypocrites. I learn that people didn't care about you, that you were alone. You had to stand alone against the world."

Mercredi-Crerar said, in Grande Prairie, she had to learn life skills and take workshops to build back her self-esteem and her identity to recover from the residential school experience.

'You can't live in the past," she said. "Take the good out of it and leave the negative behind."

Mercredi-Crerar was born in Fort Resolution in 1936 and her family moved to Rocher River when she was three. In 1945, the family relocated to Yellowknife.

It was there that she eventually married and began a family. She and her husband now have 11 children, 23 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Mercredi-Crerar noted her children and grandchildren are also volunteering.

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