Dave Sullivan
Northern News Services

Hay River (Jan 28/02) - Mary Norn will be 84 in March. She's seen all the changes in Hay River, and remembers when life wasn't quite as easy.

Supplies used to arrive by barge three times a year, and in between the local Bay store would run out of things like tobacco and tea.

Mary Norn is known for her beautiful craftwork, and she used to teach others to build teepees. - Dave Sullivan/NNSL photo

During those times, Mary used to watch her grandmother peel back a red willow sapling that was retrieved in swampy parts of the bush. The first few layers of a branch were peeled off. After being cured under the wood stove, the shavings made excellent tobacco.

She recalls hearing the stories about how her elders lived.

"They had to make their own candles and bread but there wasn't always something to eat."

Lake fish were a staple, and some of their oil was burned for light. Cleaning was helped with a mixture of fish oil and ashes, to make lye.

"There wasn't anything sweet back then. My father made rabbit stew. There was the fish and loads of meat but nothing sweet."

Norn remembers looking forward to eating cakes made by the Anglican missionaries.

Mary is known in the region for her craftwork. Over the years she made countless parkas, mukluks, mitts and other clothes featuring beadwork. She even used to teach others how to build teepees.

Hard of hearing now, Mary's in good shape except for surgery coming up she hopes will clear blood clots in her wrist.

The Norn's have been living in the South Slave for a long time. Mary's grandfather Robert came over from Scotland in the 1800s, and married a Stoney woman from southern Alberta. She had wanted to leave the North, but on her way home froze to death on the lake.

Her father Charlie built Hay River's huge Anglican mission in 1919, and worked there 52 years.

A shoebox in her comfortable home is filled with very old black and white snapshots of people from way back. Norn never married, but had a daughter and adopted another daughter and a son.

"I was going to marry a guy but he wouldn't join the Pentecostal Church so I said goodbye." Mary had left the Anglican Church when a minister arrived who she didn't like too much.