Derek Neary
Northern News Services

Fort Simpson (June 28/02) - With one ill-timed power outage on Friday, hundreds of years of Deh Cho history was wiped out, at least temporarily.

Ray Michaud set up his computer, which embodied more than 12 years' worth of genealogical work, in a tent at the Fort Simpson Papal site as part of Aboriginal Day celebrations last week. He didn't have all that information on paper because, at 250 pages per binder, it would have taken roughly 200 binders to log it all.

"It's a major loss, but it's not totally gone," a philosophical Michaud said, adding that he's sure someone will know how to recover his files.

He began dabbling in family histories in 1990 when he picked up a computer program called Roots. He started off by researching his own lineage and then his wife's side of the family.

"My tree turned into a wild bush," he joked.

"Before you know it I was sitting back and I said, 'Geez, I've got all the native families in there.' My major intent was to record the Slavey people of the area."

He acquired the information verbally, from various archives, by reading books and reviewing genealogical documents produced by others. His records -- amassed in his spare time without any grants or financial assistance -- date back as far as the late 1700s.

There are still many missing pieces to the puzzle, however. The research is complicated by variations in spelling, such as one Slavey woman whose name was recorded 14 different ways, noted Michaud, a plumber who works for the territorial government.

He has been able to help people who had been looking in vain for ancestral data for over a decade.

"It's enlightening to be able to assist someone to find his identity," he said. "It's also satisfying when you hear of someone who has been trying to do the research for years and years and years to prove he's a Dene descendant, and I can do it in a matter of minutes."