Leonard Skye is being remembered as a ground breaker who lived with humour and grace.
Skye, an influential elder and community educator from Eagle Lake First Nation who was the first Indigenous person to teach at Dryden High School and later served as director of education in his home community, died on Saturday at the age of 73.
Lloyd Napish, a band councillor for Eagle Lake First Nation and a close friend, said Skye was an important figure in the lives of many people.
“He was such a ground breaker in so many ways," Napish said on Tuesday. "He very much brought the culture and ways of life and language to our local classrooms in the region. In a time when it was very new, dare I say, even kind of dangerous to do so he did so kind of passionately and always unapologetically.”
“He was a fellow that you could always go to for sage advice and encouragement in times you really needed it. He was such a strong man in the culture and spirituality.”
Skye was a life long member of Eagle Lake, and was a survivor of St. Mary’s Indian Residential School. He went to university for native language studies. Skye served as the director of education in Eagle Lake, ending his career as a native language teacher in the community said Napish.
In 2015, the Dryden Area Anti-Racism Network honoured Skye by naming an award after him and selecting him as its first recipient. According to the network, the Leonard Skye Building Bridges Award recognizes a person, group or business showing leadership for diversity, respect, harmony, equality, humility for others, and “recognizes the importance of human dignity and self-esteem and the equality of all peoples.”
Dryden High School, where Skye started the Mini Pow Wow over 25 years ago, also renamed the event in his honour.
“I was emceeing that pow pow that time and I was joking around with the people, I’m never going to hear the end of this, that he got a pow wow named after him, he’s going to be texting me every morning going like: Hey! I’ve got a pow wow named after me,” Napish said.
Napish said Eagle Lake First Nation has been holding a wake this week and will have a traditional funeral along with a traditional burial on Wednesday.
“Because he was such a profound person in the community and one of the greatest educators in the community, we do have a memorial planned in the coming weeks where we will be holding a feast and we’ll be inviting dignitaries and community members,” Napish said.
“We plan to complete one of his final initiatives which was implementing a round house at the [school],” said Napish. “It’s very much near completion, so once that’s kind of up all and running we plan to name the roundhouse in his honour. We’ll put a nice plaque up. Again we plan on having a very fitting ceremony for a man of that stature.”
