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Eagle's Earth - Giving a Voice to an Ancient Heritage

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Project History

Attracted by an abundance of wildlife, pristine lakes and rivers, the Nagagamisis Central Plateau has been inhabited by Native people long before the advent of recorded history. The Plateau is an oasis, not only for wildlife, but also for the First Nations of the Cree and Ojibway cultures.

In the late 1990s, as part of a world objective to reduce global warming, the United Nations passed a motion of which Canada was the first signatory with an objective to preserve an additional 12% of the world's forests. The Government of Canada, specifically, the Province of Ontario designated nine Signature Sites in order to meet their commitment to the U.N. as well as preserving some of Ontario's significant natural environments.

In the summer of 2001, a sizable field expedition lead by Dr. John Pollock added to the research of previous site investigations. In conjunction with the Ministry of Natural Resources, Constance Lake and Hornpayne First Nations, the team undertook an assessment of high potential heritage areas within the existing and proposed expansion area of Nagagamisis Provincial Park. A total of 14 prehistoric archaeological sites and 20 heritage value sites were found.

The Nagagamisis Central Plateau

The Nagagamisis Central Plateau was identified as one of nine featured areas in the province established under Ontario's Living Legacy Land Use Strategy as having a tremendously unique and provincially significant natural and cultural heritage value.

The Plateau was one of the nine Ontario sites because of the following intrinsic values and unique features that exist in the area:

• Identification of over 50 pre-historical Archaeological Sites. The potential for many more finds exists, as the area once served as a regional population centre based around the lakes. There are many years of research yet to be performed, and the resulting collection of artifacts and knowledge will provide a substantive base of archaeological material for tourism and academia.
• Identification and carbon dating of a 7,000 year-old site and artifact found at the location of Eagle's Earth.
• Some 20 Significant Cultural Value Sites both historical and pre-historical.
• Colonies of Culturally Modified Trees. These trees were used to create household implements out of wood prior to European contact and the introduction of steel. Objects were fashioned out of a section of a living tree, cut in such a fashion as to allow the tree to survive and recover from the excision. One Culturally Modified Tree located in the Plateau is believed to be between 300 and 400 years old.
• Extensive natural scenery/environment with several interesting topographical/geological features. The Shekak River provides a magnificent backdrop to the centre while providing scenic rapids and level three and four white water rafting and canoeing.
• Colony of eagles living within the plateau and near Eagle's Earth Cree and Ojibway Historical Centre.
• Specifically protected groves of Ash and Cedar colonies considered of major significance.
• Wild Rice beds that historically served as the major regional suppliers to pre-contact inhabitants of Northern Ontario.
• Birch colonies that historically served as major regional suppliers of birch bark to the Mushkegowuk Cree of James and Hudson Bays to the north and the Ojibways of the Great Lakes to the south.
• Identification of the traditional First Nations inhabitants of the Nagagamisis plateau prior to the forced relocation of 1952 to established reserves by the Government of Canada and the creation of provincial parks.

Cree for "Lake with fine, sandy shores", Nagagamisis has a diverse and largely undocumented history and prehistory. The Nagagamisis Central Plateau site represents one of the most noteworthy time capsules of First Nation history in the province. It is here that the promise of Eagle's Earth was born.