August 27, 2021 • 31 mins
Edith Monture, the first Indigenous woman to become a registered nurse in Canada, is the first of the day.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is any in Samantha. I talking to stuff.
I never told your production of I Heart Radio. And
we're so excited today to be talking about another female first,
which means we are once again joined by our good
(00:26):
friend Eves Hive. Eves, did you eat the rest of
the cheesecake? Yes, very quickly, go by like it was
gone the next day, and it was very delicious. But
I think it's we helped because I definitely took some homes.
I'm gonna take a little bit home as well, and
then a little bit kept getting a bit when you
(00:47):
didn't have a whole cake. But I didn't think about that,
and I was like, huh, I wonder how long how
much it is gone? I'm sure, well it's been a month,
so surely God all of it's gone. But I'm just saying,
but yeah, I like, I really want to go back
and get some. I'm not on that side of town,
but I'm like, I need to take a trip over
there just to get some cheesecake. Yes, I have a
(01:11):
random question for your Eaves. What's your favorite season? I
would say summer because I've been saying summer for a
long time, but I think that might be like otto
and gray did me as a person who is conditioned
to not have school during the summer. But I love
hot weather. So, like I've thought about it, I'm like,
I feel like that late springtime is like the temperature
(01:33):
is really nice, then everything's in bloom during spring. Spring
is also I'm like a spring baby. I was born
right on the cusp of winter spring, right at the
beginning of spring, so it's a really beautiful season. But
I still think summer is it because the sweltering heat
is It's just something about it that makes me just
like really appreciate everything to do with, like the outdoors
(01:55):
and just like being all of everything, even though it's
kind of oppressive sometimes the heat. But yeah, I say summer.
I would say, my officially answer is summer. Okay, so
this is like your prime time it is, yes, Wow,
I think you know, one of the few people that
I know would actually say summer, especially of those of
us in Georgia where summer feels like it's half the
(02:16):
year with all the bugs and humidity. But wow, yeah, okay, right,
there is also, Yes, there are a lot of elements
of it being summer that I don't like, being the
bugs that you just mentioned like the spiders that build
their webs overnight. I'm always running into spiders in my
yard and just like cursing all the books that are
out but right' it's worth it to me, Like the
(02:37):
pros outweigh the cons. I like it. I say this
because I'm being bitten right now. I just dont two
new bug buys on my legs, so that means there's
a bug inside my house eating me as we speak.
They're rude like that, They really are so rude. The
bugs are rude. You're right, what about y'all? Oh? I
(02:58):
I used to love summer, but I think once I
was not a student, and that didn't mean you have
like three months off. That changed Now I love fall.
And that's kind of why I was asking, is because
we're in like in Georgia, the distinction isn't quite as
clear or as early as it is for a lot
of other places. But we're kind of on that place
(03:20):
where a lot of people are talking about fall. But
it's still like ninety degrees outside, right, So, and we
were just talking about how you know, dates and times
still feel strange. So it's just odd to me that
people are talking about a lot of fall things now
and some people are already doing their healthy shopping. Cracks
me up that I might, yeah, but it's ninety degrees
(03:40):
at this current moment. Yeah, but the nights, so the
nights are where you can tell a little bit of
a difference. Is starting to get a little bit more
cool cooler. And some people have been asking me about
horror movies. They're like, when are you gonna start your
horror movies? And I'm like, well, I don't really stop
because this timeline here's Samantha. You and I watched hocus Pocus.
(04:03):
It was my birthday and we were like, let's kick off.
That made you watch The Heathers too, which is a
little more dark like Fall slash Halloween Ish did for sure.
Apparently my niece, who is twenty years younger than me,
her and her friend group dressed up as the Heathers,
and I was like, how do you how do you
even know? How do you know this? What is happening? Yeah?
(04:27):
I am a Fall person as well. I think that
has everything to do with there's something about for me.
School started actually in Fall, like in that time frame,
so I think of the newness of that my birthday,
other people's birthday is typically that I know are in
the fall area. And then, yeah, Halloween was not a
big part of my life growing up. It's like I
(04:47):
like the candy bit, but I don't love the dressing
up bit that that's still not something that I love,
mainly because I'm not creative and I don't invest a
lot of money in it because I'm like, I'm not
paying two d dollars to dress up as character for
one day. Of course I'm not in that world so
that that's all new. But like horror movie and all
of that, definitely, but I'm also like you were out.
(05:08):
I can watch that oneever and I employ it and
I just want to have more of it. But I
love cardigans like nobody's business, and I will wear the
hell up. I'm still wearing a poncho during summer, so
I will keep wearing them. But knowing that it's appropriate
during this time makes me even happier. Yeah, coats are
my favorite article of clothing and it used to be
(05:30):
a running joke among my friends is that I have
more coats than like anything else, Like I don't have
enough coats for the number of like pants or anything. Like.
I just love a good coat also use Okay, this
is a great question. Samantha and I have talked about
it a lot, so we don't need to answer, but
out of curiosity before we get into this episode, were
you ever interested in going into the medical field? No? Never,
(05:55):
no never, short answer, Um, Samantha, I both were very brief,
but well, I won't say very good country. Yeah. Um,
I thought I had a plan, but it died very quickly.
My I was like, almost throughout all of my primary education,
I thought I was going to go into medical field,
but then high school senior year, I was like, never mind. Yeah,
(06:19):
I was pretty I was staunched writing from the beginning,
and it's pretty much never never swayed from that. I mean,
I mean that's that's not completely true, because I was
into fashion for a minute. I had other tangential things,
but like writing was always the central focus, right, Yeah,
but probably all for being interested in medicine or medical field,
(06:40):
because it is like it's fascinating to me, but it
is above me, for sure. It's a lot. It's a lot.
Samantha and I hung out with somebody this weekend who
was in the nursing field and just hearing her talk
about it and like she was like taking tests over it.
I was like, yeah, that is difficult. But the reason
(07:01):
I wanted to ask is because the first she bought
for us today was involved in the medical field. So
who did you bring for as eaves? Yes, So today
we're gonna be talking about Charlotte Edith Anderson Montour, who
usually is just referred to as Edith's Montour. She was
the first Indigenous Canadian woman to become a registered nurse,
(07:24):
and she was reported to be the first first Nations
woman to gain the right to vote in a Canadian
federal election. For some reason, my mind is totally blanked.
And was like, you know, you know when you hear
a word and you think that's correct, isn't it? And
then your brain is like is it It's like Canadian,
it's not Canadian. And then I was like, no, but
(07:45):
it is Canadian. I is thrown in there. You have
to go before the A, right. I can see how.
It's not like I don't use that word or see
that word regularly. I don't know why my brain just
flipped out about that very interesting story reading into this one,
(08:17):
Um and Samantha, you were talking about you were reading
some of the journal entries that you found. So this
one is just another fascinating story that I'm kind of
angry I hadn't heard about earlier. Yeah, and it's really
not a ton that's very easily accessible out there about her.
I think that's because there's not much documentation of it.
(08:41):
But it's definitely worth talking about. You know, we haven't
really gotten into that many indigenous Native American first on
the show, so I think it's great that we're going
to be able to get into one today. And I
think we also we haven't We've like Maryann shaq Carry,
I feel like we've gotten into some Canadian history. But
it I'm happy to bring that to the table today
(09:02):
because I like to, you know, try to keep a
variety of people from different cultural backgrounds and ethnic backgrounds
and nationality. So yeah, I'm really excited about that. And two,
I didn't know anything about her either, So yeah, I'm
really excited to get into her story today. So I
think that the history of women nursing in North America,
(09:25):
and specifically the history of Indigenous women in nursing in
North America and Canada is like a very rich history.
It's something that I didn't know much about, but it
seems like like a place that you can really delve
deep into because there are so many ten drils that
it connects to, you know, the history of war, which
we'll get into this episode, the history of medical practices
(09:48):
and healing practices and Indigenous communities and also medicinal practices themselves.
It's just it touches so many different things. So I
think it's really fascinating to talk about, you know, think
about those different histories all melded into one, and Edith
Montour is definitely a part of that. She was born
(10:10):
on April tenth, ninety and Oschweigen and Six Nations of
the Grand River, which is the largest First Nations reserve
in Canada, which is located in southwestern Ontario. So it's
the only First Nations reserve in North America that includes
all six holding O Shawny Nations, which is it's an
alliance among the six Native American nations that sometimes called
(10:34):
the Iroquois Confederacy. Edith Montur was a member of the
Mohawk Nation and the Mohawker the easternmost nation in Honor
O'shawny territory. So Edith was the youngest of eight children.
She went to day school in the reserve and she
got her high school diploma at Brantford Collegiate Institute. And
(10:57):
once she graduated, she tried to apply to nursing schools
in Ontario, but she wasn't accepted to any of those schools.
So this is where we get into the Indian Act
in Canada, which was passed in eighteen seventy six, and
it's still in effect today, though it's been through many iterations,
(11:19):
many amendments, so it doesn't look like it looked in
eighteen seventy six. Obviously a lot about it has changed
in that in that time period. But it defines who
is a so called Indian, which was who had Indian
status under the Act. It gave the federal government authority
over registered Indians and over reserve communities. And it's part
(11:44):
of just a longstanding effort to assimilate First Nations people
into Canadian society by devaluing their distinct political, economic, and
cultural practices. So I think we talked about this before,
but a lot of more things happening in the United
States as well. Um when it comes to efforts to
assimilating I think we may have mentioned before, boarding schools
(12:07):
and things that were specifically built and enacted in policy
to remove and strip Native Americans, in Indigenous peoples of
their of their own practices, their language, their ways of dressing,
all of the things um and to make them quote
(12:28):
unquote less savage, not my words, but less savage and
more civilized. And this was the case with the Indian
Act in Canada as well. So as part of it,
women were barred from voting and running in chief and
council elections under the Act. And they also had to
deal with the issue of enfranchisement, which in this case
(12:52):
is the process by which Indigenous peoples would lose their
Indian status under the Act and become full Canadian citizens.
And that's related to this conversation in many ways, but
it's related to education specifically, where any Indians who got
a university degree or became a professional like a doctor
(13:15):
or lawyer would lose their status as an Indian. Enfranchisement
meant that Indigenous peoples would have to throw away their
cultural and legal identities and couldn't pass along their Indian
status to their children. So First Nations people were enfranchised
for getting a university education. They also work for things
(13:36):
like serving in the Canadian Armed Forces, for marrying non
Indian men, and for leaving reserves for long periods, so
on and so forth. And I'd also like to just
call out that Indigenous people have also had always had
their own caregiving practices in their own communities. So I
don't want to make it seem like the history of
Indigenous healers in Canada starts with Edith montor like she's
(13:59):
one part of the long history of healing practices within
Indigenous communities, and also of like in a line of
Indigenous nurses and people who acted as midwives and all
these sorts of different caretaking. There's also accounts of Indigenous
women who served as nurses and midwives to colonizers. So
(14:19):
it's not like she is the beginning of all of
this conversation, but she is a pioneer in the history
of Indigenous women who nursed in this way in Canada
in the United States, because she's as well get into
she was in the United States for a bit or
came to the United States, but on top of the
assimilating policy suppressing Indigenous healing practices, Indigenous women were also
(14:43):
largely barred from nursing programs in Canada until the early
to mid nineteen hundreds, so Montor herself was barred from
pursuing professional training in Canada. She was rejected from schools
without even getting interviews, and so many Indigenous women would
(15:04):
go to the US to get professional training, so that's
exactly what she did. She turned to the United States,
where she was accepted too and began attending New Rochelle
Nursing School in New York. She graduated and became a
registered nurse in nineteen fourteen, which is the first, so
she became the first Indigenous woman who's a registered nurse
(15:25):
in Canada. So when she was asked why she became
a nurse, she just said it was something to do.
The way that it seems like it's been explained by
family members is that like she kind of downplayed her
achievements and like the things her status as a pioneer,
you know. So yeah, she was then hired as a
nurse at a private school in New Rochelle, and she
(15:49):
joined the war effort for World War One in nineteen seventeen,
and in that she joined the Westchester County Unit B
of the American Expeditionary Forces Army Medical cores. So, after
more training in New York, she left for France in
February of nineteen eighteen. She stopped in Halifax, Nova Scotia,
(16:09):
and she arrived in France on March six. So just
for some numbers. During World War One, there were more
than twenty hundred nurses who served in the Canadian Army
Medical Core or the CIMC. SO service in the CIMC
required women to be white, to have British citizenship and
(16:30):
quote unquote high moral character, physical fitness, and to be
between the ages of one and thirty eight. So a
number of Indigenous women did serve as nurses in the
Army Nurse Corps and the American Red Cross stateside and overseas.
In France during the war. There are twelve Indigenous women
(16:51):
who have been identify as doing so, but more its
thoughts that more of them did actually serve. It's just
that the record keeping is there for who those people were.
But as we can't imagine like they were definitely more,
they were definitely more. Yeah. So Edith volunteered and worked
as a nurse at based Hospital twenty three m v Tail,
(17:11):
France for more than a year. She was responsible for
treating soldiers who were shot or a guest, and she
sometimes worked at other medical centers in France as well,
which you mentioned earlier that Samantha. You read some of
her diary entries. Yes, yeah, she kept a journal. What
(17:32):
did you read? So essentially I've only got through a
little bit, but it kind of reads as if it's
like a nineteen twenties, nineteen tens kind of movie when
you were in New York and living that life. She
talks about getting legend gimbals. She talks about going to Hoboken,
going out with friends, writing letters to people saying farewell.
So she was prepping while working there, prepping to leave
(17:54):
apparently from what I could gather, because they started in
nineteen eighteen, So the diary was actual really handed down
their family and her daughter Helen, who she also has
a friend named Helen. In the diary, we read her
daughter Helen kept it and preserved it, and it was
so fragile that they had actually sent it off to
have it typed up, and they gave it to all
(18:15):
of the descendants, all of her descendants so they could
have a copee to say what it was like. I
saw that they sent it off to the Modern Literature
and Culture Research Center in Toronto as well. Yea, yes.
The thing that I really liked about this, of course,
as y'all already not really love, like the just reading
these people's stories and the fact that some people had
(18:36):
the like, the thought or just were interested in recording
their own stories, which we have from her, which I'm
just grateful for, because she had a diary that we
even haccess too, because she didn't have to do that, right,
but it was her. It was just before she died,
is when her granddaughter transcribed the diary, and thankfully they
(18:57):
didn't make it available to us, the portions that they
didn't make available, but it was she died not that
long after lived a long time by the way. Yeah,
but the diary is, yeah, it's it's really cool to see.
Like I I liked how much she talked about the weather,
(19:18):
which I feel like she's talking about it so much.
She's just like a sunny day, beautiful day in cloudy day,
and I love her. I also liked how she's just
like nothing happened today, uneventful. I wrote letters like that's
how like, yeah, I get that I stayed in. I'm
glad to know that I'm not the only one someone
who made so much history just had a day when
(19:39):
they just stayed in. Yeah. So it made me feel
a little bright. And more times she was like uneventful,
didn't do much. It was cloudy today. Yeah, I do like.
I like how mundane it is. And and just to
you know, go through that kind of day by day
with her, even though every day isn't in there, he said.
(20:00):
It started. Her entries began in January of nineteen eighteen,
and they ended after the armistice in nineteen nineteen. And
(20:20):
I will read a couple of entries from the journal
to just so y'all get to hear a little bit
of what she wrote. So, while she was serving there,
she befriended a patient, one of the I guess more
notable or one that's been talked about a lot in
the articles that are written about her, Earl King, who
was a soldier from Iowa. And she said in her
diary entry on June sixteenth, nineteen eighteen, quote my pet patient,
(20:44):
Earl King, who adopted me for his big sister, died
at this a m at seven fifteen had hemorrhage at
three fifteen am. The poor boy lost consciousness immediately. My
heart was broken, cried most of the day and could
not sleep. That's the end of the quote. She was
pretty upset when he died, and she wrote to his parents,
(21:04):
and his parents visited her. She visited them, and they
struck up kind of a friendship. So that's one of
the more I guess things that she didn't really write
a ton about specific soldiers in her diary Injuries, and
she in a later interview she did say about her
experience in the war. We would walk right over where
(21:27):
there had been fighting. It was an awful site. Buildings
and rubble, trees, burnt, spent shells all over the place.
Whole town's blown up. She didn't really talk a ton
about discrimination that she faced or the difficulties of war,
but she does say in her last journal injury quote,
(21:47):
when we looked over the shell torn fields and think
of the millions of dollars in property destroyed, to say
nothing of the tremendous loss of life. We cannot wonder
that in France they bury the dit facing the north,
even in death, they dare not turn their backs on Germany.
A bit of sentiment, of course, but who can blame them?
So Edith returned to North America and soon went back
(22:11):
to the Six Nations Reserved in Canada, where she married
Clay brand Montour in nineteen twenty. They had five children,
which were budd, Helen, Ron, Don, and Gilbert. Although Gilbert
died as an infant in nineteen twenty nine, she continued
her nursing career and she worked as a nurse and
(22:34):
a midwife at the Lady Willington Hospital on the Reserve
until nineteen fifty five, and in nineteen thirty nine she
was elected honorary President of the Oswegan Red Cross, so
Yeah her nurse, saying she continued to do what she did,
which was nurse on the reservation, and as the nineteen
(22:57):
seventeen Military Service Act had given wartime nurses the right
to vote, that's where the other first came in, where
she was the first female status Indian and registered band
member to gain the right to vote in a Canadian
federal election, although Indigenous women in general weren't able to
(23:18):
legally vote federally without losing their Indian status until nineteen
sixty and her son mentioned that he remembers other veterans
encouraging her to vote in federal elections with them. Her daughter,
who Samantha brought up earlier, Helen, was a founding member
of the National Aboriginal Nurses Association, which is now known
(23:40):
as the Canadian Indigenous Nurses Association. But yeah, Edith continued
to serve until she retired, and in nine, like Samantha said,
they transcribed the diary and Edith herself died on April third, nineteen,
which is just before or her hundred and sixth birthday,
(24:02):
And she was buried on the Six Nations Reserve and
there is a memory of her and there, Edith Monter
Avenue in Brantford, Ontario is named after her, and there's
a park there that's named after her as well. So
she is What I'm trying to say is she is
recognized for her work in her pioneering status as an
(24:26):
Indigenous woman in nursing in Canada. Yeah, and I think
so much of this story is emblematic for what we
were talking about in our cheesecake champagne celebration of these
first of somebody like you said, she's like, well something
to do, Like she wasn't in it necessarily, like was
kind of shy about talking about her first or you know,
(24:49):
was just wasn't talking about it that much, but was
just doing it and then having I love that she
kept this journal that we can read. That's something I
personally really enjoy is when people are yeah, even if
there's nothing really to report, you report it and just
like yep, you know, because I think it gives you
a full picture of their experience as we do like
(25:09):
build up, Oh, here's there first, but there's a whole
life and a person behind that that didn't have plenty
of mundane days or did go to you know, gimbals
for lunch and like it was exciting. So I really
enjoy that aspect. Looking to her story, Yeah, me too.
I'm really appreciative of it, I mean, and happy that,
like you know, the family made it available for us
(25:32):
to be able to read. And also just it wasn't
that long ago when she passed away, So just to
think about this first happening in such recent history, and
to know that she also has a living legacy is
(25:52):
it's nice to know and that you know, her work
people like me and you know, the three of Us
is still being uncovered and you know, we can talk
about it within the framework of the rest of Indigenous
American and North American history, just like it's involved in
so much. So yeah, I think it's super cool. Yeah
(26:15):
for sure, and that that was interesting too, where sometimes
i'll hear first tonight, I'm trying to like have a
context before I look it up, like when was that,
and I'm like, oh, wow, I'm pretty recent. But yeah,
once again, Eves, we bought a great story. Thank you
so much for bringing it to your attention. Is there
(26:35):
anything else before we wrap up? That's all? Thank you
again for having me. Always loved being here. So oh yes,
could y'all imagine? Though? I have to ask, like, do
you think she imagined that we would be reading and
it would be published her journal? Because for me, my
thought is, oh my god, I die, don't read my journal. Yes,
(26:59):
I've had this converse before. Yeah, I don't want people
to read my diary. I was I was thinking about
that when I was reading hers, and yeah, you know,
I know there's some stuff that was out right, I
hope so you need. I wondered to what degree there
was self censorship as well when she was actually writing
(27:19):
right her diary. Of course she knew she was going
to war. I know that that. Yeah, I think you'd
already covered the fact that you know people who went
off the assumptions you're not you're probably not going to
come back if you're going to be there. And so
perhaps she was doing this in order to have a
lasting memory, for someone to keep that record so she
(27:40):
could exist. But yeah, in my head, I'm like, please,
don't read my diaries, don't don't read my journal I
kinda keep that locked. Don't do that. But they're so embarrassing, exactly.
We've talked about that. When I was growing up, I
had a diary and it had like a little key
and I, you know, lock it that you could have
just like kicked that lock, just like ripped it a little,
(28:03):
strapped that one across the journey, but it was all
like this past again today, like I lost, But I
wasn't ready for you to mention that one. It's true. Yeah,
So for those who are interested in finding the actual
diaries as they put it up, I found it on
(28:24):
War Diaries dot c A if anybody wants to go
and read, because it is it feels very I feel
like I'm I'm understand like, without knowing any context of
where she's at, it feels like I'm there a little
bit with her crew of nurses, I start going about
their day because she makes sure to talk about all
of the nurses around her, people around her and sharing
her experiences, so she should definitely go read it. But
(28:46):
it's very interesting. Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, I unfortunately burned
my diary, but I wish I really didn't want anybody
to read yours then I really and you know, looking back,
and it was fine, it's okay, but they can laugh
at my boy ast any day. And yeah, that's the thing.
(29:09):
They're my diaries. Aren't this well partitioned? You know, like
everything is in there, so while you might be able
to read one page, the next one is something I
probably wouldn't want to share with anybody. That's why you
need a good You need a good friend to go
through it first, and you're like, okay, she'd be fine
with this, can burn this forever, but like this section
(29:33):
is okay, yeah, min not illustrations in it and everything. Yes, well,
thanks so much as always eased for being here. Where
can the good listeners find you? You can find me
on Instagram at not Apologizing, also on Twitter at Eaves
(29:54):
Jeff cote Um. You can go back and listen to
episodes of This Day and History Class, which talks about
people in history and different events on days in History
by the Day, and on the podcast Unpopular, which is
about people in history who were persecuted for the actions
that they were taking. Yes, and also on this very show,
(30:17):
so many, many many episodes of Female First on this
here very show called stuff Mom Never Told You. We're
estimating that it's twenty six. Yeah, well we'll get ready
for our fiftieth More cheesecake, more champagne. Absolutely, okta upgrade
and maybe just do a whole like tear of cheesecakes
or something. Yes, gets bigger fireworks coming out at the top.
(30:42):
Our boss Wiel lovers, Well, we did have kind of
a big send off with the champagne bottle. The last
one true went off while recording. So yeah, and listeners.
If you would like to find us, you can. You
can email us at stuffing to your mom stuff at
i heeart media dot com. You can find its on
what are at mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram at
(31:02):
stuff I Ever Told You. Thanks as always to your
super producer Christina, thank you and thanks to you for listening.
Stuff I Never Told You production of iHeart radio. For
more podcast from my iHeart Radio, visit theear radio app,
Apple podcast or where you listen to your favorite show.
Hey, this is any in Samantha. I talking to stuff.
I never told your production of I Heart Radio. And
we're so excited today to be talking about another female first,
which means we are once again joined by our good
(00:26):
friend Eves Hive. Eves, did you eat the rest of
the cheesecake? Yes, very quickly, go by like it was
gone the next day, and it was very delicious. But
I think it's we helped because I definitely took some homes.
I'm gonna take a little bit home as well, and
then a little bit kept getting a bit when you
(00:47):
didn't have a whole cake. But I didn't think about that,
and I was like, huh, I wonder how long how
much it is gone? I'm sure, well it's been a month,
so surely God all of it's gone. But I'm just saying,
but yeah, I like, I really want to go back
and get some. I'm not on that side of town,
but I'm like, I need to take a trip over
there just to get some cheesecake. Yes, I have a
(01:11):
random question for your Eaves. What's your favorite season? I
would say summer because I've been saying summer for a
long time, but I think that might be like otto
and gray did me as a person who is conditioned
to not have school during the summer. But I love
hot weather. So, like I've thought about it, I'm like,
I feel like that late springtime is like the temperature
(01:33):
is really nice, then everything's in bloom during spring. Spring
is also I'm like a spring baby. I was born
right on the cusp of winter spring, right at the
beginning of spring, so it's a really beautiful season. But
I still think summer is it because the sweltering heat
is It's just something about it that makes me just
like really appreciate everything to do with, like the outdoors
(01:55):
and just like being all of everything, even though it's
kind of oppressive sometimes the heat. But yeah, I say summer.
I would say, my officially answer is summer. Okay, so
this is like your prime time it is, yes, Wow,
I think you know, one of the few people that
I know would actually say summer, especially of those of
us in Georgia where summer feels like it's half the
(02:16):
year with all the bugs and humidity. But wow, yeah, okay, right,
there is also, Yes, there are a lot of elements
of it being summer that I don't like, being the
bugs that you just mentioned like the spiders that build
their webs overnight. I'm always running into spiders in my
yard and just like cursing all the books that are
out but right' it's worth it to me, Like the
(02:37):
pros outweigh the cons. I like it. I say this
because I'm being bitten right now. I just dont two
new bug buys on my legs, so that means there's
a bug inside my house eating me as we speak.
They're rude like that, They really are so rude. The
bugs are rude. You're right, what about y'all? Oh? I
(02:58):
I used to love summer, but I think once I
was not a student, and that didn't mean you have
like three months off. That changed Now I love fall.
And that's kind of why I was asking, is because
we're in like in Georgia, the distinction isn't quite as
clear or as early as it is for a lot
of other places. But we're kind of on that place
(03:20):
where a lot of people are talking about fall. But
it's still like ninety degrees outside, right, So, and we
were just talking about how you know, dates and times
still feel strange. So it's just odd to me that
people are talking about a lot of fall things now
and some people are already doing their healthy shopping. Cracks
me up that I might, yeah, but it's ninety degrees
(03:40):
at this current moment. Yeah, but the nights, so the
nights are where you can tell a little bit of
a difference. Is starting to get a little bit more
cool cooler. And some people have been asking me about
horror movies. They're like, when are you gonna start your
horror movies? And I'm like, well, I don't really stop
because this timeline here's Samantha. You and I watched hocus Pocus.
(04:03):
It was my birthday and we were like, let's kick off.
That made you watch The Heathers too, which is a
little more dark like Fall slash Halloween Ish did for sure.
Apparently my niece, who is twenty years younger than me,
her and her friend group dressed up as the Heathers,
and I was like, how do you how do you
even know? How do you know this? What is happening? Yeah?
(04:27):
I am a Fall person as well. I think that
has everything to do with there's something about for me.
School started actually in Fall, like in that time frame,
so I think of the newness of that my birthday,
other people's birthday is typically that I know are in
the fall area. And then, yeah, Halloween was not a
big part of my life growing up. It's like I
(04:47):
like the candy bit, but I don't love the dressing
up bit that that's still not something that I love,
mainly because I'm not creative and I don't invest a
lot of money in it because I'm like, I'm not
paying two d dollars to dress up as character for
one day. Of course I'm not in that world so
that that's all new. But like horror movie and all
of that, definitely, but I'm also like you were out.
(05:08):
I can watch that oneever and I employ it and
I just want to have more of it. But I
love cardigans like nobody's business, and I will wear the
hell up. I'm still wearing a poncho during summer, so
I will keep wearing them. But knowing that it's appropriate
during this time makes me even happier. Yeah, coats are
my favorite article of clothing and it used to be
(05:30):
a running joke among my friends is that I have
more coats than like anything else, Like I don't have
enough coats for the number of like pants or anything. Like.
I just love a good coat also use Okay, this
is a great question. Samantha and I have talked about
it a lot, so we don't need to answer, but
out of curiosity before we get into this episode, were
you ever interested in going into the medical field? No? Never,
(05:55):
no never, short answer, Um, Samantha, I both were very brief,
but well, I won't say very good country. Yeah. Um,
I thought I had a plan, but it died very quickly.
My I was like, almost throughout all of my primary education,
I thought I was going to go into medical field,
but then high school senior year, I was like, never mind. Yeah,
(06:19):
I was pretty I was staunched writing from the beginning,
and it's pretty much never never swayed from that. I mean,
I mean that's that's not completely true, because I was
into fashion for a minute. I had other tangential things,
but like writing was always the central focus, right, Yeah,
but probably all for being interested in medicine or medical field,
(06:40):
because it is like it's fascinating to me, but it
is above me, for sure. It's a lot. It's a lot.
Samantha and I hung out with somebody this weekend who
was in the nursing field and just hearing her talk
about it and like she was like taking tests over it.
I was like, yeah, that is difficult. But the reason
(07:01):
I wanted to ask is because the first she bought
for us today was involved in the medical field. So
who did you bring for as eaves? Yes, So today
we're gonna be talking about Charlotte Edith Anderson Montour, who
usually is just referred to as Edith's Montour. She was
the first Indigenous Canadian woman to become a registered nurse,
(07:24):
and she was reported to be the first first Nations
woman to gain the right to vote in a Canadian
federal election. For some reason, my mind is totally blanked.
And was like, you know, you know when you hear
a word and you think that's correct, isn't it? And
then your brain is like is it It's like Canadian,
it's not Canadian. And then I was like, no, but
(07:45):
it is Canadian. I is thrown in there. You have
to go before the A, right. I can see how.
It's not like I don't use that word or see
that word regularly. I don't know why my brain just
flipped out about that very interesting story reading into this one,
(08:17):
Um and Samantha, you were talking about you were reading
some of the journal entries that you found. So this
one is just another fascinating story that I'm kind of
angry I hadn't heard about earlier. Yeah, and it's really
not a ton that's very easily accessible out there about her.
I think that's because there's not much documentation of it.
(08:41):
But it's definitely worth talking about. You know, we haven't
really gotten into that many indigenous Native American first on
the show, so I think it's great that we're going
to be able to get into one today. And I
think we also we haven't We've like Maryann shaq Carry,
I feel like we've gotten into some Canadian history. But
it I'm happy to bring that to the table today
(09:02):
because I like to, you know, try to keep a
variety of people from different cultural backgrounds and ethnic backgrounds
and nationality. So yeah, I'm really excited about that. And two,
I didn't know anything about her either, So yeah, I'm
really excited to get into her story today. So I
think that the history of women nursing in North America,
(09:25):
and specifically the history of Indigenous women in nursing in
North America and Canada is like a very rich history.
It's something that I didn't know much about, but it
seems like like a place that you can really delve
deep into because there are so many ten drils that
it connects to, you know, the history of war, which
we'll get into this episode, the history of medical practices
(09:48):
and healing practices and Indigenous communities and also medicinal practices themselves.
It's just it touches so many different things. So I
think it's really fascinating to talk about, you know, think
about those different histories all melded into one, and Edith
Montour is definitely a part of that. She was born
(10:10):
on April tenth, ninety and Oschweigen and Six Nations of
the Grand River, which is the largest First Nations reserve
in Canada, which is located in southwestern Ontario. So it's
the only First Nations reserve in North America that includes
all six holding O Shawny Nations, which is it's an
alliance among the six Native American nations that sometimes called
(10:34):
the Iroquois Confederacy. Edith Montur was a member of the
Mohawk Nation and the Mohawker the easternmost nation in Honor
O'shawny territory. So Edith was the youngest of eight children.
She went to day school in the reserve and she
got her high school diploma at Brantford Collegiate Institute. And
(10:57):
once she graduated, she tried to apply to nursing schools
in Ontario, but she wasn't accepted to any of those schools.
So this is where we get into the Indian Act
in Canada, which was passed in eighteen seventy six, and
it's still in effect today, though it's been through many iterations,
(11:19):
many amendments, so it doesn't look like it looked in
eighteen seventy six. Obviously a lot about it has changed
in that in that time period. But it defines who
is a so called Indian, which was who had Indian
status under the Act. It gave the federal government authority
over registered Indians and over reserve communities. And it's part
(11:44):
of just a longstanding effort to assimilate First Nations people
into Canadian society by devaluing their distinct political, economic, and
cultural practices. So I think we talked about this before,
but a lot of more things happening in the United
States as well. Um when it comes to efforts to
assimilating I think we may have mentioned before, boarding schools
(12:07):
and things that were specifically built and enacted in policy
to remove and strip Native Americans, in Indigenous peoples of
their of their own practices, their language, their ways of dressing,
all of the things um and to make them quote
(12:28):
unquote less savage, not my words, but less savage and
more civilized. And this was the case with the Indian
Act in Canada as well. So as part of it,
women were barred from voting and running in chief and
council elections under the Act. And they also had to
deal with the issue of enfranchisement, which in this case
(12:52):
is the process by which Indigenous peoples would lose their
Indian status under the Act and become full Canadian citizens.
And that's related to this conversation in many ways, but
it's related to education specifically, where any Indians who got
a university degree or became a professional like a doctor
(13:15):
or lawyer would lose their status as an Indian. Enfranchisement
meant that Indigenous peoples would have to throw away their
cultural and legal identities and couldn't pass along their Indian
status to their children. So First Nations people were enfranchised
for getting a university education. They also work for things
(13:36):
like serving in the Canadian Armed Forces, for marrying non
Indian men, and for leaving reserves for long periods, so
on and so forth. And I'd also like to just
call out that Indigenous people have also had always had
their own caregiving practices in their own communities. So I
don't want to make it seem like the history of
Indigenous healers in Canada starts with Edith montor like she's
(13:59):
one part of the long history of healing practices within
Indigenous communities, and also of like in a line of
Indigenous nurses and people who acted as midwives and all
these sorts of different caretaking. There's also accounts of Indigenous
women who served as nurses and midwives to colonizers. So
(14:19):
it's not like she is the beginning of all of
this conversation, but she is a pioneer in the history
of Indigenous women who nursed in this way in Canada
in the United States, because she's as well get into
she was in the United States for a bit or
came to the United States, but on top of the
assimilating policy suppressing Indigenous healing practices, Indigenous women were also
(14:43):
largely barred from nursing programs in Canada until the early
to mid nineteen hundreds, so Montor herself was barred from
pursuing professional training in Canada. She was rejected from schools
without even getting interviews, and so many Indigenous women would
(15:04):
go to the US to get professional training, so that's
exactly what she did. She turned to the United States,
where she was accepted too and began attending New Rochelle
Nursing School in New York. She graduated and became a
registered nurse in nineteen fourteen, which is the first, so
she became the first Indigenous woman who's a registered nurse
(15:25):
in Canada. So when she was asked why she became
a nurse, she just said it was something to do.
The way that it seems like it's been explained by
family members is that like she kind of downplayed her
achievements and like the things her status as a pioneer,
you know. So yeah, she was then hired as a
nurse at a private school in New Rochelle, and she
(15:49):
joined the war effort for World War One in nineteen seventeen,
and in that she joined the Westchester County Unit B
of the American Expeditionary Forces Army Medical cores. So, after
more training in New York, she left for France in
February of nineteen eighteen. She stopped in Halifax, Nova Scotia,
(16:09):
and she arrived in France on March six. So just
for some numbers. During World War One, there were more
than twenty hundred nurses who served in the Canadian Army
Medical Core or the CIMC. SO service in the CIMC
required women to be white, to have British citizenship and
(16:30):
quote unquote high moral character, physical fitness, and to be
between the ages of one and thirty eight. So a
number of Indigenous women did serve as nurses in the
Army Nurse Corps and the American Red Cross stateside and overseas.
In France during the war. There are twelve Indigenous women
(16:51):
who have been identify as doing so, but more its
thoughts that more of them did actually serve. It's just
that the record keeping is there for who those people were.
But as we can't imagine like they were definitely more,
they were definitely more. Yeah. So Edith volunteered and worked
as a nurse at based Hospital twenty three m v Tail,
(17:11):
France for more than a year. She was responsible for
treating soldiers who were shot or a guest, and she
sometimes worked at other medical centers in France as well,
which you mentioned earlier that Samantha. You read some of
her diary entries. Yes, yeah, she kept a journal. What
(17:32):
did you read? So essentially I've only got through a
little bit, but it kind of reads as if it's
like a nineteen twenties, nineteen tens kind of movie when
you were in New York and living that life. She
talks about getting legend gimbals. She talks about going to Hoboken,
going out with friends, writing letters to people saying farewell.
So she was prepping while working there, prepping to leave
(17:54):
apparently from what I could gather, because they started in
nineteen eighteen, So the diary was actual really handed down
their family and her daughter Helen, who she also has
a friend named Helen. In the diary, we read her
daughter Helen kept it and preserved it, and it was
so fragile that they had actually sent it off to
have it typed up, and they gave it to all
(18:15):
of the descendants, all of her descendants so they could
have a copee to say what it was like. I
saw that they sent it off to the Modern Literature
and Culture Research Center in Toronto as well. Yea, yes.
The thing that I really liked about this, of course,
as y'all already not really love, like the just reading
these people's stories and the fact that some people had
(18:36):
the like, the thought or just were interested in recording
their own stories, which we have from her, which I'm
just grateful for, because she had a diary that we
even haccess too, because she didn't have to do that, right,
but it was her. It was just before she died,
is when her granddaughter transcribed the diary, and thankfully they
(18:57):
didn't make it available to us, the portions that they
didn't make available, but it was she died not that
long after lived a long time by the way. Yeah,
but the diary is, yeah, it's it's really cool to see.
Like I I liked how much she talked about the weather,
(19:18):
which I feel like she's talking about it so much.
She's just like a sunny day, beautiful day in cloudy day,
and I love her. I also liked how she's just
like nothing happened today, uneventful. I wrote letters like that's
how like, yeah, I get that I stayed in. I'm
glad to know that I'm not the only one someone
who made so much history just had a day when
(19:39):
they just stayed in. Yeah. So it made me feel
a little bright. And more times she was like uneventful,
didn't do much. It was cloudy today. Yeah, I do like.
I like how mundane it is. And and just to
you know, go through that kind of day by day
with her, even though every day isn't in there, he said.
(20:00):
It started. Her entries began in January of nineteen eighteen,
and they ended after the armistice in nineteen nineteen. And
(20:20):
I will read a couple of entries from the journal
to just so y'all get to hear a little bit
of what she wrote. So, while she was serving there,
she befriended a patient, one of the I guess more
notable or one that's been talked about a lot in
the articles that are written about her, Earl King, who
was a soldier from Iowa. And she said in her
diary entry on June sixteenth, nineteen eighteen, quote my pet patient,
(20:44):
Earl King, who adopted me for his big sister, died
at this a m at seven fifteen had hemorrhage at
three fifteen am. The poor boy lost consciousness immediately. My
heart was broken, cried most of the day and could
not sleep. That's the end of the quote. She was
pretty upset when he died, and she wrote to his parents,
(21:04):
and his parents visited her. She visited them, and they
struck up kind of a friendship. So that's one of
the more I guess things that she didn't really write
a ton about specific soldiers in her diary Injuries, and
she in a later interview she did say about her
experience in the war. We would walk right over where
(21:27):
there had been fighting. It was an awful site. Buildings
and rubble, trees, burnt, spent shells all over the place.
Whole town's blown up. She didn't really talk a ton
about discrimination that she faced or the difficulties of war,
but she does say in her last journal injury quote,
(21:47):
when we looked over the shell torn fields and think
of the millions of dollars in property destroyed, to say
nothing of the tremendous loss of life. We cannot wonder
that in France they bury the dit facing the north,
even in death, they dare not turn their backs on Germany.
A bit of sentiment, of course, but who can blame them?
So Edith returned to North America and soon went back
(22:11):
to the Six Nations Reserved in Canada, where she married
Clay brand Montour in nineteen twenty. They had five children,
which were budd, Helen, Ron, Don, and Gilbert. Although Gilbert
died as an infant in nineteen twenty nine, she continued
her nursing career and she worked as a nurse and
(22:34):
a midwife at the Lady Willington Hospital on the Reserve
until nineteen fifty five, and in nineteen thirty nine she
was elected honorary President of the Oswegan Red Cross, so
Yeah her nurse, saying she continued to do what she did,
which was nurse on the reservation, and as the nineteen
(22:57):
seventeen Military Service Act had given wartime nurses the right
to vote, that's where the other first came in, where
she was the first female status Indian and registered band
member to gain the right to vote in a Canadian
federal election, although Indigenous women in general weren't able to
(23:18):
legally vote federally without losing their Indian status until nineteen
sixty and her son mentioned that he remembers other veterans
encouraging her to vote in federal elections with them. Her daughter,
who Samantha brought up earlier, Helen, was a founding member
of the National Aboriginal Nurses Association, which is now known
(23:40):
as the Canadian Indigenous Nurses Association. But yeah, Edith continued
to serve until she retired, and in nine, like Samantha said,
they transcribed the diary and Edith herself died on April third, nineteen,
which is just before or her hundred and sixth birthday,
(24:02):
And she was buried on the Six Nations Reserve and
there is a memory of her and there, Edith Monter
Avenue in Brantford, Ontario is named after her, and there's
a park there that's named after her as well. So
she is What I'm trying to say is she is
recognized for her work in her pioneering status as an
(24:26):
Indigenous woman in nursing in Canada. Yeah, and I think
so much of this story is emblematic for what we
were talking about in our cheesecake champagne celebration of these
first of somebody like you said, she's like, well something
to do, Like she wasn't in it necessarily, like was
kind of shy about talking about her first or you know,
(24:49):
was just wasn't talking about it that much, but was
just doing it and then having I love that she
kept this journal that we can read. That's something I
personally really enjoy is when people are yeah, even if
there's nothing really to report, you report it and just
like yep, you know, because I think it gives you
a full picture of their experience as we do like
(25:09):
build up, Oh, here's there first, but there's a whole
life and a person behind that that didn't have plenty
of mundane days or did go to you know, gimbals
for lunch and like it was exciting. So I really
enjoy that aspect. Looking to her story, Yeah, me too.
I'm really appreciative of it, I mean, and happy that,
like you know, the family made it available for us
(25:32):
to be able to read. And also just it wasn't
that long ago when she passed away, So just to
think about this first happening in such recent history, and
to know that she also has a living legacy is
(25:52):
it's nice to know and that you know, her work
people like me and you know, the three of Us
is still being uncovered and you know, we can talk
about it within the framework of the rest of Indigenous
American and North American history, just like it's involved in
so much. So yeah, I think it's super cool. Yeah
(26:15):
for sure, and that that was interesting too, where sometimes
i'll hear first tonight, I'm trying to like have a
context before I look it up, like when was that,
and I'm like, oh, wow, I'm pretty recent. But yeah,
once again, Eves, we bought a great story. Thank you
so much for bringing it to your attention. Is there
(26:35):
anything else before we wrap up? That's all? Thank you
again for having me. Always loved being here. So oh yes,
could y'all imagine? Though? I have to ask, like, do
you think she imagined that we would be reading and
it would be published her journal? Because for me, my
thought is, oh my god, I die, don't read my journal. Yes,
(26:59):
I've had this converse before. Yeah, I don't want people
to read my diary. I was I was thinking about
that when I was reading hers, and yeah, you know,
I know there's some stuff that was out right, I
hope so you need. I wondered to what degree there
was self censorship as well when she was actually writing
(27:19):
right her diary. Of course she knew she was going
to war. I know that that. Yeah, I think you'd
already covered the fact that you know people who went
off the assumptions you're not you're probably not going to
come back if you're going to be there. And so
perhaps she was doing this in order to have a
lasting memory, for someone to keep that record so she
(27:40):
could exist. But yeah, in my head, I'm like, please,
don't read my diaries, don't don't read my journal I
kinda keep that locked. Don't do that. But they're so embarrassing, exactly.
We've talked about that. When I was growing up, I
had a diary and it had like a little key
and I, you know, lock it that you could have
just like kicked that lock, just like ripped it a little,
(28:03):
strapped that one across the journey, but it was all
like this past again today, like I lost, But I
wasn't ready for you to mention that one. It's true. Yeah,
So for those who are interested in finding the actual
diaries as they put it up, I found it on
(28:24):
War Diaries dot c A if anybody wants to go
and read, because it is it feels very I feel
like I'm I'm understand like, without knowing any context of
where she's at, it feels like I'm there a little
bit with her crew of nurses, I start going about
their day because she makes sure to talk about all
of the nurses around her, people around her and sharing
her experiences, so she should definitely go read it. But
(28:46):
it's very interesting. Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, I unfortunately burned
my diary, but I wish I really didn't want anybody
to read yours then I really and you know, looking back,
and it was fine, it's okay, but they can laugh
at my boy ast any day. And yeah, that's the thing.
(29:09):
They're my diaries. Aren't this well partitioned? You know, like
everything is in there, so while you might be able
to read one page, the next one is something I
probably wouldn't want to share with anybody. That's why you
need a good You need a good friend to go
through it first, and you're like, okay, she'd be fine
with this, can burn this forever, but like this section
(29:33):
is okay, yeah, min not illustrations in it and everything. Yes, well,
thanks so much as always eased for being here. Where
can the good listeners find you? You can find me
on Instagram at not Apologizing, also on Twitter at Eaves
(29:54):
Jeff cote Um. You can go back and listen to
episodes of This Day and History Class, which talks about
people in history and different events on days in History
by the Day, and on the podcast Unpopular, which is
about people in history who were persecuted for the actions
that they were taking. Yes, and also on this very show,
(30:17):
so many, many many episodes of Female First on this
here very show called stuff Mom Never Told You. We're
estimating that it's twenty six. Yeah, well we'll get ready
for our fiftieth More cheesecake, more champagne. Absolutely, okta upgrade
and maybe just do a whole like tear of cheesecakes
or something. Yes, gets bigger fireworks coming out at the top.
(30:42):
Our boss Wiel lovers, Well, we did have kind of
a big send off with the champagne bottle. The last
one true went off while recording. So yeah, and listeners.
If you would like to find us, you can. You
can email us at stuffing to your mom stuff at
i heeart media dot com. You can find its on
what are at mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram at
(31:02):
stuff I Ever Told You. Thanks as always to your
super producer Christina, thank you and thanks to you for listening.
Stuff I Never Told You production of iHeart radio. For
more podcast from my iHeart Radio, visit theear radio app,
Apple podcast or where you listen to your favorite show.
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Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.