When Bernice Rabideaux was five years old, she and her four siblings were herded into a large black car. It was 1930. Their nookomis (“grandmother” in the Ojibwe language) said they would be staying with the sisters because there weren’t enough “eats” at her house for everyone. They were driven a few miles away to a Catholic-run school on the Bad River reservation in Wisconsin.
Nearly a century later, Bernice’s daughter, Mary Annette Pember, still carries the weight of those memories — passed down in vivid, painful detail.
From the mid-nineteenth century to the late 1930s, spurred by federal assimilation policies, tens of thousands of Native children were pulled from their homes and placed in these institutions. Many were beaten for speaking their Native languages, denigrated, denied food, and deprived of affection. Some of these schools were operated by the U.S. federal government, others by Christian missionaries.
Pember recalls her mother sharing stories of hunger, of Sister Catherine beating her for stealing an apple from the cellar where food was stored. There were constant put-downs of the children’s Native identity, and the belittling phrase, “dirty Indian” — which Pember said lingered in her mother’s ears for years.
These stories loomed large in Pember’s life. When the Ojibwe journalist looks back on it, there was never a time when she was not writing or thinking about boarding schools.
“Medicine River” — Pember’s first book, out on April 22 from Pantheon — is a culmination of the experiences of her late mother and of other Native children, coupled with extensive archival research into the history of Indian boarding schools in the United States. It is a deeply reported portrait of communities still feeling the reverberations of years of trauma and abuse, and it lays out plainly its origin. In recent years, there’s been renewed attention to the system by the federal government.
Ahead of the book’s release, Pember spoke with Poynter about her mother, the intensive research that went into telling this story, and much more.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Amaris Castillo: Congratulations on your book, “Medicine River.” I understand this is your first book. How do you feel to be closer to its publication?
Mary Annette Pember: I’ve been really swamped with work. And I just got back from a reporting assignment, and there are several boxes of the book. But it hasn’t really registered. As you know right now, there’s a whole lot to write about. We’re just really busy in ICT News, writing, so in some ways I haven’t even really fully absorbed what’s happened. But it’s very satisfying that I finally got this done.
Castillo: You have a deeply personal stake in this story. Your mother was a survivor of a Catholic-run boarding school in Wisconsin for Native children. You grew up listening to what you call her “Sister School” stories. What impact did her stories have on you?
Pember: It was as though I was placed on this quest to make the world aware about what had happened to her and the wrongness of it. It was just always unsaid that this is what I would do: I would shine a light on what happened to her. And I would get some redemption, if you will, or at least awareness of what happened.
She really did not suffer hypocrisy well. Even though she sort of bought into the system, because she had to, she was always so disgusted at the lies that white people told themselves — particularly the Catholic Church. She was always just outraged. Even though she — and people are always shocked to hear this — she sent me to a Catholic school. In her way, that was really the best preparation she could give a Native woman to enter into the world. It really stuck in her craw that this was really the only path for success for Native people in that time.
Castillo: You write that you knew your mother’s stories were fantasies with shreds of truth — invented to protect not only you but also her mind — and that her job was to tell them, and your job was to listen and believe. To me, that speaks to a child’s willingness to trust in their parents, even if they don’t fully trust the story handed to them. Mentioning that your job was “to listen” reminded me of the role of a journalist. Was this a seed planted for what your career would become?
Pember: Oh, yes. I always knew I would write. I feel like I was placed on this earth to witness, and to describe to the world what I had seen. I was that place under the table. I’ve kind of always been under the table looking at the world and, of course, that is the goal of a good journalist. You’re not going to be under the table physically, necessarily, but that you’d be like a fly on the wall. And that you witness, and you describe what you’ve seen as accurately as you can.
Castillo: In recent years, there’s been more attention on federal Indian boarding schools and the abuse and neglect that they aimed at children. The Interior Department also released its final report on its investigation into these institutions. What do you make of this increased attention?
Pember: I think it really reflects former U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland’s presence, certainly, and President Joe Biden’s commitment to really looking at systemic racism. And that, of course, that’s one of the naughty words now. At this panel talk, that was how a woman described it. I was talking about missing and murdered people, and she goes, “Oh, what we’re doing, all of our funding is tied to the naughty words, so we anticipate seeing it go.” So my work really is tied to the naughty words, or what has happened is tied to the naughty words: the efforts to take a couple of giant steps upstream and take a look at what has gone on historically to create this situation.
Boarding schools, viewing them in isolation, really doesn’t do justice to what happened in this country. Because boarding schools were simply one element of the assimilation process. If, for instance, they had only sent our kids to boarding school, and that’s all the federal government did, we probably would have done better.
But it was really part of what I call a triple whammy that happened after the Civil War, in the last 30 years of the 19th century, which just had a profound impact on Native people. Removal and allotment; taking people off of their land or reducing new lands, so they could no longer live in the way they had lived to provide food for themselves. So, taking away their generational wealth, their foundational wealth, and then also taking the children away. And then, of course, there’s the whole philosophy of taking away culture and language. All of those things together are part of the assimilationist story in the United States.
Castillo: Your book draws on extensive archival research and historical accounts of both the origin of these schools and of the treatment suffered by students. Can you talk about your approach to this project and how you managed order over this incredible amount of information?
Pember: The structure was always the challenge. A huge challenge — because I had so much. How does one arrange it to draw attention to the personal while also including the broader historical elements? That was really David Treuer, who is my editor. He was tremendously helpful. And I have really good agents. They helped me do a good proposal. And I’m open to receiving criticism and suggestions, so that all really worked together well.
Castillo: In your introduction, you write very candidly about your relationship with your mother. You write, “I am four. I am her helper. Her crutch. Her whipping post. I am her secret confessor and her most trusted coconspirator.” I read this as unaddressed trauma and how it passes over into the next generation. How did you manage to write so honestly about your mother and family’s story?
Pember: It was a very organic process. This has taken a while. This has taken a long time. As you know, the parallel with my own path forward of a recovering alcoholic is my own healing, really. They had to be part and parcel of it.
Castillo: What was the most difficult part of working on this project? Was it the research and wrangling it all together, or more the personal narratives that you weaved through?
Pember: The personal narratives were fun. That was what I call fun. And journalism, it’s fun. So that was the real fun part.
The history stuff was difficult. It was rigorous. I spent quite a bit of money on a fact-checker, and my commitment to that. That was not as fun as just sharing my own story, but it was really necessary and that was good. It was also really instructive. I learned a lot doing this book as well.
Castillo: Was there a part of the process that was most rewarding?
Pember: That my mother and people like her have finally gotten recognition. This really happened and it’s a nuanced, complicated story, because Indians are like everybody else. We’re nuanced and complicated. But I think this book presents that complexity and nuance in a way that hopefully will broaden, I think, people’s perspective on Native people.
Castillo: As a professional journalist, you have received multiple awards for your work focusing on Native American issues, as well as grants and fellowships. Recently, press freedom has been a big topic of discussion in our industry. What are your thoughts on this renewed focus on press freedom?
Pember: It’s especially important for Native people, especially tribal people, because tribal leadership is political leadership. Often, they’re political representatives, and often they do not really embrace press freedom. A lot of tribes don’t have open records laws, so it’s a challenge for Native people and for everybody to cover them. But I think anything that shines a light on that is really important.
Castillo: What do you hope readers take away from your book?
Pember: I think a couple things. The history of assimilationist policies in the United States that, in many ways, this country is built on. Also, the importance of looking at your family of origin. And maybe viewing your parents as other people. It doesn’t matter what nationality or ethnicity you are — you probably struggle with your family and family relationships. Making some kind of peace, gaining some understanding, can offer you a little relief and healing, and authority over what happened in your family.
I think that’s actually one of the things that would appeal to somebody who doesn’t necessarily have such a great interest in the history of boarding schools and assimilationist policies. Just my life — how I forgave my mom and got over myself a little bit and actually came to admire her. That’s a worthwhile thing. I think a lot of people could benefit from that.
