The Toronto islands is actually one of my favourite spots to talk about history because it is so significant. And, I find it fascinating because when you actually do research on the Toronto islands you come up with obviously a lot of white history, you come up with like “The Diving Horse”!
It’s such a rich history there. The island is not built on landfill, that would be leslie spit.
And actually the island used to be fully connected to Toronto. You could see where the landmass actually connected it so you could just walk across this giant sandbar.Then there’s historical accounts of this horrible storm coming through one day and it just totally disconnected the island from Toronto, so that’s how it separated. First Nations people used to be able to ..There’s accounts of you could walk to the islands and you could see the spray from Niagara Falls. That’s how clear it was with no pollution or anything. Like you could see the spray?! Right there. Which always blows my mind whenever i’m out there. The whole island was a sacred spot specifically for the Mississaugas of New Credit First Nation.and they would do all their ceremony there, they would do a ton of stuff there. So from the area where they lived they would come out and camp on the shore of where it actually connected, before when they were doing their ceremonies and it has always been a very meaningful place for First Nation peoples for that reason. And there’s a lot of medicine that grows there…
An excerpt from Interview with Amber Sandy. July 2016