New Snye Homemakers building near completion

The Chenail Homemakers began in the early 1940¹s at the home of Richard and Anna Sunday located on the River Road in Tsi Snaihne. For several years the members met at the Sunday home or sometimes moved from home to home.

The members would get together to make baskets for their income.

In the late 1970¹s a new Tsi Snaihne School was built on School Road. At

that point the Homemakers became the Snye Homemakers and were granted

permission to move into the old school building. For several years the Homemakers shared its space to house the Adult Education programs. In fact, several Mi’kmaq students came from as far away as Restigouche, New Brunswick to take the classes offered by the Adult Education. While in Akwesasne, the Mi¹kmaq students stayed and had their meals with the Homemakers who took turns cooking for the students.

The Homemakers were very active during the 1980’s and early 1990’s. They met every Monday to make quilts, baskets, they offered Mohawk language classes ribbon shirt making, beading and even had a dance troupe that traveled around the area. They hosted many gatherings and held all kinds of activities. They were also noted for their Ace to King tournaments. There were many struggles for the group housed in this center, but they always managed to keep going. The center kind of slowed down when several of the

older members were lost. However several dedicated members continued to work hard to keep it going and pushed for renovations to turn one of the larger classrooms into a wake center. Many of our community members saw this as the last resting place of their family members.

In 2008 the old building was torn down to make way for a new building which is now near completion. As the center nears completion, members are

re-organizing and have even changed the name a bit. It will now be known as “Tsi Snaihne Homemakers, Akwesasne Ionkwakiokwa.”

The new building is going to house a wake center and a multi-purpose gathering center. The wake center will be non-denominational and open to all. Membership is open to anyone from Akwesasne, not just for Tsi Snaihne residents. The wake center has been sorely missed during the past year while it was being rebuilt. To prepare for the new building, the current members will be doing lots of fundraising and asking for donations to furnish the center with new furniture such as chairs, tables, a sofa bed, refrigerator, stove, window treatments, etc.

Much appreciation goes out to the Tsi Snaihne Recreation Committee who made a generous donation of $5,000, which were proceeds from the Christmas Enchantment event for the center; and to Wade & Sonia Mitchell who donated an organ for the center.

The Russell “Hoss” Mitchell Memorial Dance scheduled for Saturday, January 16th at the Brass Horse Bar & Grill has also committed to donating all of the proceeds to the center.

If you have a donation to make to the Tsi Snaihne Homemakers, Akwesasne Ionkwakiokwa will be in attendance before the dance at 6:00 p.m.

Toknikon tanon niawen ko:wa!