About 10 years ago, a stranger unwittingly revealed facts about Tom Wilson's adoption, pointing the singer and guitarist with Blackie and the Rodeo Kings towards life-changing truths about his identity.
His origins had been hidden from him for more than five decades, even though a sense of not belonging and a recurring dream had made him suspect things were not exactly as they appeared.
Growing up in Hamilton, he'd come to think of himself as "a big, puffy, sweaty Irish guy, when I'm actually a pretty big Mohawk guy," Wilson tells cohosts Jessica Vandenberghe and George Lee.
"Now I can continue in my life, knowing the blood that runs through me, and that only strengthens my intent creatively," says Wilson, a member of the Kahnawake Mohawk Nation in Quebec. "My job now is to bring the Mohawk culture into the light, to battle whatever way I can, artistically or with my voice, or through standing as a land defender, or through starting an Indigenous scholarship, which I did at McMaster—all those ways are fighting colonialism."
Find out more about Wilson, his thoughts on Canada, colonialism and identity, and his way of living a Mohawk life in this episode of Unsettled: Journeys in Truth & Conciliation.

The Tom Wilson Indigenous Bursary in Honour of Bunny Wilson
https://tomwilsononline.com/scholarship/
Beautiful Scars: Steeltown Secrets, Mohawk Skywalkers and the Road Home
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/531052/beautiful-scars-by-tom-wilson/9780385685672
Beautiful Scars TVO Documentary
https://www.tvo.org/video/documentaries/beautiful-scars
The Art of Tom Wilson
https://tomwilsononline.com/art/
Kahnawake Mohawk Nation
http://www.kahnawake.com/
Thunder Bay Podcast
https://www.canadaland.com/shows/thunder-bay/
Thunder Bay on Crave
https://www.crave.ca/en/tv-shows/thunder-bay

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When your ancestors speak to you, you should probably listen. And in Mike Bern's case, that means using his talent and voice to honour them, his culture, and the loved ones he's lost.

The folk rocker from Tobique First Nation in New Brunswick released the album Ancestors earlier this year, with the single no words for goodbye reaching number one on the Indigenous Music Countdown.

Cohosts Jessica and George talk to Mike about his current and past musical focus, his culture, the importance of incorporating his native language in his songs, and much more.

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Renowned Blackfoot educator Ramona Big Head talks about overdoses and other tragedies, the ripple effect of residential school abuses through generations and families, and hope.
Recent deaths in her community and family "knocked me off my feet," she tells cohosts Jessica Vandenberghe and George Lee. "I think I'm still processing the magnitude of these losses. And it's still happening."
Among her tools for healing are prayer, ceremony, physical exercise, humour, empathy, and spending time with her grandchildren.
"I'm such an optimist," Ramona says. "I honestly believe that this generation of kids. . .they could be the first generation of our people that absolutely, 100 per cent stay away from drugs or alcohol. Why? Because they see immediately, you take that drug, you die."

Warning: suicide, sexual abuse, and substance abuse are discussed in this episode.

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