César Néwashish
Keeper of Atikamekw tradition
César Néwashish (1902-1994) hailed from the Atikamekw community of Manawan. The father of 12 children, he "understood the crucial importance of handing down his culture and traditional knowledge of ancestral practices and lands. [...] He had a deep knowledge of his people’s history, and a reputation for always knowing just what to say, without ever leaving anything out." (César Néwashish/Biographies/Onze Nations). At the end of his life, César Néwashish had the following message for the members of his nation: "Tell them we have never given up our territory, tell them we have never sold or traded it, tell them that we have never reached any other sort of agreement concerning our territory" * César Néwashish was also an expert builder of birchbark canoes. The Musée de la civilisation in Quebec City houses one of his masterpieces, a 32-ft (9.7 m) rabaska. (Excerpt from a brief submitted by the Atikamekw Nation to the Commission parlementaire sur la révision du régime forestier québécois, 2008).
