Indian School Days
Book Review

Justin Delorme
Introduction
The book, “Indian School Days” is an autobiography of the author Basil Johnston, an Ojibwe native from Wasauksing First Nation, in Ontario. This piece by Author, “Basil Johnston”, gives the reader more and more evidence of the structural lifestyle of the Spanish Indian residential school. From the very beginning his writing style links the reader to never put down the book, it is full of action and true events that took place during his lifetime. The book starts off with Mr. Johnston as a young child of ten years, skipping school with another student, an act that they didn’t think would get them both shipped off to a residential school. But as fortunes and his unfortunate …show more content…

When you get home tell everyone what it’s like here. Tell the other boys never to some here.” Alas he was free from such a place but the years that followed were even harsher for Basil, as he had to grow up and look after himself. After receiving some grade nine education from another school he quickly dropped out of school and was left to fend for himself at home since his father looked for work elsewhere.. having been a bright and able young man, he had bright ideas of running his own business, went through a wood chopping phase, raccoon hide, and chipmunk hides phase, and the reality and effort of his actions convinced the young man to go back to Spanish, as eerie as it may sound this was Basils last option for his own survival. Then in 1945 a new Superior emerged at the Spanish school, one that seen the phasing out the industrial trades program and replacing it with an academic one.(170) After Basil’s stint at home he is quoted on page 178 as saying, “ maybe it would be better to go back to school. I had heard vague rumours that Spanish was offering a high-school program. If it were true, I would return. It was my only chance to escape a life of cutting wood.” All in all, after reading such a book and the way that Basil Johnston wrote it, I would recommend this to anyone to read. It has given me great admiration and respect for those native children who went to such places. Having myself been in the residential school system, I somewhat know the feeling