She investigated Michigan Indian boarding schools — and found her family

A new book follows a Michigan journalist’s investigation of her family’s history in Indian boarding schools
Native American children weren’t allowed to speak their tribal language in the boarding schools, and abuse was rampant
The last of the Michigan boarding schools closed in 1983

Journalist Sierra Nadeau recalls the moment, while researching an article on boarding schools for Native Americans, that “my heart sank.”

She had grown up among Michigan’s tribal communities, but it was a chance discovery in archival documents that led her to realize her own ancestors had spent time in one of the state’s notorious boarding schools.

That discovery and a subsequent two-year investigation led to a book chronicling the journey of her family, and of thousands of Native American families like hers, over more than a century.

Nadeau’s book, What the Ancestors Say, to be released Sept. 29 and available for preorder now, follows the Traverse City resident’s search through documents for her own family’s history.

There were at least 417 federally operated Indian boarding schools in 37 states in the 19^th and 20^th centuries, according to the Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report, released in 2024.

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Michigan was the home of five federal boarding schools, in Baraga, Mackinac Island, Schoolcraft County, Mount Pleasant and Harbor Springs.

The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition lists three additional boarding schools, in Marquette, Omena and Assinins.

The last to operate was the Holy Childhood of Jesus Catholic Church and Indian School in Harbor Springs, which closed in 1983.

At the schools, children weren’t allowed to speak Native languages or wear Native American clothing. Some were given non-native names. Physical and sexual abuse were common, according to the federal report.

There is no known documentation of the number of Native American children who were taken from families and shipped to boarding schools in Michigan, or the number who died at those schools.

The Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan documented the deaths of 229 students at the Indian Industrial Boarding School in Mount Pleasant between 1893 and 1934, when the school closed.

That is the boarding school where Nadeau’s ancestors spent at least some of their childhoods, the most recent being her great-grandfather, who never told his children about his experiences.

“I’m not an academic, archivist or genealogist,” Nadeau told Bridge. “I kind of threw myself into it.”

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

You grew up as a member of a northern Michigan tribe, but none of your adult relatives ever referenced boarding schools. Did you think your family had been lucky enough to avoid them?

It wasn’t something I thought of until I became an adult and had a better understanding of the historical context of what indigenous peoples went through. I was raised by my mother who is a member of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, and I grew up with the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians.

When I became a reporter and began digging into Indian boarding schools, there was a feeling I could separate myself from this because my family was not a part of it. I felt for the people I grew up with — I knew families that had been through it — but my family hadn’t.

While conducting research for a story for the Traverse City Record-Eagle newspaper, you found something that changed all that.

It was a master list of children at Mount Pleasant (Indian Industrial Boarding School), from the time it opened (1893) until it closed (1934). It was chronological, so I was just reading over the names and then I got to Naytoshing Antoine. That is my family name.

I kept reading and found 10 (ancestors). We were there every generation from (the boarding school’s) opening to its closing.

My heart sank. My family wasn’t supposed to be in here.

That was a very, very pivotal moment, not only in my personal life but as a reporter.

In what way? What changed for you?

It was hard, knowing the histories of Indian boarding schools and what they did to children, and to know (what) my family had endured, generationally. It was like, every generation, we were stripped more and more of our identity.

In your book you describe revealing your discovery to your oldest living relative, a great uncle, who didn’t know his own father had spent his childhood in an Indian boarding school. Is that silence common among Michigan’s Native American families?

Working as a reporter and covering these stories for years, I came to better understand that is very typical. There were families where it was openly discussed, and they knew exactly what their mother or father experienced. But a lot of families were in the same situation as me.

A lot of people didn’t like to talk about their time in the boarding schools. I think it was a way to protect future generations.

The thing that always lived rent-free in my head, is the story of my great uncle asking my great grandfather (his father, who’d been in a boarding school) “Why don’t we ever speak Indian?” He said, “There’s no need to, we live in a white man’s world now.”

There have been documented cases of abuse, and even deaths, at the boarding schools. Were you able to learn much about your ancestors’ experiences?

It was incredibly frustrating to have all the documentation I could get my hands on and knowing there are (still) questions I could never get answered. Why were we going there? Was it willingly, unwillingly? Was it a tool of survival? Were we ready to forgo our traditions? It was starting to eat me alive.

Now, I sit at peace with it. That was their choice to keep it to themselves. Maybe some of their experiences were great there, or they experienced something horrible and wanted it to bury it with them.

We have to be OK with silence, because it’s not our story to tell.

You write in your book that “people think these events happened long ago and we should move on, but the lasting impacts are prevalent.” Tell me about that.

There’s a lot of research coming out that shows how trauma affects the DNA inside of people, (creating) intergenerational trauma. There’s generational trauma of substance abuse, mental illness, suicide rates. There is a disproportionate number of Native American children in the foster care system. Native Americans are less likely to go to college.

Not all of these things are tied to Indian boarding schools, but they are tied to the same thing that boarding schools are tied to, which is colonialism.

Despite that, you seem hopeful for the future?

I don’t think I would be the person I am today without the boarding schools. I don’t think any indigenous person would be the same.

(But) we live in a different time than we did. I’m the first generation when it was OK to be Indian.

The Anishinaabe have always pushed forward, and I really think (my ancestors) were setting it up for generations like myself to pick up these pieces, these clues of who we are in our identity, so we could bring back that fire.

We’ve had over 500 years of laws and wars and policies to completely wipe us out, yet we’re still standing here. I’m thankful for the act of how resilient and beautiful indigenous peoples are in the face of all that.

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