Chanie Wenjack

Chanie (Charlie) Wenjack (January 19, 1954 - October 23, 1966) was an Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) First Nations boy who escaped from Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School he attended in Kenora, Ontario, Canada. He died of hunger and exposure at Farlane, Ontario while trying to walk 600 km (370 mi) back to his home Ogoki Post on the Marten Falls Reserve. His death brought attention to treatment of children in the Canadian Indian Residential School System and following Wenjack's death an inquest into the matter was ordered by the Canadian Government.

R. Wenjak was born on the Ogoki Post on the Marten Falls Reserve. At the age of nine he was forced, along with his two sisters, to attend the Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School school in Kenora. Once there he was given the name Charlie. The school was funded by the Canadian government and overseen by the Women’s Missionary Society of the Presbyterian Church. At the time 150 students attended the school. Wenjak began his schooling at the age of nine and was put in remedial classes soon after. He was known to have a good sense of humour according to the principal at the time and was always the first to recognize a pun or riddle.

On the morning of October 16, 1966, Wenjak and two school friends, orphaned brothers Ralph and Jackie MacDonald, ran away from the residential school, making it as far as Redditt, 31 km (19 mi) north of Kenora. The three boys stayed with Ralph and Jackie's uncle, Charley Kelly, in Redditt. After four days with the Kellys Wenjak left to follow the Canadian National Railway (CN) mainline, heading towards Ogoki Post, 600 km (370 mi) east and north from Kenora. He had found a CN passenger timetable which included a map and was using it as guide to get back home. The Kellys gave him some food and matches and suggested that he ask for help from the section maintenance crews stationed along the line.

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