Unmarked Graves, Remember Every Name — Transcript

Sue: Did you guys see people or hear about people who were also being murdered?

Antoinette: Yes. Oh, yes. I saw it with my own eyes. They did kill somebody there, and a guy got burned in the dryer. They threw him right in the dryer and burned him to death. And that was at the laundry mat where I was working? And I got scared I was shaking.

Sue: And they let you see that.

Antoinette: They wanted us to see it. Because they say if you don't do what we tell you. You're going to be next. That's what they were saying.

Sue: And then they you saw them kill someone in the dryer?

Antoinette: Yes I did and I was sick. And they made the dryer go around, around and around and they put it the heat real high. I don't know how high those dryers go, but they made it so hot, when that poor guy came out, he was black all over and dizzy, any he fell right down. He wasn’t able to stay on his feet. And that was terrible.

Antoinette: And there was that guy that was, he couldn't hear. He died already. They killed him with the train. They didn't even help him to cross the…, to go where he wanted to go swimming. They didn't even want to help them. They let the train go right over him. And they never got charged. I know he was Deaf, okay? And the staff there didn’t care, he wanted to cross the tracks to go to the swimming, to the beach. They had a beach there where you could go swimming. He probably wanted to go swimming, he didn’t hear the train coming, and the train run right over him and killed him and the staff didn’t care. They didn’t even help the poor guy.

Sue: How many people do you think were killed at Huronia?

Antoinette: I think there was a lot because that cemetery was full.

Marie: Then some more neglect, neglected too.

Antoinette: Yeah.

Marie: Like they had, some had diseases that were curable and they didn't want to do anything about it. Like Marilyn's brother, died of pneumonia. He was eight years old when he died. You know, and I don't think they did anything too cure his pneumonia.

Sue: They just let them die.

Antoinette: Yeah,

Marie: yeah, and you know what, I think that our lives were not worth anything to them. Our lives didn't mean anything to them.

Antoinette: Like, they didn't care for us. You don't treat people like that. And I'll never forget that.

Marie: And you know, what they did when, when we died out there? They burried us behind the barn, with no names of the date of birth or the date of death. Nothing, just a number. That's what they did.

Antoinette: Yeah, that's true. That's very true.

Marie: And then they took those same stones, and they use them as a patio walk, as a walk, walkway, for a patio. You know? Then then when, when somebody found out that they were gravestones for the people who were buried in the institution, they took them out. They took them back to the grave. And instead of putting them in the proper places, they put them in one great big huge square.

Sue: All the gravestones,

Marie: yes,

Antoinette: yes. It was very sad. You know what we did? To remember every name, we all got together. And we put out a nice stone with the tree and a crow. In the middle of Orillia where the cemetery is so people can see what we did and how we felt sorry for everybody that got killed.

Marie: You know, when the people who were buried there, they didn't even they didn't even keep up the cemetery.

Antoinette: No,

Marie: they let the grass grow with the stones and everything.

Antoinette: Yeah.

Marie: It was terrible

Marie: They made a mess, It was terrible.

Antoinette: And they had a sewer there. And we didn't even know about that sewer.

Marie: There was a sewer right through the graveyard.

Antoinette: And we did not know that.

Marie: You see how disrespectful they were towards us.

Sue: can you talk a little bit about how it feels to be involved in activism today living through what you both survived in the institution? Seeing the murders, the rapes, the treatment, the abuse? What? What does it feel like today to be involved in advocacy?

Antoinette: we're very happy to do what we're doing. I tell you the truth. We love doing what we're doing. And I would do it for anybody to help them out. Because I don't think that's right.

Oh, yeah, that's the way we are. We love to be with people. We love to help people. We don't want people to suffer like we did.

Marie: And to me, that kind of suffering that we went through was totally unnecessary. Uncalled for, there was no reason for it.