A youngster plays along the shoreline of Partridge Lake during the May 25 opening of the Lake Nipigon Reserve. (Jody Porter/CBC)

After more than a century of struggle, an Ojibway community in northern Ontario is finally celebrating a home of its own.

On May 24, the Lake Nipigon Reserve opened. It's about a three-hour drive northeast of Thunder Bay. It's an unusual move, in an era when nearly half the First Nations population in Canada lives off-reserve.

The federal government occasionally grants additions to reserves through its arduous land claims process, but the creation of an entirely new First Nation land base is rare.

However, the new reserve land isn't the only thing that makes Animibiigoo Zaagi'igan Anishinaabek unique.

A fresh start

"We see a lot of existing reserves with poor housing conditions or no water," says Chief Yvette Metansinine. "No fault to the community, no fault at all. But that's the last thing I want. We're unique in having the opportunity to build a community from scratch and build a thriving community."

Metansinine made securing a land base her top priority when she was elected chief more than a decade ago.

By now she thought she'd be living on the new reserve, but the battle with the bureaucracy took much longer than she expected.

"At times we did lose hope," Metansinine says. "You lose track because it's such a long process. There are a lot of tears and you want to give up. But finally we're here. It's only been 158 years."

Reconciling the past

Animibiigoo Zaagi'igan Anishnaabek (Lake Nipigon Ojibway) fall under the Robinson Superior Treaty of 1850. But, unlike other First Nations under the same treaty, they weren't granted land.

In the early part of the 20th century they were officially known in federal government records as "Lake Nipigon, Various Places." It's a name that still smarts with elders like Mary Ann Nord.

"That's what we used to be called, Various Places," she says. "Now we finally have a home."

Nord, and most of the other Animbiigoo Zaagi'igan Anishinaabek grew up at a place called Ombabika. It was a native community, near the thriving mid-century logging and railway town of Auden, close to the shores of Lake Nipigon.

Nord remembers her parents getting letters from a government official, promising the people a reserve at Ombabika.

But she says that official was hit by a train on his way to visit the community — and the government plans for a reserve died with him.

By the mid-1980s, Auden was a ghost town. Without economic opportunities, or reserve status, the people of Ombabika moved away, too. They scattered throughout Northern Ontario, to places such as Geraldton, Beardmore and Thunder Bay.

Modern governments were reluctant to support a reserve at Ombabika. Metansinine says the government argued the community would be vulnerable to many of the economic hardships facing other remote reserves because there's no road to get to it.

For years, negotiations for a reserve were at a stalemate.

So when Metansinine was elected chief in 1997, she told the government her people were willing to compromise. They'd look at alternative sites for a reserve.

It was Nord, the elder, who came up with the spot that would ultimately become her new home on the shores of Partridge Lake. It's a spot where families from Ombabika sometimes camped in the summer.

It's a small, calm lake with a sandy beach, surrounded by cedar trees. The reserve land stretches out from its shores to the side of the Trans-Canada (Highway 11), 12.5 square kilometres in all.

Standing at the edge of the lake on a brisk spring day, Nord is struck by how peaceful it is and looks forward to the freedom that comes with having a place to call your own.

"I don't know how I'll feel at first," she says. "It will probably feel like home, but not real home like Ombabika. But I'll grow into it. I already love this place."

Many elders, few youth, strong women

Nord is part of something else that makes this community unique among First Nations. There are more elders, like her, than youth.

Most First Nations are experiencing a baby boom, with their youth population rising dramatically. But the trend for the Animbiigoo Zaagi'igan Anishinaabek, is reversed. Nearly 100 of their 310 members are elders and most of them are women.

It makes for a legacy of strong female leadership. It was an all-female band council that brought the community here and is leading it forward.

A few weeks before the official opening of the reserve, the elders gather around a campfire at Partridge Lake, sharing a lunch of goose and bannock.

Memories of life at Ombabika are also on the menu, seasoning their hopes for the future with a tinge of regret.

Elder Jane Fournier says she hopes to live long enough to have a home at Partridge Lake.

Elder Mary Ann Nord checks on the goose cooking on the campfire at the site of the new Partridge Lake reserve. (Jody Porter/CBC)

"I'm looking forward to that," she says. "We struggled all our lives. We lived here and there and survived in the bush. We managed with what we had.

"I'm getting old," she adds. "This will be good for the younger people, but I'm counting on making it here too, if I can."

The sense of loss goes beyond nostalgia for their former life at Ombabika. Just weeks before the official opening of the new reserve, an elder from the community died.

"She never had a chance to step foot on her reserve," Chief Metansinine says. "And she could have brought so much to participating in our community planning. It has taken so long for us to have a place to call home."

The way forward

With the decades of negotiations now behind her, Metansinine says she understands her people's desire to move ahead quickly.

For years, she has been telling young people from the community to go away to school. She wanted them to be prepared to come home and use their education to build the new community.

And many heeded that call. In a recent survey, nearly 70 per cent of community members said they wanted to live on the new reserve.

But Metansinine wants to make sure their new land base is the dream home they waited so long to get.

Now they're laying the foundations. A series of community consultations will determine what people want, before any building begins.

Lake Nipigon Reserve, Ont. (CBC)

The new land base offers the potential of economic development in areas such as mining, forestry and tourism.

On the social development side, there are plans for an elders complex, a tidy housing subdivision, powwow grounds and perhaps a school and daycare.

Peter Johnson is one of the young people hired to explore the seemingly endless potential the new land base provides.

"I've always wanted to work for my people," the 34-year-old says. "And this is my time. I'm eager. This is what I've wanted to do all my life, now I have the chance to do it."

Animbiigoo Zaagi'igan Anishinaabek's health co-ordinator, Blythe Morrisseau, also sees boundless opportunities for herself and her community.

"I have no idea what I'd be doing if our band didn't get connected," Morrisseau says. "I can see all kinds of things, health programs and services I want to set up. I'm really excited to build a healthy community."

But for now, as the elders' laughter reaches another crescendo around the Partridge Lake campfire, Morrisseau says the most important thing is just being here — together.

"Our community loves getting together," the 26-year-old says. "We love laughing, telling stories. That's the first thing I'd like to see, to gather here more often."