Arnold Sylvester

siilece’, xwuchilum | Arnold Sylvester

22 August 1929 – 23 June 1999

siilece’ Arnold Sylvester was a respected Elder and Knowledge Keeper from the Halalt First Nation. He was a fluent speaker of both Hul’q’umi’num’ and English and generously shared his knowledge of the language, culture, teachings and traditions of his people with linguists and other scholars.  

Arnold Sylvester was born on Valdes Island on August 22, 1929 to Wilfred Joseph Sxa Wult Sylvester (1907-1983) and Sarah Norris (1910-1999). According to community researcher Donna Modeste, Sylvester had several siblings including Barbara, Patricia, Myra, Margie, Norbert, and Bill. He was raised by his grandparents, his mother’s father and mother,  t’hulusqinum and xwe’muye’. It was from them that he received the name siilece’ as a child. Later, he took his  great-grandfather’s name, xwuchilum. Both names originate from his mother’s family in Malahat (where his mother’s mother was from).

When he was young, Sylvester learned how to harvest, prepare and cook traditional foods from his grandmother. He and his grandparents traveled through their homeland seasonally, harvesting different resources in each region. They gathered berries, clams, oysters, and mussels as well as fished and hunted deer. Sometimes they sold foods they harvested, like seaweed from the Squamish region or butter clams in Yakima. 

At around 11 or 12 years of age, Sylvester had a life-changing encounter with orcas. He and his grandparents were living at Ley’qsun at the time, and Sylvester was paddling in a small boat his grandfather had given him. He was planning to fish when he noticed that his boat was surrounded by orcas. This encounter, though frightening, changed his life. His great-grandmother told him that this experience would bring him power and he felt that this had proved true, crediting his success in harvesting, hunting and fishing to this power. 

From 1939 to 1945, Sylvester attended Kuper Island Residential School. Like many Indigenous children who attended residential school, Sylvester was a witness to abuse while there. 

In 1947, at the age of 17, Sylvester married Catherine Daisy Pierre (1928-1967) of Katzie (Maple Ridge). The couple lived together in the Westholme area until Catherine’s death in 1967. Together the couple had at least three children, including their son Arnold Moody Sylvester (1958-2009). For most of his working life Arnold was employed as a longshoreman in the logging industry. After Catherine passed away, Arnold remarried. He wed Rose Page (1945-2002) of Duncan and remained with her until his death. Sylvester had 19 children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

During his lifetime Arnold Sylvester was a strong advocate for the revitalization of the Hul’q’umi’num’ language. He also worked to share important cultural knowledge with young people, researchers and linguists so that it could be remembered and observed by future generations. He shared important teachings about respect and protocol, and placed particular importance on the teachings surrounding the protocol for funerals as well as on valuing cedar as a sacred being. In his youth, Sylvester was a canoe racer. As a former racer, he spoke about the importance of having a good heart and mind when paddling a canoe and shared that there are many important teachings that go along with canoe racing.

Sylvester held many important roles within his community. He was a speaker and he carried out the this work at funerals as well as in Bighouse ceremonies. He was also a dancer in the winter ceremonies. In addition to this cultural and ceremonial work, Sylvester was politicallly active. During the early 1960s he served his community as a councillor of the Halalt First Nation and by 1968 he was elected as Chief. As part of this work he advocated for provincial and federal recognition of Indigenous land and resource rights. 

siilece’ Arnold Sylvester worked for many years sharing his knowledge, language, culture and teachings with family, community members, new learners, and researchers. He died in 1999 at the age of 69. We are thankful for the important work that he carried out and are grateful for the knowledge repository his sharing created.