Aboriginal community says goodbye to respected Elder

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When Dan McLean passed away on April 9 at the age of 89, his passing left a void in the lives of many people.

Described by some of those who knew him as a trailblazer and a progressive thinker who was dedicated to making things better for his people, McLean was also remembered as being a man that was filled with humor, who never failed to make those around him feel good.

McLean was an honorary lifetime member of the Aboriginal Multi-Media Society (AMMSA) board of directors, publisher of Windspeaker, but that was just one accomplishment in the long list of accomplishments and contributions he made to the Aboriginal community over the years.

Chester Cunningham, founder of Native Counselling Services of Alberta, and another member of the AMMSA board, said he first met McLean in the mid-1960s.

"He was on the band council with Sturgeon Lake. And I always felt that Dan was the most progressive leader up there," Cunningham said. "It seemed when you went to meetings, it was Dan who was putting forth the ideas. And he really cared about his people, and realized that his people were going to have to move ahead to survive."

And when oil companies came to the reserve wanting to drill, McLean was very much involved in negotiations, Cunningham said.

"Dan was at the forefront of all of the discussions. And he could see ahead. He was the visionary, really, I guess, seeing what could happen."

When Cunningham created Native Counselling Services in 1970, McLean was one of the first people he put on the organization's board.

"And he always came with new ideas. He was a bit more than a board member; he also went out and did a lot of public relations. But he was a real Elder," Cunningham said. "He was always, right up to the end, he was always concerned about the plight of his people."

McLean was one of the founding members of the Native Federation of Alberta in the late 1960s.

"It was sort of the organization that kind of spearheaded all the programs for Aboriginal people in Alberta," Cunningham explained.

"We were always trying to get one organization to provide services for all organizations. When the federal government refused to fund the Native federation, we kind of split off. And also they were involved in recruiting both Harold (Cardinal) and Stan Daniels to run for their respective organizations, because we felt that the organizations needed to move forward to a political group rather than just more of a social thing. And as a result, Native Counselling got going, Native Outreach, Canative Housing . . . the communication network. And they all more or less got their jump-start as a result of the Native Federation of Alberta. But Dan was always involved, and was really level headed with all of his decisions, and you could tell any of the decisions he made were well thought out. And he listened to people," he said.

Jim Badger, former grand chief of the Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council got to know McLean through the council.

"When it was first formed, I think he was one of the key runners in the 1974 start-up of the Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council. And he was very instrumental," Badger said. "You have to realize in those days, there was no sort of formal organization, no formal formats on how to do things, how to run meetings. So he came to it at a really hard time."

McLean was with the council when Badger first joined the organization, and was still there when Badger had climbed the ranks to grand chief.

Badger described McLean as a trailblazer, both in his work with the council, and in his work in the early days of Native Counselling Services of Alberta.

"Because in those days, remember, relations were not really that good with the police and with the Indian people. I see him as a trailblazer, working with Chester in terms of developing a system like that. And to this day, we have grown. Now you see First Nations controlling their own enforcement arm of the RCMP, their own system, and their ownprocesses. And it is going to go further starting from that point," Badger said.

"For the short time that I knew Dan, he was the type of person that liked to tell jokes. He had a lot of humor. Gentle. Kind of the old-fashioned type of person that you just got to know the first time you met him," said AMMSA board member Rosemarie Willier.

Dan McLean is survived by his wife Eliza, son Arnold and daughter-in-law Ernestine, son Paul, daughters Christine, Martha, Rosie, Beverly, Ann, Ruby and Shirley, daughter Carol and son-in-law Lawrence, daughter Doris and son-in-law Robert, daughter Sharon and son-in-law Clarence, daughter Annette and son-in-law Billy Joe, as well as 62 grandchildren, 14 great grandchildren, and three great, great grandchildren.