Rankin Location 15D is one of four reserves of the

Batchewana First Nation of Ojibways The Batchewana First Nation of Ojibways ( oj, Obaajiwan Anishinaabek) is an Ojibway First Nation in northern Ontario. Their traditional lands run along the eastern shore of Lake Superior, from Batchawana Bay to Whitefish Island. They were reserve ...

Algoma District Algoma District is a district and census division in Northeastern Ontario in the Canadian province of Ontario. The name was created by an American ethnologist, Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (1793-1864), who was appointed Indian agent to the Ojibwe in ...

northeastern The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. It is bounded on the north, west and south by the city of Sault Ste. Marie, and on the east by Garden River First Nations reserve of another Ojibwe people. As of 2005, a total of 2,205 people were registered to the Nation; about half live on the reserves and many others live in Sault Ste. Marie. Rankin Reserve 2

At 3,733 acres, Rankin is the largest of four reserves for the Batchewana band

First Nation Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

, whose traditional territory ran north from Sault Ste. Marie (known in Anishinaabe as Bahatwing), along the Lake Superior coastline. Their total amount of land in reserves is 2,241 hectares (5538 acres). The other reserves include

Whitefish Island Whitefish Island is an island in the St. Marys River, just south of Sault Ste. Marie, in Ontario, Canada. History It was an ancestral fishing station to the Anishenabek of the Great Lakes region for over 2,000 years. It was reserved for the u ...

in the St. Marys River, Obadjiwan 15E at Batchawana Bay, and at Goulais Bay 15A. None of these areas are reserves under the 1850

Robinson Treaty The Robinson Treaties are two treaties signed between the Ojibwa chiefs and The Crown in 1850 in the Province of Canada. The first treaty involved Ojibwa chiefs along the north shore of Lake Superior, and is known as the Robinson Superior Treaty. ...

by which they ceded their land to the Crown.Margaret Beattie Bogue, ''Around the Shores of Lake Superior: A Guide to Historic Sites'', Univ of Wisconsin Press, 2007, pp. 197-198
/ref> The band signed the Pennefather Treaty in 1859 relinquishing all title to Reserve 15 (except for Whitefish Island, which was expropriated by the Crown in 1902). The Nation purchased the Rankin property in 1939, trying to regain some of its historic territory. It was added into the reserve system in 1952 by government approval. The Nation has also maintained historic hunting and fishing rights under the Treaty. This was affirmed in the Gargantua Harbour Trial, with a ruling in 2015 in favor of the Batchawana Band First Nation being allowed to continue commercial fishing and have access to a traditional village through Lake Superior Provincial Park.Sarah Petz, "Reasons to celebrate ruling, says chief"
''The Sault Star'', 29 March 2015, accessed 16 May 2015

References

External links

"Gargantua Harbour Decision"
under Justice of the Peace Thomas Logan, 24 March 2015, ScribD
Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rankin Location 15d, Ontario Ojibwe reserves in Ontario Communities in Algoma District