Jimmy Johnny, Jawa (1945 - 2015)
Jimmy Johnny was born at a Stewart River wood camp to parents Doc and Sarah Johnny and he grew up at 17 Mile learning traditional ways from his parents and grandparents. He had siblings near his age, Alex and Dorothy, and they all, including some younger sisters, went to residential school.1)
Jimmy Johnny was a citizen of the Na-cho Nyäk Dun First Nation. In the 1950s, the doctor in Mayo ordered the Na-cho Nyäk Dun living in the Old Village across the Stewart River to move because of the danger of flooding and because the river water was being polluted from Mayo and the hospital. Instead of moving into Mayo, Jimmy’s family moved twenty miles downriver and lived in a tent until they built a cabin. They hunted and fished in that area for many, many years.2)
Jimmy shot his first moose at age nine when he was hunting with his father and he went on to become a wrangler for outfitter Louie Brown at age thirteen.3) Johnny started his career as a big game hunter guide as a teenager in 1958. He first went into the Snake River valley in 1961.4) He helped to trail horses to the Bonnet Plume, Snake and Wind rivers and hunted big game with Louie’s clients. Jimmy and brother Alex broke horses for the outfitter and in return was given their own horses to care for.5) Jimmy had his own dog team and he participated in the Mayo Carnival race. He spent fifty years hunted and fished around Tekwänt’e Ddhaw and Tekwänt’e Män.6)
Jimmy Johnny and Joyce Simon lived in Elsa and raised three children: Morley, Jimmy and Chó-Khyaiá. Jimmy Sr. was proud of them and doted on his grandchildren and instilled in them respect for the land, the water and all living things. He met Linda Champion at the Vancouver treatment centre in 1990 and they spent many happy years together in British Columbia and then Yukon when Jimmy got home sick.7) In 2010, at age 65, he and four others spent seven days trailing twenty-five horses from McQuesten Lake into the Bonnet Plume River area to get ready for the season's hunt. He was part of a team that invited journalists into the Peel watershed in 2009 for three days, just as the great debate over protection of the area entered its final stage. 8) Johnny’s knowledge of the Peel River watershed terrain made him one of the most respected guides in the Yukon. He became a tireless and fierce defender of the plants, animals, and culturally important sites in the region. Jimmy Johnny was awarded the Yukon Conservation Society’s 2016 Gerry Couture Stewardship Award for his work in protecting the land, water and wildlife of the Yukon. 9)