“Stringing Rosaries,” is a labor of love. But like most books associated with the Native experience in the U.S. Denise Lajimodiere’s history of Indian boarding school survivors is studded with long-hidden painful thorns.

Although the survivors interviewed for the book ultimately display a fierce spirit of resilience and even humor, “Stringing Rosaries: The History, the Unforgivable, and the Healing of Northern Plains American Indian Boarding School Survivors,” is a difficult read especially for former boarding school students and their families. According to Lajimodiere she offers a “trigger warning” during her public presentations about her work in researching the book.

“I had to fight back tears when my editor handed me the finished book. I promised survivors I would tell the world what happened to them at boarding schools,” she said during an interview with Indian Country Today.

Lajimodiere has kept her promise with this sacred oath of a book.

She began researching the history of U.S. Indian boarding schools in 2006 and spent the last 10 years interviewing survivors; she was also on the board of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition from 2011-2018, serving as the organization’s second president.

While attending Canadian Truth and Reconciliation hearings in 2007 about that country’s Indian boarding school history, she was shocked to realize that there was so little information about similar schools in the U.S. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was created as part of Canada’s Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.

To read more of Mary Annette Pember's article, please click here.