“On this day in 1877, Treaty 7, the second treaty between the federal Crown and Plains Indigenous people, was concluded and signed at the Blackfoot Crossing of the Bow River, the present-day Siksika First Nation. A second signing took place on Dec. 4, 1877, with Blackfoot leaders who could not be present at the primary ceremony.
“The treaty covers 130,000 square kilometres of land from the Rocky Mountains to the Cypress Hills in the east and Red Deer River south to the U.S. border, including traditional lands of the Siksika, Kainai, Piikani, Stoney-Nakoda, and Tsuut’ina First Nations.
“Albertans honour and respect the First Nations of this province and the moral imperative to share our future prosperity through such vehicles as Alberta’s Indigenous Opportunity Corporation. This is a day Albertans should remember as an important one in forming the province’s future.”