Colleagues, on behalf of the Deh Cho MLA and myself, we regret to inform you that Alison de Pelham passed away on August 10, 2025. Out of respect for her and her family, the Deh Cho Grand Chief closed the DFN office on Aug. 11.
Alison was born to Elizabeth and William de Pelham on December 13, 1951, in Hamilton, Ontario. She was one of five children. Her four siblings were able to make it to Fort Simpson for her Celebration of Life on September 6, 2025. It was an adventure for getting them here because of smoke and road closures, but in the end they made it.
The Celebration of Life was officiated by Martina Norwegian, with several speakers including her two daughters, the Deh Cho Grand Chief, the LKFN Chief, the former PKFN Chief and number of young people who she helped during her life.
Many residents spoke out about de Pelham's contributions, saying she was a game-changer for the community and the region. She started working in Sambaa K'e, where they would say, 'Ask Alison,' she will get things happening and helped the community.
Then she moved to Fort Simpson, working with LKFN and then moving to the Deh Cho First Nation. People spoke about her being the axle that helped move the Deh Cho First Nations' wheels. Through three retirements and four resignations, she was always coming back to help the organization. Alison and her three main stays - Dora, Leona and Sarah - had a lot of firsts, great experiences, laughter, and tears throughout the years. They were an amazing team. As time came about, she would recruit other strong ladies to the organization. A few of those ladies spoke about how Alison was always there for them. They thanked Alison for her commitment, dedication, and love for the Dene people in the region. She left a lot of her knowledge and work ethic to her staff and youth.
We heard how she was a tireless champion of the Deh Cho, playing a vital role in preserving and protecting traditional culture and lands. She was a major advocate for language revitalization, securing funds to help people learn Dene Zhatie. She was a key proponent of the mentor apprenticeship program.
Alison was a great mother and a foster parent. We heard stories how she went to bat for her children under her care and doing it without wanting any recognition. One young man spoke about how she helped him get where he was today and how she treated him as a son. This was Alison, always providing care for children in the community and area.
Like most individuals, it is hard to fully share her impact on the residents of the Deh Cho and her family so I have attached both her daughters' words of Alison, which I will like deemed as read and printed in the Hansards.
On behalf of the Deh Cho MLA and myself, we would like to thank her and her family for serving the people of the Deh Cho. She will be sadly missed but never forgotten.
Alison de Pelham was born to Elizabeth and William de Pelham on December 13, 1951, in Hamilton, Ontario. In her early years she spent her time focusing on education and her love of books. This drive she had to read would be her foundation to attending the University of Toronto acquiring a bachelor's degree, Master of Arts and a Degree in Anthropology. Alison's love for education and studies ranged from studying chimps and baboons and the Dene Culture which she would then use to develop her thesis, studying at the University of Dundee.
Alison's travels to Gibraltar, Morroco, Aruba and South America eventually took her to Sambaa K'e in 1979 for a paddling trip. The vast wilderness and the beauty of the people brought her back to the community where she lived in the rich culture during 1980. It was then where she ended her educational journey and started a family.
In this place she met her husband Dolphus Jumbo, adopted George Jumbo, and had two daughters Jessica and Beth. While living in the isolated community Alison dove into the Dene culture, laws, and practices; learning from the elders and her in-laws. Finding humbleness in the culture she encouraged the Dene way of life within her children throughout their lives. Passion and support for the people and culture brought her to move to Fort Simpson, NT in 1991 where she began work for Deh Cho First Nations. While at Deh Cho First Nations Alison created, molded, assisted, and established programs supporting the elders of the regions wishes.
Alison's heart reached beyond just that of her children, she became a foster parent in her late years in Sambaa K'e and throughout her life, housing and providing safe environments for numerous children of the Deh Cho. This led to the adoption of her youngest son Travis de Pelham.
A significant part of Alison's later life was her love for the Buddhist culture and region, travelling to Nepal and Tibet on her own, with her children and then her siblings. Sharing the experience of visiting mountains, monasteries, and orphanages. Alison was a very loving, supportive, intelligent, direct individual that left an imprint on the lives of many.
Her love had no bounds and did not only rest with her children, adoptive children, foster children, charity children, Tibetan children or the beautiful nation she helped lead, but with the people who worked alongside her and whom she believed in. This is one the greatest gifts she gave all of us and we will carry forward, knowing "Alison taught us this", "Alison said I could do this", she believed in us.
A loving mother, sister, daughter and legend.
We were looking through all of her photographs and I keep remembering all the times that she took us to all the different places camping up the Alaska highway, playing on the beaches in Sambaa k'e, fall hinting in island lake, visiting family in Ontario, hiking in the foothills of the Himalayas, vacationing in Tuscany, there was no place on this planet she wouldn't take us to experience, to enrich ourselves. We spent many of our young years playing in mud, swimming in lakes, playing on beaches, berry picking in gravel pits, dragging us alongside her work events. Living amongst the work of DFN and its gatherings, the drum dances were our favourite events. There was no place we couldn't go with my mom, we went everywhere, got into everything, drove her insane, but made the best memories that we will carry with us for a lifetime.
As we grew older there was nothing we could not bring to my mother, of course sometimes we would think, oh crap "mom's going to mad", she would be, but then she would say how are we going to fix this, how are you going to improve. She always supported every effort in us no matter what and strived to ensure she was always behind us 100 percent. I will forever cherish this boundless love she gave.
When my mother passed, I was so worried, "what am I going to do?" "Where do I start from here?" This was unchartered territory for me, not knowing what to do next and not having my mother to lean on. I continued with things you have to when you are experiencing the passing of a loved one feeling lost but pushing ahead. And then I found myself saying to whomever was near, "wow, I sound like my mother", "this is exactly what my mother would do", "this is something my mother would say", then I realized she is here, she lives through me. She's given me all these great characteristics that I will carry on. I am and I know my siblings are so very grateful for having her as our mother.
I want to thank you all for coming and sharing this time us. My mother was an avid believer in the spirituality of Buddhism and travelled to Tibet numerous times. You will notice behind her urn here are prayer flags. There are flags each have a prayer on it and it is thought when they are placed in a high point in the wind the prayer will follow winds. When being greeted by someone in the Buddhist culture you may be given a prayer scarf. We have one here today on her table near urn, we invite you to have a look and if you would like to hold it and say a prayer for her, we will be taking her prayer scarf to Tibet to spread her ashes on mount lash, as per her dying wish.
How to start this, how could anyone know how to start this…
Alison, mom to me, my siblings, Deh Cho children, a grandmother, an auntie, a leader who did so regionally aligned with the elders wishes, a friend to many.
She had a passion for the work she did and did it well, did life as she saw fit and did not budge especially when it came to helping someone. She was a so many things a student that'd travel the world to gain knowledge and intelligence, a leader, laydispenser, a personal librarian, growing up there was always a book in her hand. But most of all a woman with impeccable love, kindness, selflessness, strength and understanding.
A woman who appreciated and embraced the Dene culture, laws, and life. Memories of us being out in Island Lake where she is by my late aunt Sarah and grandmothers side punching/scraping moosehides, setting and checking a lengthy Snare line with all my siblings while shooting chickens, making socks out of rabbit skin so our feet were warm and cooking sweets when we'd run out that attracted the cutline camp children, nursing broken winged birds back to health are always some of the fondest. As parents you gave us the best of both worlds, the Dene and Western knowledge!
A woman with a heart that felt calm and warm. Hauling a load of Sambaa K'e children around to swim and having the best birthday parties in our bright green yard (I will forever have the picture burned in my memory of you in a sweater, pj pants and a smoke raking the yard) and rigging up a plastic slide into the river with dish soap bubbles. Even in a small community you showed us a world of love. Trips to visit family in Ontario, Disneyland and one of the most memorable. Nepal. Hiking the mountains for weeks and witnessing you first had given everything you can to people in need, your kindness and love did not only reside with your children or a parent for the region but extended across the world.
A woman with such strength as mother that modeled the strength, I inherited to be that mother to my children. The strength, love, and patience you showed me and my siblings I carry to my children. You are the reason I am the mother I am. The strength to put up with my siblings and I and when we drove you crazy, I miss the saying "I'll lock you all in a room and see who comes out alive", the idea to record yourself to replay instead of repeating is a tactic I considering using now. The grandmother you are to our children the love, cuddles, kisses, and moments will never be forgotten. The pride through the good and the support during the bad times could be matched by none other. Your love was the strength that broke cycles and carved a path for the rest of our lives!
The last memory I will hold forever in my heart is this past January when I came to stay and you asked me to help brush your hair and give you a trim, it took me a half hour to get that knot out but will remember and cherish every stroke of that brush and the beaming smile you had after I cut it. It was like a movie I wish never had an ending.
If I shared every memory, I have burned in my heart we'd have to extend this celebration to days. You gave us a life I will never forget.
After she left us a song that kept playing in my head by a Dean Lewis and the line that said "How do I say goodbye to someone I've known my whole damn life" and it took me awhile to realize this isn't really goodbye, not only in our culture that her spirit lives on but her spirit lives on within us, the memories we've all shared with her, the teachings, the impact she's made on people lives around us whether it be through providing a safe place full of love for children, work colleagues and friends she supported and loved or a region full to the brim of passion she had had for the work she did. Mother you live on in each and every one of us. Each one of the siblings and grandchildren that you've left love and strength in. You've left an imprint that will carry on generations, your spirit lives in me.
So, I ask when we finish this celebration today to bring forth the strength, love, kindness, passion, selflessness and maybe a little of the stubbornness that my mother had, for each other, for her
