Quaqtaq, Quebec

Quaqtaq (population 307) is an Inuit village in Nunavik, northern Quebec, Canada. The village is one of the northernmost inhabited places in Quebec, located on the eastern shore of Diana Bay (Tuvaaluk in the Inuktitut language), on a peninsula which protrudes into the Hudson Strait where it meets Ungava Bay.

The name Quaqtaq signifies tapeworm. According to local lore, the name derives from a man who once came to the area to hunt beluga and found live parasites in his faeces. His hunting companions began to call the place Quaqtaq.

Inaccessible by road, Quaqtaq is served by a small airport.

History

Archaeological evidence indicates that people have occupied the area around Quaqtaq for about 3500 years. Thule people, the ancestors of today's Inuit, arrived around 1400 or 1500 AD.

In 1947, a Roman Catholic mission opened in Quaqtaq. The present-day settlement was established after a trading post first established in 1927 at Iggiajaaq, a few kilometres south-west, was finally closed in 1950. After a measles epidemic killed 11 adults in 1952, the Canadian government began delivering basic services to the community. A nursing station was built in 1963. In the 1960s, the Quebec government opened a store and a post office equipped with a radio-telephone. In 1974, the store became a co-operative and, in 1978, Quaqtaq was legally established as a Northern village.

External links

* [http://www.nvquaqtaq.ca/ Website of the village of Quaqtaq]
* [http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/qc/gui/quaqtaq_e.html Demographic and other information from the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada]