La Conner Schools has outdoor celebration of Orange Shirt Day

Orange is a color that has long linked the La Conner and Swinomish communities, perhaps never more so than now, 66 years after the Rainbow Bridge was built.

That was much in evidence Friday afternoon when La Conner students, most wearing bright orange shirts bearing the phrase "Every Child Matters," gathered at Whittaker Field to pay homage to victims and survivors of the Indian Residential School era.

Superintendent Will Nelson, a member of the Blackfeet Nation, said the annual fall event promotes awareness of the residential school system in place in the U.S. and Canada during the 19th and 2...