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Native Americans

Fall 2018

A river rolls on

After thousands of years of use for food, transportation, and trade, the Columbia River’s dynamics have changed, resulting in unforeseen consequences and deeply mixed emotions.

 

Once there were Five Sisters. Because they loved to eat salmon, the sisters kept a dam at the mouth of Big River to prevent the fish from swimming upstream. Every night they feasted on a wonderful, fat salmon. This didn’t suit Coyote, who thought that the salmon need the people and the people need the salmon. Or maybe he was jealous and wanted some of that fat salmon for himself. So Coyote tricked the sisters to get into their … » More …

Huckleberries
Fall 2018

The huckleberry

In the shadowy spaces and the sunny clearings of high Northwest forests, the huckleberry waits for an eager human or bear in the late summer. Imbued with an intense sweet-sour flavor, this coveted wild treat might peek out from its glossy leaves in a jealously-protected secret location, but it will be sought and often found.

Seekers of the huckleberry—whether they are Native Americans, more recent residents of the area, or the berry-loving grizzly and black bears—hunt incessantly for the deep purple to red fruit. Even if they aren’t pickers, any Northwesterner or visitor would still find it hard to miss the huckleberry jams, shakes, pies, … » More …

Marmes Rockshelter
Fall 2018

The curation crisis

More than 8,500 years ago, a group of people used a rock shelter at the confluence of the Palouse and Snake Rivers as a base camp. When rediscovered in the early 1950s, the shelter amazed scientists, including Washington State University archeologist Richard Daugherty, with its wealth of artifacts—and the age of its human remains. Named after the property owner at the time, the Marmes Rockshelter was soon inundated by waters from the recently closed Lower Monumental Dam on the Snake. Although a levee had been built by the Army Corps of Engineers to keep the shelter dry, the Corps neglected to take into account the … » More …

Charles Hudson
Spring 2018

Living the fighting spirit

Hunting and rodeoing, playing football and singing in the school choir. For Charles Hudson ’84, growing up in the ’60s and ’70s on the Ft. Berthold Indian Reservation in rural North Dakota also meant listening to stories from his Hidatsa mother and white rancher father. One of them was about a huge flood — and it wasn’t a myth.

Six years before Hudson was born, construction of the Garrison Dam submerged 550,000 acres of Hidatsa, Mandan, and Arikara (the Three Affiliated Tribes) land, resulting in Lake Sakakawea and forcing hundreds of families to flee, including Hudson’s. The tragedy only inspired his parents to triumph over it.

» More …

Peace-Weavers cover
Winter 2017

Peace Weavers: Uniting the Salish Coast through Cross-Cultural Marriages

Peace-Weavers cover

Candace Wellman ’68 

WSU Press: 2017

 

Clara Tennant Selhameten was born the daughter of Lummi tribal leader in what became Whatcom County, and eventually married John Tennant, the son of a famous Methodist minister around 1859. Tennant established the first permanent farm in the region, on Lummi land. In later years, she and John traveled as missionaries and built many churches. It was clear that the couple were true partners in both spiritual … » More …

Smoking Place in Idaho
Fall 2017

Holy smokes

The straggly plant is easy to dismiss. Narrow leaves and white, trumpet-like flowers, fade easily into Northwest fields and roadsides. But Nicotiana attenuata, commonly known as coyote tobacco, contains medicinal and ceremonial properties long revered by Native American cultures.

For thousands of years, coyote and other types of wild tobacco have provided what many consider a versatile healing remedy and meditative, spiritual channel to the Creator. Much of the botanical lore was muddled, however, with the arrival of Europeans and subsequent cultural upheaval.

At Washington State University, researchers Shannon Tushingham and David Gang ’99 PhD are using a combination of archeology and high-end molecular chemistry … » More …

Hang Them All cover
Spring 2017

“Hang Them All”

Hang Them All cover

George Wright and the Plateau Indian War

Donald L. Cutler ’76

University of Oklahoma Press: 2016

 

Questions about the viciousness of Col. George Wright’s month-long war against Indian tribes of the Upper Columbia Plateau typically are filtered through a lens of historical and cultural context.

The cruelty of Wright’s tactics during the Plateau Indian War of 1858 are undeniable. He hanged 16 Indians, including some who had surrendered after being told … » More …

More than God Demands book cover
Summer 2016

More than God Demands

Politics & Influence of Christian Missions in Northwest Alaska 1897–1918

More than God Demands book cover

Anthony Urvina ’85 with Sally Urvina

University of Alaska Press: 2016

Tucked away in cabinets and forgotten closets at the Alaska regional offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Juneau was a collection of old documents known simply as the Reindeer Files.

Anthony Urvina ’85, a natural resource manager at the BIA, began digging through them in 2003 while trying to … » More …

Book - Briefly Noted
Spring 2016

Briefly noted

 

American Indian Health and Nursing

By Margaret Moss ’81

Springer Publishing Company: 2016

A nursing faculty member and assistant dean of diversity and inclusion in the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Nursing, Moss published this work because American Indians have the highest suicide rate for teens, the highest prevalence of diabetes, and one of the lowest life expectancies in the United States. It is the nation’s first nursing textbook tailored to Native Americans.

 

My Years in the Information Technology Trenches, From Data Processing to Information Technology

By Bruce Johnson ’59, ’62 MS

Trafford Publishing: 2015

Involved in computers since … » More …