Over the past few months, I have been writing articles about the temporary reservations in the Willamette Valley. From March 1855 to January 1856 these reservations existed in the valley and the Kalapuya and Molalla Indians lived within their boundaries. Farmers took contracts to supervise the tribes. American settlers did not want to live next … [Read more…]
The Grand Ronde Tribe is a confederacy of tribes. The history of research on how many tribes came to Grand Ronde has greatly progressed in recent years. For a time in the 1990s, Grand Ronde noted five tribes (the primary tribal groups- which encouraged some people to believe that there were only five tribes). In … [Read more…]
One band of the Santiam tribe, Chief Jo’s band, lived within the north and south forks of the Santiam River. Alquema or Jo (Joseph) Hutchins had earlier signed the 1851 treaty with Anson Dart. During the treaty negotiations, the first for the tribes of the Willamette Valley, Alquema and Tiacan (possible the leader of the … [Read more…]
Tribes have their own holidays. As sovereign nations the events and dates significant to the tribes are dates of their establishment, dates of their treaties and date of restoration and termination,and important people. Some events are not necessarily celebratory, like a termination date, or even a date of removal from our homelands to the reservation, … [Read more…]
The reasons for the elimination of federal management of Indians were many. A primary reason was the tribal reservations contained the last undeveloped western lands, which had some of the last untouched natural resources in the United States. Many reservations contained significant stands of timber and clean water resources, as well as significant … [Read more…]