10
Smoke Signals
MAY 15, 2011
BOOKS continued
from front page
right away that the Tribe didn't
already have copies of them.
One was a Grand Ronde Agency
book of allotments from 1889.
"We've seen these allotments be
fore," he said, "but not the original
books."
The other book was a pass book
recording Natives coming and go
ing from the Grand Ronde Agency
starting in 1861. Natives could not
just leave the Agency, Lewis said.
'They needed a pass and it was
in this book that the agent recorded
the passes. I had to call back to the
staff to see if they had this informa
tion," Lewis said.
This turned out to be new for the
Tribe, Lewis said. "A significant
find."
On Tuesday, May 10, Cultur
al Resources staffers and Tribal
members Khani Schultz, Cultural
Collections coordinator, and Ju
lie Brown, Collections assistant,
joined Lewis on the fourth floor
of the Oregon Historical Society,
the research floor, in the Jefferson
Room, with a wall full of south
facing windows and plenty of light
to photograph the books, page by
page. Lewis figured it would take
them about four hours.
The pages were delicate, and some
stuck together at the spine, making
it difficult to flatten the pages for the
photographs. There was excitement
in the find and between photographs,
an anecdote was remembered, a
piece of history related.
Lewis paged delicately through
the allotment book, noting names
that today's Tribal members would
surely know: Martha Jane Sands,
Allen (could be an ancestor of Tribal
Chairwoman Cheryle Allen Ken
nedy), Bob (now spelled "Bobb," as
in Tribal Council member Steve
Bobb), Apperson, Amos, Foster and
Hutchins.
"We know for sure that this is a
name that has changed over the
years to Hudson," Lewis said. "We
have records that say that Hutchins
or Hudson refers to the same per
son or family."
All the names in the allotment
book refer to Grand Ronde Tribal
members or their descendants.
"Most were full blood," said Lew
is. "You needed to be at least half
blood to get an allotment."
"Here's Hartless," he continued to
read from the book. "Holmes. Here's
Jones from the Molalla Tribe. That
most assuredly is a relative of
Kathryn (Jones) Harrison. Here's
LaChance, Lafferty."
While the allotments were signed
into the book in 1889, Lewis said
that most weren't likely delivered
until 1891 or so.
"Here's Mercier, Metcalf, they're
all here. Riggs. We have lists of these
allotments from the National Ar
chives," he said. It is something else
again, though, to see the original.
Looking at the pass book, people
were named with their Tribes. We
now know that "Perry and family"
got a 10-day (lOd) pass on June
20, 1864, to visit the "Millers" in
"Polk"?
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Ths two pages show records from a pass book that recorded Natives coming and going from
Agency starting in 1861.
Photo by Michelle Alaimo
the Grand Ronde
We know that on April 7, 1890,
that "Umpqua Charles and wife"
and "Cultis Joe and wife" got "7d"
passes to visit "Mill Creek"?
And that on April 9, that same
year, "Muddy Jim and wife" got
a "lw" (one week) pass to go to
"Marys River"?
"This is an amazing archive," said
Lewis, particularly for genealogists.
"It has information that people don't
have. It tells (partial) stories about
lineage, and is more detailed infor
mation on a daily or annual basis
than we have seen before."
Natives sought passes to leave
the reservation for many reasons,
said Lewis, from harvesting crops
to fishing to visiting relatives.
"When you were here, you couldn't
make your own money," said Schul
tz, holding down a page for photo
graphing, "so they took off."
And not all of those leaving the res
ervation did so by seeking passes.
"There are stories my mother
(Tribal Elder Peachie Hamm) tells
about trails from the reservation
to the coast that only the Indians
knew about. We've looked for the
Old Coast Trail many times," said
Schultz, "but we've never found
it."
Although the Tribe does not yet
know what rules were in place for
Indians to get these passes, Julie
Brown guesses that a lot depended
on the agent in charge at the time,
or whether the Indian was in trou
ble at the time.
Likewise, she said, punishments
for taking off without a pass varied
from being whipped to a family los
ing rations to nothing at all if an
Indian had something perceived as
valuable to trade.
These ideas are strung together
from things we know about history
and human behavior and from oral
tradition. Finds like this add reli
able details to the mix that need to
be collected and interpreted.
Before the professionals at Cul
tural Resources work through one
batch of data, another arrives full of
new information and possibility.
As Schultz and Brown continued
photographing pages, Lewis went
back to the stacks where he uncov
ered copies of "what are possibly
the first laws in Grand Ronde."
Among the information was a list
of the Tribes represented in this
early legislative body as well as 22
laws governing the peoples of the
Grand Ronde Agency nearly at its
beginning. B
BOOK. FOR 5ALE.
"The KaUpuyans:A sourcebook on the Indians of the Willamette Valley
by Harold Mackey. Ph.D.
This book, th cough collabora
tion between the Cultural Re
sources Department, Mission
Mill Museum, an4 the Mackey
Family, has been re-released
in a second edition with a new
cover, an updated bibliography
with more current and accurate
sources, new photographs, and
a new afterward explaining the
Grand Ronde Tribal perspective.
Name;.
AddrttK.
City:.
Slate:.
Zip:.
Checks only.
. of book x $ 15.93 each
.total.
$12.95 per book
Books may be purchased from the
Tribe's Cultural Resources Department
(ocate4 on the secon4 floor of Tribal
Bui!4mj 14 CA4ult Education Build
ing) for 12.95 each. To have an order
mailed to you, please fill out this form
and include an additional $3.00 for
shipping cost per book.
Mail this form toe
CTGR Cultural Resources
The Kalapuans
9615 Grand Ronde Road
Grand Ronde, OR
97347
fill