Ethnographic Overview and Assessment of Federal and Tribal Lands in the Lake Roosevelt Area Concerning the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation

Ackerman, Lillian

The purpose of this document is to give an ethnographic overview and assessment of existing information on the historical and contemporary native populations of the Lake Roosevelt and Coulee Dam National Recreation Area. To meet this requirement, the cultmes of all eleven of the Colville Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation are described, based on available published and archival information. Chapter 1 presents the objectives of the report. Chapter 2 consists of a brief narration of the intergroup culture of the entire Plateau, which serves as context for the cultural description of the tribes currently on the Colville Reservation. The intergroup culture of the Plateau includes trade patterns, task groupings in which seasonal resources were shared with all comers, the extensive kinship network, which tied groups together culturally, politically, and economically, and other factors that unified Plateau societies' across tribal lines. Chapter 3 describes each of the eleven tribes culturally, based on available information, and assesses each of the ethnographic sources. Chapter 4 describes the historical contacts between the Indians and the Europeans and EuroAmericans. The latter included fur traders, missionaries, settlers, and soldiers. The Treaty of 1855 is noted with the wars arising from it. The restriction of Indians to reservations, particularly the Colville Reservation, is described. Chapter 5 has a discussion on the history of the Colville Reservation, its creation, reductions in size, the allotment process, loss of culture, persistence of culture, the building of Grand Coulee Dam, and the termination threat. Finally. the modem day situation is briefly discussed including modem culture, kinship to other reservations, and relationship to federal and local governments. Chapter 6 presents recommendations for future research. They include a satisfactory definition of village, extended family, band, and tribe; a clarification ofland tenure rules; more evidence on the role of women in the Salmon Ceremony; more data on the puberty blanket; an evaluation of how the recurrent epidemics in the Plateau affected the cultures socially in the past, and the contemporary numbers of the constituent tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation. Not all recommendations are listed here: there are fIfteen recommendations in all .

Ethnographic Overview and Assessment of Federal and Tribal Lands in the Lake Roosevelt Area Concerning the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation

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