Closed Captions Audio Described

Honorary Chinook Chief Cliff Snyder discusses the Lewis and Clark Expedition from the Indigenous perspective, focusing on Chinook and Clatsop nations at the Pacific terminus. He covers tribal encounters along the Columbia River, the critical role of Sacagawea, trade and diplomacy, and the winter at Fort Clatsop, emphasizing how Native peoples shaped the expedition's survival and success.

Transcript

0:07 Good afternoon. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Corp of Sky Two, the 10 of many voices. For those of you who are not familiar with us. We are a traveling exhibit. We've been traveling the Lewis and Clark Trails since January of 2003 and made our way Westward to the Pacific Ocean. We'll also be doing the return trip next year in 2006 back to Saint Louis from the coast. We call this the ten of many
0:29 voices because we bring in people from all over the country due to programs and 10 of many voices about Lewis and Clark. And we also bring in tribal presenters to talk about their tribe. Today. We have with us chief Greywolf Cliff Snyder, who is an honorary chief of the Chinook and he's going to be talking about the tribal history at the end of the trail. So please welcome cliff Snyder.
0:59 Is this working? Can you hear me?
1:04 Well, here we are at the end of the trail. And uh I wanna tell you that I've been traveling with my Maya Lin in the last three days at the Snitzer in Portland Fort Vancouver. And in order to keep this appointment, I see some of my people who have been following me all around and it's good to see them here. And I wanna also tell you that
1:29 I did do a rain dance this week. And that's the reason why we have such good weather
1:40 I want to say to you, Klahowya you is a chinook Indian word for hello or goodbye, much like Eloah. And I also want to say that I sometimes I fear following Roger Wendling. If any of you are here at the last presentation, he puts on such a great show and we've done things
2:03 all across America all the way from here to Monticello. I would like to say also that I don't go through the acts like he does, but I will probably be doing a lot of reading off of my notes and I think you gonna understand that. And it is the custom of most of the tribes across the nation
2:25 to welcome visitors into their area. And I'd like to take the honor at this point to welcome you to the eternal homeland of the Clatsop Indian tribe who live just a few miles from here. In fact, they have villages right out here uh where the rivers go into the ocean above seaside and dear heart.
2:50 And the Clatsop tribe history actually goes back over 10,000 years by carbon dating. And I'm using that in the same text I would the Chinook Indian tribe because all that separated us was a river we intermarried
3:10 and uh we visited each other and we had the same language as Chinook Penutian language. And so nowadays you make territories. This is Washington, this is Oregon. The river runs between. But those days we were just all Indians living here at that particular time to the south of us. We had the Killamuks,
3:35 you've heard about the whale story uh and below them were the Nehalem And uh then on the other side of the Columbia River were the lower Chinooks. And then the Clatsop of course, were the ones that kept Lewis Park at Fort Clatsop during that winter 05/06. And that was the second longest place
4:00 that they stayed on their entire trip. The first one of course was in at Fort Mandan and we'll get to that later. And the third one was last month when I was visiting the 10 of many voices in Kenya, Idaho on the Clearwater River. That was the third place they stayed the longest on a return trip.
4:24 I would like to take one minute and I don't know if he's back there in the audience someplace to talk, talk about a man who is a director of the ten of many voices and corps of discovery too. I worked with him for 25 years on the Chinook Indian Council even though he is a Clatsop Indian.
4:48 His name is Dick Bash and he works with Darryl Martin and they are running this wonderful, wonderful corps of discovery all across America and the people who work here. I tell you when I visited with them in different places. They, I've never seen one group of people work as hard as they do to put on a great show.
5:13 This bad okay Thank you,
5:19 Dick Bass currently is the uh seaside resident and Gerard Baker who preceded him is now the head of Mount Rushmore. So I've been working with some really neat people across uh in 2003, in Monticello, uh
5:40 Gerard Baker asked me to be the first educational speaker on the tour. Dick Bass gave the first blessing. And so we were right there at Monticello and in Virginia in Charlottesville at the very beginning. And here we are again, at the end of the trail, I feel very blessed to be at Monticello kamea seaside.
6:05 And I guess in a few weeks, I'll be back from Fort Vancouver when we come back. And uh I wanna say something about Dick Bash. We don't say great in the Indian language, like great, great, great, great. Like the white people do we just say great grandfather or grandfather Well, Dick Bass's grandfather was Chief Coboway or comowool
6:30 who was in the Young Bay area around Astoria, the river and Fort Clatsop And he's the one that helped the uh Lewis and Clark contingent make it through that terrible winter. Uh 050405. Well, I'm getting mixed up on my dates, but anyway, that would enter before they return. Anyway, uh when,
6:56 when Lewis and Clark left Fort Clatsop and headed back to Jefferson, they presented Coboway with Fort Clatsop itself and that was kind of famous in the last few weeks if you understand because uh it burned down accidentally. And
7:18 so many times I've had my picture taken there and done the interviews that it's going to, it's a great loss for me. But on the other hand, they're finding artifacts there and they might rebuild it and it might be better than ever. Thank God we have Dick bash.
7:39 Ok. Uh One thing that, uh we want to say about the clatsop in that time and you, if you're all Oregonians or have been here a long time, you know how much it rains he mentioned. And for you people who are new from last presentation, Lewis and Clark spent that winter here and it rained every day except for 12 days
8:04 and only six of those days that they even see a glimmer of sunshine. So I think we're very fortunate today, I guess a couple of weeks ago when they were walking the Astoria Bridge across there and doing some Lewis and Clark activities and I imagine some of you were there. I think you got rained on pretty hard.
8:26 Now, today, my story is gonna be a little different from the ones that you might have been reading about on this 8000 mile trip across America I'm gonna be giving you the view from the Indian villages. Put these people coming who are they, I'm gonna give you the boom the view
8:50 that these are strangers in our land. And it's not gonna be the same thing that you read about in a white man's history book. So be prepared today to get a different version.
9:04 I would like to ask you though if I could see a show of hands. how many of you have a trace of Indian blood in your veins? Would you please raise your hands?
9:15 Wonderful. Is two or three? I must tell you if you are part Indian and people find this out all the time. I know, I ask kids this all the time. I'm talking to the schools where the teachers are, how many of you are Indians? And they say, yeah, my dad's an Indian but they never say they are for some reason. But if at all possible
9:38 when I was a small boy walking down the street with my mother holding her hand, people had passed by, she was a half breed Indian, but she told me never to tell anybody that you're part indian because of discrimination factors. Now, we don't see that today but after playing football at Oregon State, catching passes one handed
10:03 and being a uh all American golf coach and things like that. Wherever I go. Being an Indian, I'm the one that's different and being in being different is my greatest asset in the world. That's one of the reasons I've even here today because I'm part of Indian. So follow your bug eyes back there if you're younger,
10:26 uh, sometimes there might be some educational opportunities there to be very proud of your heritage.
10:34 And those are my days of being called Floating Feather by my coaches at Oregon State. And now my story, how many of you study, uh, anything about the Lewis Clark trip six? Most of you know the whole story then, uh some of the how many read journals are really up on everything? There's still a few of you. Ok.
11:00 The reason I'm asking you that is because sometimes when I'm talking to high school kids or grade school kids, they hadn't had that experience. But sometimes I find people in the audience who know a lot more about it. For example, like Roger, he's had all these journals and he's been studying for years. I have to get mine to legends and talking to other Indians on the trail.
11:25 And sometimes they'll tell me stories that aren't in the White Man's history books
11:32 and you know, something that coming along the trail and trying to relate these stories. Remember there was sign language, but the Indians couldn't write. And so it would be very difficult for them to portray their history down to the line. Now, I want to say that
11:53 the way the legends and the true stories are handed down comes to campfires at night during the winter when they're sitting around and the elders are teaching the young about what has happened. And that's how the history was handed down. For example, I told you, you told her, she told him
12:19 back there, got back to me, the story would be slightly changed and we did it again the next night, it would change again. And by the time the next year or so, it would hardly seem like it would be the same story.
12:35 But here's my son, I talked to my son, I tell him to repeat the story back to me. Ok? He repeats it back to me. No, you have it wrong. You do it again, you do it again, ok? We'll start tomorrow, you come back and you do it again and I keep doing that and doing it and doing it. So that way
13:01 when he tells his son, the story is the same as when I told him. And so that's why when you read the history books, it's all written out and it goes on for ages. But the Indian stories are handed down by legends. And so today we'll talk about that. But actually my reflections
13:24 of this whole business of Lewis and Clark goes clear back to President Jefferson and who set out to buy a little town in the mouth of the Mississippi river called New Orleans.
13:40 And I guess you've been reading about New Orleans and watching that on TV. Lately, quite a bit. But to get New Orleans was to uh dominate the river traffic on the Pacific. So, in negotiating with uh France who had just acquired that territory from Spain,
14:04 he found out that Napoleon of all people wanted to sell some land over here because he wanted to pay off his war debts. You know, Napoleon was always at war And so Jefferson sent an emissary over
14:24 and they decided on what we now call the Louisiana purchase. And you know how much that was? Three cents an acre, a little less than we are paying today around the seaside up there.
14:40 It amounted to $15 million for all the land from the uh east coast to the rocky mountains, $15 million. Well, that was more than the kind the budget of the United States. At that time when I was in Kenya, they asked the other speaker
15:05 about how they pay off those debts. Uh How do you get rid of them? You know, where the money come from? And I think President Jefferson died owing a lot of money. I don't think it probably ever got paid for it. But anyway, we acquired the land and that was double doubled the size of America at that time.
15:27 Remember at that time, there were only 17 states in the Union and we only had 15 stars on the flag. And when Lewis and Clark were handing out flags, it wasn't really a true emblem of what was really happening
15:45 now, I must, I did an oar canoe over in Orwako a short time back and I told them how legends were handled down, but I told them now I'm 80 years old and so I have to write things down. So when I'm turning the pages, I hope you, excuse me for a minute, because I don't want to leave anything out. Anyway, Jefferson, pick Merriweather
16:09 Lewis and Clark to explore this new region. And he knew about uh uh a little bit about what was gonna happen. But really, he didn't know what was gonna happen with the Indian tribes. He knew that some French trappers had gone up the Missouri river and he thought maybe
16:32 there might be a river passage all the way to the Pacific Coast. Mackenzie had done something similar up in Canada before that
16:43 and the information he received back, he knew there were different people out there. Some of them had never seen a white man. So he didn't know whether they're gonna be friendly or whether they're gonna be treacherous and just wipe out the whole expedition. The only knowledge he has is that real close to Monticello.
17:07 And I just love the time that I got a chance to be in that area and meet with those people because actually it was a sister city of uh the friends of Pacific here across the National Story in Long Beach. And so I had to go back with them too and see that particular area. But the Monacan tribe was back there. They're unrecognized today, like how the chinooks is unrecognized.
17:31 By the way, I want to tell you, even though we're an unrecognized tribe, the United States government, we got recognized under the Clinton administration after 30 years of work and then new administration came along, they took it away again. But I want to tell you something, we still recognize the United States government
17:52 found
17:54 he didn't know about like I said about being friendly and being massacre. But I want you to just come with me and try to visualize in your mind. Remember on our trip on the bus and we're going up to Columbia River and we were talking about visualizing what they went through as they came down and you almost get a clear picture
18:17 even though it's changed in their dams and things like that things have changed. And almost every speaker talks about all the horrible things they went through. They talk about the bears, they talk about the river problems, they talk about the Great Falls taking a month to get around 19 miles. I was there. I went to the Buffalo jump and I know how sticky that mud can be.
18:42 I don't know how they did all those things. But mainly I just wanna say like Roger said, it was the Indians that helped him all the way.
19:01 Now that tradition has started out. And of course, I couldn't begin until everything was finalized with France, with Napoleon. So they kind of sat with Billy's for a while. They finally got into Saint Louis little dancing and celebration. Then they took out
19:23 now for the next few 100 miles, they start running into the Osages and the Kickapoo Indians. I always think of that comic strip with the Kickapoo juice. I didn't know there were Indians like the kickapoo. But anyway, they were, and they just went for several 100 miles. They run into the Shawnee Indians who were friendly. No problem there.
19:47 And uh they were kind of curious about Lewis and Clark, but they didn't offer any resistance. You said they went into their camps and they did, did some talking, tried the council and tell them that the white great white father was back in Washington and then in Iowa, they ran into the uh otoe
20:11 I had the honor of making the uh reflection speech of the uh first speech on the Lewis and Clark trail in Omaha. And there, there was, I got a chance to go to Council Bluffs and Lewis and Clark held their first council and within where they just sat down around the council park. And uh
20:36 what they talked about was the great white father. And that now he was in charge of this land and now they would have to be subservient to him and not trade with any other nation except America. I don't know how that sounds to you right now, but that's the way it was going at that particular time to cancel.
20:58 Roger talked a little bit about the Lakotas. We're getting the Lakota country. First of all, you get into the uh Yankton Sioux and of course, had been a white man or two. And then to that area at this point, they still have got to a place where the Indians had never seen a white man.
21:22 So they picked him up on a carrier that was covered with skins and carried them in the camp. And they had a big feast and they fiddled and they had a great time and that was swell. So they said, ok, it's not gonna be a bad trip at all. Well, the other Lakotas, the Teton Sioux were just up the river aways
21:45 and you heard about black buffalo? I can't remember the other chief's name. They were just having a problem with uh lewis and clark What they wanted to do because they had seen some white trappers come through there is control the trade. So they made high demands of tobacco, alcohol, goods of every kind in order to let them go by.
22:09 And actually Lewis and Clark, train their cannons on them Clark decided to pull out his sword and I'm not going through the whole story since some of you read about it. But anyway, they finally left and good. Then they led a couple of chiefs and some of the women right down the river ways with them and that seemed to satisfy them
22:34 and they went on. So here we are in a situation
22:41 where we know that Indians can be troublesome. Not every tribe is going to help us on the way.
22:51 Now, we run into the Arikara tribes. A lot of times they're just sewn in with the Hidatsa and the Mandans and they shared entertainment with them. They danced around the campfire, they got out their fiddles and uh York got up and he was dancing. They couldn't believe how well this black man could dance. Of course, they're kind of curious too about his skin color,
23:16 but they handed out some peace medals and some US flags at that particular point. And here they still had some trade goods to trade off so that they could proceed. And then they reached the Ninth river and that's where they found the man Mandans and the Hidatsa
23:37 And this is the greatest acquisition of the whole trip. A 16 year old woman called Sacagawea We and people ask me constantly, how do you say that if you're a tricity? You say Sacajawea
23:55 with a J some of the Lenn Heister only say there are no Js in the language of the Shoshoni and it's spelled with G So for me to tell you uh how old she is where she's buried, there's a lot of things to go on with that. But this time she's only 16 years old. And she was married to a man called
24:20 Toussaint Charbonneau
24:23 Anyway, they had a new baby and it was just born just prior to the uh expedition coming in there. They decided anyway, she'd been captured actually by the Hidatsa by the fighters before and had lived with them. And so she could be very valuable in translating uh for a different tribes and also giving directions.
24:47 And some people say she's not as famous as everybody liked to put her. But actually, there's so many places along the trail where she found food for them, she's able to translate for them. And actually, she was a great acquisition to the tribe. And so they were hired on even with the baby. And of course, remember they had the dogs
25:12 and here's this picnic party heading off, uh down down the road. But anyway, during that winter at Fort Mandan, but as I mentioned, it's a longest they spent in any one place, but the winter was cold, the snow was three or 4 ft deep. The buffaloes were scarce
25:36 and they had a really hard time making it through that winter. As Roger said, um, if we starve you starve and if we eat, you eat. And actually they got along with the Indians. So well, they went out to help them hunt, went on their trips and helped them bring the animals back when they couldn't find them.
25:58 And somehow or another, they made it through that terrible winter. They didn't have too many good winters. I'll tell you that.
26:06 Now, I haven't seen any natives for a long time. The robots, I wanna call them gross ventures, but I guess they pronounce the robots. Darryl Martin, who's also part of this crew here and one of the directors he was from Montana. And of course, you know, the whole story about the Great Falls. So I won't go into that, took the money
26:31 and they finally got around that and they nearly lost the expedition there. But they weren't seeing many Indians.
26:38 But then they got to that and now they are reaching the area, the headwaters at a Missouri, they're running out of water, there is no passage all the way through. And so Lewis went on ahead and uh he had some of the, some of the four with him.
27:02 And of course, you know, the story, they run into some Indians and some women and they went back and Clark was gonna come and the Indians were all afraid that they're gonna kill him. They thought this is the end of all of us and they knew another contingent was coming. Of course, Sacagawea Jo was in the uh in that part uh group with Clark who was coming up the river behind him.
27:29 So one of the things that Roger didn't say that I would say he told the story about the skins being wrapped around, but to make sure that this new bunch with Clark was not gonna kill them all. They changed clothes. They not only put the skins around uh Lewis but also
27:53 Kamiah Way wore his clothes, but the idea that they wouldn't be killed, you know if they show to be friends. And the story of Ahi Hi where they hugged each other and they hugged each other so hard, he was almost tired of being hugged. So that was good. And then, you know, Sacagawea we had come along and always smokes. This is her tribe
28:18 and Kamiah Way never walks as her brother. And so from then on, it was a matter of getting together and uh being friends again, it was a wonderful home country.
28:33 And so they sat down in the wigwams, they took off their moccasins and they smoked together because that was the story at the time. That meant there's a sign of s sincerity and security.
28:52 Now, in order to proceed now, they can't use the canoes anymore. So they're gonna have to have horses to carry their goods And
29:05 this is where uh Sacagawea have become very valuable because she had to work in a translation. I have to read this because it runs on a little bit. Lewis spoke English to Levi who spoke French to Charbonneau
29:27 spoke Hidato to Sacagawea
29:32 spoke to Kamai away and Sososogi and that's how they translated their bargains and they picked up some horses from them as I recall, it was like 28 horses and one mule and the one you will think more important to them the 28 horses. And then they were going north at this time
29:56 and been into, uh Montana country and here they run into the flathead indians
30:03 and they bought 11 more horses and then they traded seven of the horses that they had for other horses. And among them were some colts and you'll understand later how the colt is going to help him get across the Bitter routes
30:24 Now, they know that there's no northwest passage and the mountains were steep. They said steep like, uh, like on the house and there were hardly any game living in the bitter routes you know. Now there are, but those days they're all down where it was less and easy to live. Now, with the coming of the white man, they all been horsed up into the woods and on this, they were starving
30:49 and they had to, uh, kill a colt colts and use them for food in order to survive. And I talked to people who have traveled this area by airplane, Ron Lowery. He spoke, chasing across America. Uh, Kevin Chris who works here with the tribe, uh, with the, uh, uh tension.
31:12 And he says that is the only way that they could have crossed the bitter route. It's the route that they took. And they finally got to the Wake Prairie Prairie and in their spirits, they offered them some food. And the young tribesman looked at these people and he said, look at all these goods they have,
31:37 maybe we should kill them all and take everything and we will be rich.
31:44 And as Roger has told you, there was a woman there who had lived with the white people for a while and she had returned to the village as an elderly woman. Her name is Wu is make sure when you're reading about journals that you get the book about wattoes (incorrect) she said they were good men
32:09 and do them no harm. And that's the phrase that you will see all of the Lewis and Clark expedition. And so they decided to do that. And I've been friends with NP for the last three or four years. In fact, I'm gonna speak at their signature event and they said, well, maybe we shouldn't have let them go. We should have taken everything that they had.
32:34 Maybe we'd still have our big homeland. Now, the reservation had come into many pieces and they lost a lot of their possessions.
32:44 Well, they found a way to make canoes. They showed them at canoe camp how to hollow out cottonwood trees, not the cedar trees that we know of or the pine, but cottonwood trees. And we all know what cottonwood is like. It's really hard to work. They didn't chip on it. They burned out these canoes
33:09 and they used fire and then chipped away after the fire and it made it so that they were good enough to go down the Clearwater river and then eventually into what is now Lewison and tricities and all those places down the river. And it just kept going in their canoes. Their canoes were ok, but they weren't
33:34 like an Indian canoe that you'll hear about the chinooks further down the river. No, they got to the, where the snake river comes into the Columbia right now. I work with Maya Lin on a project at that very point for the clip with the state interstate of Columbia. And uh we ought to have that project done in a couple of years.
33:59 But anyway, it's just awesome to see the change and how with the dam there, Ice Harbor and everything has changed the snake river completely but they decided to go up the river and they uh met with the apple, my secret and no one comes and then they turned around and went back down and they danced with them on the walls. That's one of the things they always talk about.
34:23 How a good time they had dancing. Wait a minute, there's a Houma indian
34:29 and what's he wearing? He's wearing a red sailor's jacket and they had sailor clothes on. Well, we must be getting close and according to their maps, they should be about 200 miles from the Pacific Ocean because here these, you Houma Indians have been trading prevented smokes at the,
34:51 at the river and they got sailor clothes. And by this time, you know, 28 ships had entered the Columbia River before Lewis and Clark even got there so the indians have been trading with them for quite a while.
35:06 They left there, they got to Celilo falls and Indians stepped back with their arms folded. Let's see if they can get a release without losing all their step.
35:18 Well, the Wasco who spoke it to the Venetian language and the Wishrams who also spoke the same language,
35:27 they decide they would just let them go over the falls and all the stuff that fall out and anything that's on the shore belongs to us. And that's just what I mean. I miss Steven Ambrose and I approached him with this one time and I said, you are discredit the chance as being thieves and he said, weren't they? And I said, no, I said no, they slept attendant.
35:52 That's yours. That's just their way of life. And so please Steve don't say that to their Chiefs they probably were a little bit
36:03 anyway, they, they got a couple of canoes over, that's all remember, Celilo Falls was only 40 ft wide at that time. I mean, between me and Roger at the back of the tennis all further west between the rocks. But salmon were trying to run up over the top and Indians came from all over the west to fish at this particular site. It's very important a lot of people talk about the
36:28 Celilo Indians. They weren't Celilo Indians. There were Indians from all the different tribes. There were Chinooks, Wishram Washoe Wallas, everything. Everybody came there to catch fish because it was a tough place for the fish to jump over the falls
36:46 So we're meeting these new kind of Indians and they got, they look different. The Mandans is 6 ft five, Tex Hall, Gerard Baker, 6'3 6'5, head of all the national things, American Indians. And I'm telling him, hey, oh, here we are, we're only 5 ft five and we got flattened heads.
37:11 And who are these new people coming? They got upside down faces and they look like bears. We're gonna be all killed. No, there's a woman and a baby. And when you have a situation like that with a group of men, they are not going to hurt harm us And so again, Sacagawea
37:37 was one of the reasons why they made it safely down the river. And the Indians said and said, well, we'll let you pass, we know you're not our party, but there's Indians down guards, they're gonna take you out. And so they had to worry about that. Well, I got to a place called the, the one of us, of course were there. And uh wasu
38:02 police said, look about by the time I was canvas is down and Lewis and Clark stopped there in Cotwo Beach and they said, this is probably one of the finest places to, for human beings to live this side of the rocky mountains. Well, of course, it's a good place to live.
38:21 16,000 Chinooks lived in this area at that particular time. I mean that from there to the mountain, the river, 100 years, 100 years before Columbus, there are 6 million Indians living on the Columbia drainage and down to California and up to Canada on the coast, 6 million Indians.
38:45 Could you imagine how many of them have disappeared this time?
38:50 Well, we're making by Portland Fort Vancouver now and we're heading on down to the mouth of the Columbia river and old to ocean view. What a mistake that was. My mother was born and raised, and buried at pillar rock. Pillar rock claims that's where they saw,
39:15 thought they saw the ocean for the first time. Roger says come up over here, I'll have to talk that over with him to get through. Anyway, there's a sign down on pillar rock now. It says that's, that's where they were. Anyway. Little story goes on. They were, they were in bad shape. The Chinooks put, found them.
39:39 And that put uh uh portrait by Russell had some great falls. show sacagawea doing sign language with my fourth great grand uh grandfather from family. That's not the way it was. The river was roaring, the waves were high, the trees were falling and they were hungry.
40:02 They were starving and they weren't protected into this moment for little protection.
40:11 The Indians bottom three fish and showed them a little place to survive and they finally made it and it ended up a station camp, I'm gonna be running out of time here. So I'm gonna run along. I just want to tell you about how they decided to go. to Fort Clatsop they had run out of trade.
40:35 So my grandfather come tell me that they're no use to us. We've already seen 28 ships. That why don't you guys discuss where you're gonna spend the winter?
40:48 So they had a vote. Some say it need a poll York voted first black man to vote Sacagawea voted
41:00 Toussaint Charbonneau did not vote
41:05 Chen. I say he was 19. Roger says he was 17, was the first one underage to vote. So if you say there are some things that happened there, some first did happen. But Singing Beckham at Lewis and Clark College says that was not a vote. That was a poll.
41:26 And Roger tells me that chief, you know why they decided to come across here and to uh to the Oregon side. I said, well, no roger how come He said they didn't want to pay the Washington sales tax. I I'm gonna borrow that roses for an hour.
41:48 Yeah. Anyway, they got a report that, you know the story um Roger had done that trail to the whale. They called beach
42:00 opalize the way that the chinooks pronounced it. And, uh, the Clatsop went with them, of course, those Clatsop Indians, they kept them to the whole winter. They help. It's kind of funny though, every time the Indians shot them with a bow and arrow it would still be in the elk And when driver went out there and shot the elk, they have five or six arrows in it
42:24 that are still living. They did, they had to almost trap him. So that's the way they kind of got their food. But Roger and I were working on the trail a couple of years ago from here across to the Akola beach and the state of Oregon wanted to call it, uh, the Clark trail.
42:47 Well, I kind of resisted because the Clatsop have been using that trail for 10,000 years and parking over at once, even though he took Sacagawea with him
42:58 to get that letter from the web. Well, all around for about two years down the state. And then finally they invite Roger and I to come up for the big dedication and they decided to call it the Clatsop Loop Trail and we're very happy about that. Thank you, Roger.
43:20 Anyway, uh, so on the way back, they made it through that terrible winter. I'm gonna end this up by just saying they, they finally, they stole a canoe, but the Indians, they couldn't bargain for one. So they stole one. They got up to the cap lemons and they took the wrong wrong channel. And there was a Wakaya kine who just
43:45 kept running after them and said, hey, you took the wrong channel, the regular rivers back here, little ways. So you can go back there. But by the way, that's my canoe that you stole me. Oh, it is. Well, how are we gonna work this out? So they gave him three elk skins and he was very happy because he had another canoe anyway.
44:09 And so they considered on and then they, the scuds, some Chinooks stole the dog semen. He paid $25 for that dog back then. So you got this point, go out and get that dog and return it or else and you have to take their lives while they start chasing them uh schools and they gave
44:33 up and they brought it back and he's very happy. Well, they had a lot of different things but the only when I'm talking about being authentic, I just want to tell you one story on their way back. Of course, you know, they made it back. And that's the reason we're all here today. And the only reason we're here today is because as Roger says, the Indians help them of coming and going. But they had met
44:59 uh Lewis and fields and a couple of those had taken a different course going back and uh then there was some Piegan black feet as you know, if you know about history, the Black Feet and they're still at war with the United States. But anyway, at that time, there were some young, uh, black Piegan, uh,
45:23 staying with them that night. So they, they met him, they danced together and they did the whole thing. And early in the morning these, uh, black people, I guess they're probably teenagers. I started stealing their horses and their guns and taking off with them. Well, Bill, he runs after one, he stabs, kills Remember in the books, it always says there's only
45:48 one man died as a result of the expedition in Iowa of appendicitis. And now we're having this problem. So it's one white man died as a result. And here's the status, right? And Lewis chased after the other one because he had his uh rifle or something and he shot. So now we got
46:13 three men died as a result of the expedition. Well, I'm telling this story all over. It's not in history, but it's exactly that way. So I'm sitting in my house in the right and I get a call from a black foot man who had met at Monticello in Omaha and Saint Louis. And all along the way,
46:37 he said, I meet you at the truck stop, grab a cup of coffee. So I told him that story about the because he was a white, but he said we did not change he says that's true. The one that the old stabbed did die, but the one that Louis shot survived. So only two men died as a result of the lewis and clark expedition
47:00 Well, I'll leave you with that co beni the Tom Tom from my heart to you. How you must see for coming today. And I hope if you want, if there's any questions, I'm gonna be roaming around with Roger for a few minutes, please come up and, and we'll discuss anything you want to discuss how you must see for.
47:33 Thank you so much Cliff for coming and speaking. He's also gonna be speaking again this afternoon at three o'clock before I come back from.

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Chief Cliff Snyder on Chinook and Clatsop history at Fort Clatsop

Chief Cliff Snyder

Chinook, Clatsop

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Chief Cliff Snyder on Chinook and Clatsop history at Fort Clatsop

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