The Lewiston Hill and the Camas Prairie, Idaho

Hopefully, the pictures that appear above this information will be of the Clearwater and Snake Rivers taken from atop Lewiston Hill. When driving from southern Idaho to northern Idaho on U.S. 95, one must drive up Whitebird Hill (named after the Nez Perce head man at the time of white contact whose band lived on the Salmon River). The old road is said to have had 33 switchbacks (one can still drive this road if they want) as it gained 200o or so feet in elevation. You can imagine traveling this route in the winter. The new road is a pretty straight road. It just keeps going up and up and up. The famous Battle of Whitebird Hill was fought alongside the road. The Nez Perce put the big hurt onto the U.S. Army in this battle. It was the battle that started Chief Joseph's famous flight toward Canada. The old Lewiston Hill road was much like the old White Bird Hill road. It also gained about 2000 feet. The cars that were built in the seventies and before often overheated on the way up. We saw lots of cars pulled to the side with radiators steaming. Travelers regularly carried five gallons of water when making this trip. The first picture should show the Clearwater River flowing west toward Lewiston (ID) and Clarkston (WA) and its confluence with the Snake River. (Note the winding road pictured) The Clearwater is the first river that Lewis and Clark were able to put canoes on after crossing the mountains. They stayed with the Nez Perce at Canoe Camp and while making their dugout canoes and much enjoyed their time with the Nez Perce people. When I was a little kid I was scared to cross the Snake river because I thought it was full of snakes. Actually, it was named after the Indians who lived along the river upstream from Weiser to the Wyoming border. The sign language for these people among other tribes was to show a hand moving in a weaving manner or as a snake would move. Actually, it had nothing to do with the reptiles, but with how well these Shoshone people could weave and were known throughout the West as master weavers. White men got it all wrong and the Shoshone Indians in southern Idaho became known as Snakes. Well, so did the Paiutes. They were also called Diggers. Not especially complimentary, but these people were masters at digging roots for food.

These three panels are located at Tolo Lake on Camas Prairie. The prairie was one of the favorite places for the Nez Perce people to gather in June to harvest the camas root. They would harvest, roast and store literally tons of these bulbs. Tolo Lake was a place where several different bands of Nez Perce would meet. After the long winter, the people were enthusiastic about seeing members and relatives of the different bands. Of course, the young people, if of age, were looking over the members of the opposite sex with much interest. There was much gambling by the men, horse racing, and foot racing. Are you knowledgeable about Indian culture? Test: Did the Indians tell stories around the fire at night on the prairie at this time? See answer at bottom of the blog. I will not restate what is written on the panels. If you will double click the pictures, the picture will be enlarged and you may read what is written on the historial panes. Incidentally, Idaho does a very good job with their historical roadside markers. I have driven in all but two of the states and I think Idaho does the best job.

Oh, yes, the answer. Indians told stories only during the evening hours of the winter. Stories were very entertainingly told. Most tribes considered it to be bad luck to tell stories once winter camp was broken. I think it was because the work of gathering, fishing, and hunting food for winter storage was such hard work that they just collapsed into their beds at dark and said to heck with telling stories. I have prepared and tanned a hide. I can tell you that it is very hard work. My son and I also dug sego lily bulbs for about 20 minutes. We dug seventeen bulbs. If we had had to exist on our gathering skills, I would be a very fit and thin person.

Time for bed,

You all take care and enjoy the day. You know the old saying......

Yeeeeoooowww, Papa Coyote loves you all.

This panel about the mammoth is of particular interest. When the first carbon dating results were returned, the tests showed the mammoth remains to be only about 4,500 years old. The mammoth are thought to have gone extinct with the rest of the megafauna about 7,500 years B.
C. or thereabouts. I have a good Mormon friend, Jim, with whom I taught, who was ecstatic about those test results. Somehow the idea that mammoths lived 6,000 years longer than what had been commonly accepted by scientists played into his theology or the theology of the LDS Church, I am uncertain which. The remains were re-tested because the first results did not fit into the scientific model that had been created. I don't know if the second testing brought results more consistent with the commonly held hypothesis developed by paleotolongists or not. But it sure had Jim excited. More importantly, a man who was leaving just as I drove up to the small lake, had caught two sixteen inch bass and released them. He had pictures on his cell phone. These cell phones are going to ruin a lot of creative story telling.