An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington, Part 84

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.)
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1172

USA > Washington > Skagit County > An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington > Part 84
USA > Washington > Snohomish County > An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington > Part 84

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

EVERETT TIMES

Intimately associated with the history of Everett almost from its earliest beginnings, and a material factor in the upbuilding of this city by the sea, was the Everett Times. For nearly thirteen years it reflected the life of this com- munity, partook of its successes and suffered its reverses. To have done this, considering the vicissitudes that Everett has experienced during its fourteen years of existence, is certainly a somewhat noteworthy feat.

While yet the bay side portion of the city was simply a slashing in the forest with few streets marked through the fields of stumps and brush, with only one small store, a postoffice and a lodg- ing house, and these all in one rough building, the home of the Times was erected on the site by permission of the Everett Land Company. That was early in December, 1891, before the original plat of Everett was thrown open to the public. In Swalwell's three-month-old town on the river, two newspapers had been established a little earlier in the fall, the News and the Herald, but the Times was the pioneer of the bay side. Its first number appeared Thursday, December 17, 1591, and was in every way an unusually creditable issue. Its publisher was the Times Publishing Company, composed of W. P. Rice, president ; James M. Vernon, vice-president, treasurer and manager; S. F. Robinson, secre- tary. Mr. Vernon was practically the head of the enterprise, as he was both editor and manager. Hle, accompanied by Mr. Rice, had come to Everett from Port Payne, Alabama, where he had been publisher and editor for some time pre- vious of the Herald, one of the strongest weeklies in that section of the country. In his salutatory, Editor Vernon announced that the political com- plexion of his journal would be liberal Republi- can, and to this it remained true until the end.

Except to state that the Times was always

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progressive, of unswerving faith in the destiny of its home city, aggressive, able and public spirited, we shall not dwell on its life during the next ten years. In February, 1901, Mr. Vernon relinquished his ownership and guidance of the Times to Bower & Lowton, who soon after began publishing the Daily Times. In a short time, however, they leased the daily paper to R. A. Grant and several associates, who changed its name to the Record. Then Paul W. Custer conducted the daily for a brief period. Finally Hubbard lunt and Horace Peters secured both the Times and the Record properties and they continued to issue the Times as a weekly and the Record as a daily. In May, 1904, however, a new policy was adopted whereby the weekly was discontinued, thus bringing to an end the career of that pioneer newspaper. The daily is still published, under the name of the Morning Tribune, its name having been changed recently. To the old files of the Times we are indebted for much valuable information concerning early days in Everett.

EVERETT HERALD (Discontinued )

Everett's first newspaper was known as the Herald and is spoken of in high terms by those who remember this pioneer journal. Its publi -. cation was begun at Swalwell's Landing, Decem .. ber 10, 1891, within a few weeks after the influx of population set in, by James M. Bradley, formerly of Tacoma. A. B. Bailey, formerly with the Tacoma Globe, became the Herald's city editor, and C. H. Boynton, also formerly with the Globe, assumed the responsibilities of

the business management. With this array of talent it was but a short time before the Herald climbed to a high position among its contem- porary journals of the state. For many years it was Everett's official paper. The hard times were the principal cause of its discontinuance about 1895.

THE EDMONDS CHRONICLE,

which was discontinued in 1892, upon the com- plete destruction of the property by fire, appeared first in the spring of 1890, published and edited by Hartnell & Lintz. At that time Edmonds was enjoying its great boom, and it was through the activity of the town-site owners, the Minne- apolis Realty & Investment Company, that Hartnell & Lintz were led to enter the field at that point. The plant occupied a handsome, substantial, two-story frame building, erected for its use by the Realty & Investment Company. During the two years of its existence, the Chronicle won for Messrs. Hartnell & Lintz a commendable reputation as capable newspaper men.

Following the abandonment of the Chronicle, came the

LYRE,

another weekly, whose initial number appeared in July, 1893. J. Hartson Dowd was its founder and publisher. However, the Lyre could not weather the financial storm of that period and soon sank to rise no more.

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

SINON INDIAN CAMP, POULET & com

Chief . .

THE CHANGE MAKER

LIMEINGILIZ AND JUMBOUTA STY"

4 .4

TULALIP AND "SIWASH" INDIANS

CHAPTER IV

INDIANS OF SKAGIT AND SNOHOMISHI COUNTIES

There are in Skagit, Snohomish and adjoining counties five small Indian reservations, four upon the shore of the sound and one somewhat inland, yet so near the coast as to be subject to essen- tially the same conditions. The leading one of these reservations, being the headquarters for the agency and its schools, as well as being the largest both in area and population, is the Tula- lip. The Tulalip reservation is immediately north of Port Gardner bay, its entire southern and western line bordering that bay and the adjoining portions of the sound. The eastern line of the reservation just reaches the city of Marysville.

The Swinomish reservation occupies the southeast peninsula of Fidalgo island, separated from the town of La Conner by the Swinomish slough.

The Lummi Indian reservation is in Whatcom county upon the peninsula lying between Lummi bay and Bellingham bay.

The Port Madison reservation is adjoining the town of that name and about eighteen miles dis- tant from Seattle. It was at this reservation that the old chief, whose name is now preserved in the city of Seattle, lived and died.

The fifth of these reservations is a very small one but well located, being in the heart of the fertile White river valley about twenty-five miles distant from Seattle. This reservation is known as Muckleshoot.

These reservations, though some of them are thus outside of the limits of Skagit and Snoho- mish counties, all center in the principal one of the number, Tulalip, and therefore for purposes of description may be regarded as a part of the area under consideration.

These reservations arc of great interest to the historical student, for the reason that they origi- nated in the great convention held at Mukilteo on January 22, 1855. This great meeting was one of a number of similar gatherings held at different places throughout the territory of Washington by Governor Isaac I. Stevens for the purpose of negotiating treaties with the Indian tribes. These treaties were followed in many instances by desperate wars and the scattering of some of the tribes and the breaking up in some instances of the treaty limits planned by Gov- ernor Stevens, but in the main the reservation limits agreed upon in those various great con- ventions still exist. The convention at Mukilteo

was held with the D' Wamish and allied tribes of Indians. It created the agency and sub-agencies of Tulalip and by its terms the Indians agreed to relinquish to the United States all their right to the lands included within the area bounded as follows: Beginning at a point on the castern side of Admiralty inlet known as Point Puldy about midway between Commencement and Elliott bays, thence eastwardly to the summit of the Cascade range of mountains, thence north- wardly along the summit of that range to the forty-ninth parallel of latitude, thence west along said parallel to the middle of the Gulf of Georgia, thence through the middle of said gulf and the main channel, through the canal De Haro to the straits of Fuca, crossing the same through the middle of Admiralty inlet to Suquamish Head, thence in a general course along the divide between Hood's canal and Admiralty inlet around the foot of Vashon island eastwardly to the place of beginning, including all the islands within those boundaries. As will be seen the arca thus outlined embraces practi- cally all the large cities of the sound region north of Tacoma and is of a prospective value beyond computation.

The government on its part agreed to estab- lish four specified reservations of the five now embraced under the general order of the Tulalip agency. It stipulated moreover that Tulalip should be made the location of an agricultural and industrial school for all the Indians west of the Cascade mountains, a school which was to have a capacity of educating a thousand Indian children. The pledge of the government called for the equipment of this school within a year and its maintenance for at least twenty years. It is a rather melancholy reflection upon the carelessness of the great American government in dealing with Indians that this school was not established until a year ago, and then with facili- tics for only seventy-five children.

The devotion of missionaries of the church, to whose oversight this group of reservations was committed, that is, the Roman Catholic, has been a partial substitute for the failure of government. There is, in fact, in connection with the estab- lishment of the Catholic mission schools, a most interesting historical record to preserve. The St. Paul of the Catholic church in Washington was Father Chirouse. He was one of those devoted men who forget self absolutely in their

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desire to minister to the needs of their fellow men and to carry out some great aim of their religious order. The first mission of this self- sacrificing priest was on the Yakima in ISI7. His work at that point received the enthusiastic plaudits of Theodore Winthrop, author of that brilliant book "Canoe and Saddle." Driven from the Yakima by the Indian war of 1855, Father Chirouse took up his location at Olympia

at the mission of the Oblate Fathers. In Sep- tember, 1857, he, in company with Father Durien, went to Tulalip and started a mission school with five girls and six boys. In 1858 they moved to the point which, from their location, became known as Priest Point. The fine orchard and garden which they there established became famous throughout the country at that early time and afforded means of subsistence for many of the Indian children whom they gathered there. It may be remarked in passing that Priest Point afterward became the general rendezvous of all the loggers of the Snohomish, Skagit and Stillaguamish rivers. In 1864 the mission school was removed from Priest Point to its present site upon Tulalip bay, where it became known as the Mission of St. Ann, and was maintained until July 1, 1901. This noble work of the good Catholic fathers has kept the Tulalip Indians from entire destitution of training, and it is devoutly to be hoped that the government will now prove true to its plighted faith by establish- ing at once such institutions as may fulfill the promise of those benevolent schools of the fathers.

Upon the closing of the mission school a small school was opened under government control in the mission building, but this building was destroyed by fire in the spring of 1902 and the government authorities decided to abandon the old site and erect a new school building at the agency. This location is a fine one for the pur- pose of the school as well as for the agency itself. There is a tract of three hundred acres set apart originally for the purpose, directly fronting Tulalip bay, of the finest nature imaginable for the purpose of grounds and buildings. Moreover, as an inspection of a map will show, the central location of Tulalip affords a specially desirable point for centralizing the whole governmental work in connection with the Indians of the sound. The wharfage facilities are also of a high order, and. all in all, the site is a very fortunate one for such of the native tribes as still remain to take advantage of this tardy provision for their better- ment.

The school in the new building was opened January 23, 1905, just a half century after the creation of the treaty which provided for the establishment of a school ten times as large within one year. However, though so unfor- tunately delayed and even now so inadequate in size, this Tulalip school is an excellent one in so

far as it goes. It is designed to afford both scholastic and industrial education. It provides boarding, housing, clothing, teaching and care for the children ten months in each year. Each pupil spends half his time in the schoolroom and half in the manual training department. Both boys and girls are to be taught the plain English branches in the class room, while the boys in the industrial department are to receive instruction in agricultural pursuits and the manual trades. The girls are to be taught cooking, sewing, housekeeping, nursing and other domestic arts.

The employees of the school at the present time are a superintendent, matron, principal teacher, assistant teacher, industrial teacher, laundress, seamstress, cook, engineer, laborer and night watchman. The intention is that as soon as possible the school shall be made self- supporting by the industrial work actually carried on.

Among other equipments the school is pro- vided with a fire department, consisting of a hose company and a chemical company. There are four fire stations inside the building and three outside, affording full fire protection. Fire drills are held regularly in order to test the apparatus as well as to drill the boys in the qualities of mind and body necessary to efficiency. This school, though only in its inception, has gained the hearty approval of the people who are famil- iar with its operation, and it affords much hope that something of what was originally planned for these Puget sound Indians may yet be attained. The present agent, Dr. Charles M. Buchanan, is emphatically the right man in the right place, having a clear conception of the needs of his charge and practical as well as philanthropic views upon the subject of Indian education.

Turning from the school to the Indians them- selves we find that the Indians gathered at the Tulalip reservation are fragments of a number of broken bands whose names in the native ver- nacular are almost unpronounceable by an American, and hence have been softened down to their present sound. The name Tulalip is a corruption of the Indian Duhhaylup and signifies the landlocked nature of the harbor. The leading tribes there gathered are the Sdohobsch and the Sdoqualbhu. The former name has become the Snohomish of our own speech and the latter has become the Snoqualmie. The Sdoqualbhu are declared in the native legend to have come hither from the moon, which their name signifies.

The Tulalip Indians are, with few exceptions, canoe and fishing people. Their living is derived from the salmon, flounders, crabs, clams, mussels, etc., of the sound, and its beaches, to some extent supplemented by the wild berries which they find in the woods. Although their reservation contains some land of the best quality it is densely timbered and to prepare it for cultivation

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would require heavy labor in clearing and grub- bing such as most of the Indians are entirely incapable of. Therefore the aim of the various agents has been to train the Indians in economi- cal and efficient ways of taking and disposing of fish and other marine products rather than to expend useless energy in endeavoring to make farmers of them. The agents who have been in charge prior to Mr. Buchanan were Michael T. Simmons from 1853 to 1860, then Captain Hill, who was in charge from that date to 1872 and was sueceeded by James P. Comeford, who retained the post for two years and was succeeded by Major Edmond Mollett who remained in charge for about a year, then gave way to Dr. Alfred N. Marion. Short terms of service were filled after this by John O. Keane, Edwin Eells, Patrick Buckley, Chester C. Thornton, Daniel C. Govan and Edward Mills. Dr. Buchanan came first as physician in 1894 and became agent in 1901. The burning of the records of the agency several years ago has destroyed some data neces- sary to a continuous narrative. It is believed, however, that for a short time in 1876 Father Chirouse, whose great work has already been detailed, aeted definitely as agent at this reser- vation. Some of the records which have been preserved of the early days in Tulalip history show encouraging progress in the labors of the reservation. Thus a report of Captain George D. Hill, dated September 1, 1870, records the fact of the building of a new wharf, the fencing of twelve acres of ground, the planting out of eight hundred fruit trees, the raising of between fifteen and twenty tons of potatoes, six tons of oats, two tons of peas, and two thousand head of cabbage. This report also mentions the fact that there were sixty children in attendance at the school.

As at present outlined the Tulalip reservation contains twenty-two thousand four hundred and ninety acres of land, all except four hundred aeres of which has been allotted to individual holders. The census of 1904 shows a population of four hundred and sixty-five. The area of the Swinomish reservation is seven thousand one hundred and seventy acres, all of which except ninety, reserved for school purposes, have also been allotted. The Swinomish Indians, like those of the Tulalip, derive their living mainly from fishing and have become reasonably pros- perous financially. There are said to be now practically no "blanket Indians" on either reservation.

Upon these reservations Indian courts are maintained to try small offenses, with Indians presiding over them as judges. Fines are im- posed either in the form of money or specified amounts of road work. As another proof of the possibility of intelligent labor on the part of Indians, we may relate the facts connected with the building of a bridge across the stream known to the whites as Sturgeon creek[and to the

Indians as Duh-kwih-ty-id-sid-dub slough. This bridge is in the near vicinity of Marysville. It is four hundred feet in length by twenty in width and is not only substantial but, for a bridge structure, of very attractive appearance. It was built in 1903 by five full-blood Tulalip Indians. Not only did these Indians construct the bridge itself, but they built their own pile driver, which they operated with horse power, and the manage- ment of which was superintended by one of their own number named William Shelton. The only part taken by a white man in any manner was the drawing of the plans by Agent Buchanan. The total cost in cash of the bridge to the gov- ernment was only six hundred and fifty dollars, and good mechanics declare that the actual worth of the bridge is not less than three thousand dollars. They state, moreover, that it is an object lesson in skilful bridge building. This single fact is enough to substantiate the claim that rational industrial training and stable methods of administration will elieit the best efforts of Indians as of other people and that these offer the only true avenue to the peaceful and economical solution of the Indian problem.

Of the three other Indian reservations included under the management of the Tulalip agency, the Lummi reservation contains 12,312 acres of land, the most of which is allotted, and a population of 385. The Muckleshoot reservation contains 3,367 acres, practically all of which is allotted, and which has a population of 153. The Port Madison reservation contains 7,284 acres, of which about three-fourths is allotted, and a popu- lation of 165.

Worthy of some special mention in connection with all of these Indians is the basket making industry. Since the present fad for the collection of Indian baskets there is a large demand, which the squaws of these tribes endeavor to supply. The material of which they make them is partly the tide grass of the sound shores and partly the "squaw grass" which grows in such profusion at the base of the snow mountains, especially of Mount Rainier. The labor of gathering the material and weaving these baskets is so great that the poor squaws receive a comparatively scanty remuneration for their patient toil.

It may be said in general terms that the United States government and the white race owe much to the majority of the Indians gathered at these reservations, and particularly at the Tulalip reservation. These Indians never took part in the early wars against the whites. It is affirmed by those competent to judge that no Indians ever cost the government less or gave the government more than the Tulalip Indians. Contrary to the impression entertained among many of their white neighbors, these Indians are not a source of expenditure in any considerable degree to the government. For years they have been practically self-supporting, receiving

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neither rations nor other supplies. Aside from the school now started the government is doing nothing for them. Not only does the govern- ment owe a debt ot gratitude to these Indians themselves, but also to some of their early teachers, particularly Father Chirouse, whose influence is said to have led some of the doubtful tribes into a policy of peace instead of war during the troublous times of early settlement.

It is fitting to incorporate in the conclusion of this chapter a few words upon the earliest white settlements and enterprises in the vicinity of Tulalip. Mention has already been made of the settlement of Priest Point in 1857 by the Catholic Fathers, but this was antedated four years by a group of pioneers, the leader of whom was John Gould, who lately died at Coupeville. Mr. Gould, with a few associates, established a saw- mill upon Tulalip bay in 1853, two years prior to the establishment of the Tulalip agency. Upon the establishment of the reservation the govern- ment condemned the holdings of the white settlers, paying for them at an appraised valua- tion. With the other property the old mill was taken by the government. It is a historical curiosity, having one of the old style upright saws, slow and cumbersome, but still capable of doing excellent work in the hands of the Indian employees.

There were also a number of post traders whose establishments passed over from the era of the Indians to that of the whites. Prominent among those early traders were Messrs. Laurin L. Andrews and J. S. Hill, who conducted the trading post at Tulalip in 1869. A little later John Carney conducted the same business These post traders, as well as the agents and other employes of the reservations, went in sev- eral instances from the reservation work to take up locations and become prominent men in the growing settlements open to white occupation in their vicinity.

A detailed account of the habits and customs, ceremonials, legends, etc., of the Tulalip Indians cannot here be attempted, but that something of their peculiarities and the problems concerning them may be made known to the reader, space may here be given for two excellent articles from the able pen of Dr. Charles Milton Buchanan, the present agent, a man who has devoted much study to the Puget sound Indians, so minch indeed that he is winning a national reputation for his contributions to the fund of general knowl- edge concerning them.

THE INDIAN: HIS ORIGIN AND LEGENDARY LORE"

The whole breadth and depth of our broad domain is dotted with latter day homes of the Indian, for comfortable and comforted he dwells

#Published originally in Overland Monthly. Repro- duced by permission.

to-day on the reservations set aside for his exclu- sive use by a kindly, a paternal and a powerful government. The high hills, the lowly valleys; the broad plains, the long accustomed hunting grounds, all, all now know him no more. Gradually he has been swept back by the increas- ing floods of civilization, until it became neces- sary to guarantee him a sure and positive foothold, or else to drive him from the continent into the sea. So to-day this great and once powerful race remains little else than so much flotsam and jetsam upon the tides of time, water-logged by civilization and sluggishly jostled by the currents of life where they touch it at all. Still never for an instant does the kindly and watchful government lose its interest in its dusky wards, nor does it ever relax its endeavor to raise this people from degradation to a full, enlightened and civilized citizenship.

What of the origin of this strange race? Whence came they? What are they? What has been their history? The future-what will it be? It is easy indeed to ask these questions. Can we reply to them?

It has been said that the curability of a dis- ease is in an inverse ratio to the number of positive specifics proposed for its cure. So it happens that pulmonary tuberculosis, one of the most deadly and intractile of all diseases, is famed for the legion of specifics and "sure cures," which trail in its wake to mock the limitation of the power of the physician over the disease. So, too, with the proofs of the origin of "Poor Lo." Their name is legion; there are almost as many opinions as there are minds and in all frankness it must be admitted that, how- ever diverse in intent, however chimerical they may seem at first sight, not one but can put forth some shadow of reason at least, as an excuse for its being. It is true that many theories have been advanced upon this perplex- ing point; but we must not lose sight of the fact that many of them are as yet but theories-some of them not even that, being the merest and baldest hypotheses.

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An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington, Part 84

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.) Publication date: 1906 Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1172

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.)
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1172