1871: An Oregon word for ‘log cabin’?
During the frontier era, several words of Chinuk Wawa dropped into a news report may have documented an expression we ought to know.
This was in the Grand Ronde area, better yet.
A stick house by Patti Deters (image credit: Fine Art America)
An article about a Thanksgiving celebration in Albany, Oregon brings us this nice find.
… As many of them had been on their feet from early morn until far into the night, they were doubtless glad when the crowd, satiated with the good things of which they had partaken, and with swapping civilit[i]es with their friends and acquaintances, commenced to hiac clatawa copa stickhouse. …
— from the Albany (OR) Register of December 2, 1871, page 6, column 3
This hiac clatawa copa stickhouse = áyáq ɬátwa kʰapa stík-hàws = literally ‘quickly go to wooden house’ = apparently ‘hurry off to the log cabin’.
It’s not from English, where the compound word “stickhouse” wasn’t especially common, and meant ‘woodshed’.
