1899, Washington: Wenatchee tribe doesn’t speak Chinook…supposedly
The loaded headline “LOST TRIBE OF INDIANS” introduces a long article reprinted from the Portland Oregonian in the early post-frontier era.
It’s a sympathetic account of the Wenatchee Salish people’s loss of their lands.
Likely Chinook Jargon speakers (image credit: Wenatchee River Institute)
One factor noted is that the Wenatchees got lumped together with the Sahaptins (“Yakimas”) by the Settler colonial government; the two tribes don’t speak each other’s languages, which we know to be unrelated.
A more surprising claim is that the Wenatchees don’t know Chinuk Wawa — even though they are said to know another crosscultural medium, the Indigenous sign language:
Early in the history of this people the Catho-
lic Church established a mission near what is
now Wenatchee, and the limited education of
these Indians has been wholly within that
mission. There has never been a dollar spent
by the Government on their education. or in
feeding or clothing them. They do not speak
the Yakima language, and cannot understood
the Yakimas in ordinary conversation.
Neither do they speak Chinook, which is a
common language among the Northwestern
tribes. They can understand the sign lan-
guage, which is common to all Indian people.
— from the New York (NY) Sun of December 26, 1899, page 9, column 2
This “no Jargon” claim is contradicted by plenty other evidence we’ve seen from the Wenatchee, Chelan, Entiat, etc. tribes.
