Harold Morton Kramer (1873-1930) published a novel, “The Chrysalis“, in 1909 (Boston: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.).

Pretty early in the frontier settlement period for Washington state, “our native reporter” contributes an awesome article about a Seattle fistfight.

Not so many locals understood Chinuk Wawa in 1923, so there’s another reason why the newspaper editor left this one untranslated.

Reader Darrin Brager sent over this clipping that brings us a newly discovered appearance of the “Seattle Illahee” song…

The infamous bawdy Pacific Northwest folk song…

Thanks to indefatigable anthropologist Jay Powell, a famous Pacific Northwest folk song that uses Chinook Jargon shows up in another version…

From more than one source, I’d like to present you with some Chinook Jargon-related dirt on the notorious Seattle house of prostitution, the “Illahee“, famed in song and story.

Franz Boas 1892 observed, with charming vagueness, that the word mamuk (‘do, make’) “has acquired an obscene meaning,”*…

Hugh Lenox Scott (1853-1934) was seen as an authority on Plains Indian Sign Language…

In a pretty cryptic note on the editor’s gossip page, we’re treated to the suggested lyrics for a Jargon ditty.