1900: The Northwest Jargon + William Jennings Bryan
In the post-frontier period, a traveling salesman in western Washington managed to avoid the already popular “sitkum dollar” joke…
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1863: “Inciting Indians to revolt” in Victoria
“Half-breeds” took a lot of blame for social frictions between Natives and Settlers…
1900: “Hiou Tenas Iktah”
Some really nice visuals are to be found in an obscure old book with a Chinuk Wawa title…
1920: Yakka cultus man, a myth, and another Jargon song
This somewhat fanciful, sometimes nonsensical, piece comes to us from more than a generation after the frontier era…
1896: Illihee Club gift and mystery “matukta”
Are any of my readers able to figure out what matukta is?
2022: Art involving Chinuk Wawa
Opening in the Vancouver, BC metro area as I write this article, and running through December 11th, is an exciting new work of art involving fluent spoken Chinuk Wawa.
Early 1880s, Alaska: Skookum papers, skookum boards
In my understanding, “skookum papers“, a Chinuk Wawa expression, were 19th-century letters…
1902: “Niga” in BC Chinooklish
A measure of how much Chinook Jargon had penetrated into British Columbia folks’ English by the turn of the century:
1920: Volleyball invitation in Tacoma
An overly enthusiastic translator a generation after the frontier era needs a fact-check…
1913: Chief Basil of Bonaparte speaks against Sir Richard McBride
Very precious words: A southern interior BC Salish chief’s speech against the government is quoted on the front page of the newspaper.