Reader challenge: Can we find a copy of the 1862 “Guide and History of Salmon River & Cariboo”?
A Chinook Jargon vocabulary previously unknown to us beckons from a faded 1862 newspaper published in a forgotten California gold rush town.
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1894, Yakima: Hiyu hum humor
Today, some Chinook Jargon humor from eastern Washington on the cusp of the frontier period’s end…
1882: Klahowya Queen’s Papoose!
British Columbia has a history of greeting the royals in Chinuk Wawa.
1903: Annual clambake
Our old buddy, pioneer Judge Joseph A. Kuhn, strikes again…
Early frontier humor in the Nicola (BC)
Here’s a funny memory of one of the last known speakers of the Nicola Dene (Athabaskan) language, south of Kamloops, BC.
1914: Redmen plan a big pow wow; Kumtux?
To add to our voluminous “Improved Order of Red Men” files…
1855: The only “Stevens treaties” document in Chinook Jargon
dret hayu masi kʰapa chup henli / nawitka ayu naika wawa mirsi kopa olman hinri! Among the many reasons why the following document is perhaps the most valuable item ever written in Chinuk… Continue reading
4-language mix in JMR Le Jeune’s notes to self
If you like puzzles, read on.
1890: Washington state’s “coat of arms” coulda been a contender
The Washington Territorial seal (not coat of arms) (image credit: State Symbols USA) A helpful editorial suggestion for a new, improved (because humorous) use of Chinuk Wawa in official symbols of the new state… Continue reading
“Naika tilicum” and Native ways of talking about your relatives
One page after declaring the fur trade extinct on the coast, Geo. Gibbs (1877) tries to explain why nayka tilixam is such a common expression among Native people, and by extension among all Chinuk… Continue reading