Page:History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana.djvu/412

380 tion concerning Washington, was first published at New Tacoma, Dec, 15, 1879, presumably in the interest of the land department of the Northern Pacific railroad company. No names of publishers creditors appeared. The Weekly Ledger, an independent journal, 'devoted to the development of the resources of Washington,' began publication at New Tacoma by Radebaugh & Co. in April 1880. Then there was the Tacoma News; also the Bellingham Bay Mail, edited and published by James Powers, republican in politics; the Vancouver Independent, W. Byron Daniels editor; the Spirit of the West, Walla Walla, B. M. Washburne editor, independent in politics; Olympia Northwest Farmer; the Dayton News, founded in 1874 by A. J. Cain; the Waitsburg Times; and Columbia Chronicle, of eastern Washington; and the weekly Puget Sound Express, Steilacoom, Julius Dickens editor.

The Indian reservations of Washington occupy land as follows: There were five reserves belonging to one agency, the Puyallup, covering altogether about 29,000 acres. The reservation situated on this river contained over 18,000 acres, for the most part heavily timbered. The aggregate of land tinder cultivation was in 1885 less than 1,000 acres, though over 150 home- steads had been taken, chiefly in forty-acre lots, Nisqually reservation, on that river, contained 4,717 acres. The Cliehalis reservation, half of which was good agricultural land, contained 4,224 acres. On Shoalwater Bay were reserved 340 acres. The Squoxin reservation covered an island in JNIason co., containing about 1,500 acres, little of which was improved. Tulalip agency embraced the reservations of Tulalip Bay, Muckleshoot prairie, Port Madi- son, Swinomii-h River, and Lummi delta, at the mouth of the Nooksack River, comprising 52,C48 acres. The headquarters for these various reserva- tions was at Tulalip Bay, where there were between 15,000 and 20,000 acres of the richest land. This agency was in charge of the catholics, who had a chapel on each of the reservations. Schools were taught, and about three fourths of the Indians cultivated gardens or farms. The Indian town was built in a triangular form around a flag-staff and crucifix, Neah Bay agency, located in the extreme north-west corner of the county of Clallam, contained 23,000 acres for the use of the Makahs, who numbered between 500 and GOO. The land was chiefly mountainous and heavily timbered, and the Indians, who were a sea-going tribe and lived by seal-hunting and otter-fishing, had not adopted a civilized mode of living to any extent. These Indians had a methodist teacher. The Queniult agency comprised the Queniults, Queets, Hohs, and Quilleliutes, none of them numerous tribes, and only the first two living upon the reservation, which contained 224,000 acres of heavily timbered land, in- accessible for half the year. Only about twenty acres were cultivated in 1885, but these people, like the Makahs, lived on the products of the ocean fisheries, and were by no means poor, their houses being comfortable and themselves well-fed. Little progress was made in changing their mode of life. The Skokomish agency on the Skokomish River comprised something over 5,000 acres, of which about 1,300 were suitable for tillage and pasturage, the remainder being either in heavy forest or valueless. The tribes located here were the Sklallams and Twanas, later making considerable progress toward comfortable living. The Twanas resided on the reservation and sent their children to school, also clearing and planting, and cutting saw-logs for sale to the mills. But the Sklallams lived in a number of Villages some 50 or 75 miles from the agency, often near milling establishments. At Jamestown, the largest of their towns and the residence of the chief, the Indians had purchased the land—200 acres—and erected a school-house and church. Their habits were temperate and industrious.

East of the Cascade Mountains the Yakima agency extended over a reservation containing nearly 900,000 acres, with a population of 3,000, which would give to every man, woman, and child belonging to the agency some 250 acres. The actual amount under any kind of improvement was about 5,000.