Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 15.djvu/39



OLD FORT OKANOGAN AND OKANOGAN TRAIL 31

tribes as the Chelans, Wenatchees (properly Wenatshapam or Pisquowsh), Nespelems, San Foils, Similkameens, Thompson River Okanogans, and likewise the Flatheads of Northwestern Montana belong to the same linguistic group, as do also cer- tain Indians living on the lower Fraser, even down to its mouth. The Okanogans and their immediate and closely re- lated neighbors of the same stock occupied a country from about Priest Rapids, on the south, to some distance above and beyond Thompson river on the north. The Yakimas, Walla Wallas, Umatillas, etc., joined them on the south, and the Denes on the north. Alexander Ross is the greatest authority in regard to them at the time when the whites first arrived. The original meaning of the name "Okanogan," or "Oak-kay- nock-kin," or "O-kin-nah-kein," as the Indians pronounce it (as near as I can reproduce it in English spelling), is un- known now. The derivation appears to be irretrievably lost. The same is true of nearly all Indian geographical names in this section. Some of their ideas and stories of the remote past are valuable in that they throw side lights on known historical facts and assist us in drawing conclusions. For instance, the old Indians think the Okanogans always had horses. This indicates that they have been in possession of these animals for many generations. My investigations have led me to believe that horses had reached the Indians of the Columbian plains at least 150 years before the time of Lewis and Clark, and this is not strange, for the horse and mule population in Mexico was immense by the year 1600, and the animals could have been moved northward from tribe to tribe with comparative facility. Another interesting story that is persistently told by the old folks among the Okanogans is that a few buffaloes at one time existed in their country. I have heard this so much and from such varied sources that I have come to think there must be something in it. They generally fix the vicinity of Moses Lake as the locality where they ranged and where they were killed by their fore- fathers. When Lewis and Clark came through, the buffalo herds were to be found on the west side of the Rockies, in