Many indigenous people believe that their ancestors have always lived in the same place. Most archaeologists believe that humans arrived in the Americas between ten and twenty-five thousand years ago, when the Bering Strait that now separates Siberia from Alaska was above water. Discerning when Native people made their way to northeastern Oregon is difficult, as settlement no doubt focused on rivers that periodically flooded, washing away tools and other signs of habitation. But Native Americans certainly resided in or near the area 10,000 years ago. In 1996 a skeleton discovered near Kennewick, Washington, was dated as being over 9,000 years old.
Native populations grew with their capacity to know and utilize their environment. Political identities and boundaries shifted over several millennia in ways that we shall never completely understand. By 1750 A.D. the area was home to several thousand Cayuse, Umatilla, and Nez Perce peoples. The Paiute of the Great Basin sometimes crossed into the southern Plateau area and occasionally clashed with their northern neighbors.
© David Peterson del Mar, 2005
