HISTORY IS NOT ALWAYS WRITTEN BY THE VICTOR, BUT IS OFTEN INTERPRETED BY THE VICTOR.

     On March 10, 2007 my youngest son, Aidan and I drove to the village of Celilo to commemorate the 50th anniversary since the US Corps of Engineers drowned that famous village under the somewhat more placid waters of the the Columbia River. The Dalles dam was the newest addition to the Columbia hydro-electric compact. At the time, and for most of us, it was a great engineering achievement. Houses were being built that advertised their all-electric features. Some of them with the logo of Reddy Kilowatt, an advertising scheme concocted by Pacific Power and Light Company. That half-century had brought the states of Oregon and Washington rapid economic growth and greatly reduced our use of fossil fuels to create energy, a goal that had not yet become a goal. It had also opened the upper Columbia River to barge traffic for the grain farmers and timber producers upriver, making Portland a major trading hub to Asia. But there was a cost. Columbia River Salmon runs that once were legendary were diminished. The fish ladders were not sufficient to keep the major part of the salmon run from being ground up into chum by the great turbines. We had not foreseen that. Today, the lesser dams throughout the Northwest are being returned to their natural state, their electricity generation now being taken up by wind and solar generation. As a 7 year-old boy I was amazed when our family drove past the Dalles dam sometime later, when my dad told us that the Village of Celilo had had to be removed to  a tiny plot of land above I-84. The new village, we were led to believe, would be a suitable replacement to the Indian tribe that had fished from those platforms high above the cavity the falls had created for thousands of years. Many are the stories of the rickety platforms and the courage of the noble Indians that had built and maintained them. In fact, they had built sturdy platforms that tens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of generations of Columbia treaty Indians had fished from using long polled dip-nets to snag leaping salmon that had onetime been claimed to be, "so thick you could walk across the river on the salmons backs". Those platforms were perhaps not as ricketty as legend has told us, to last as long as they did to be part of the inheritance of generations of Celilo Indians, should be an indication of the engineering marvel they must have been. Built with Cedar and Douglas Fir poles pinned together with wooden trenails and wrapped with thick strands made of wood fiber, pounded out of the bark and twisted into rope, then sealed with hot sap. It is difficult to picture how sturdy those platforms were from the ancient black and white photos. 

     Aiden and I parked in the lot of the State Park next to the river and waited for the bus to pick us up for the short ride to the village. While we waited, we looked over pictures of the villagers harvesting salmon. Aidan was 13 years old and this was intended to be a Howard Zinn history lesson, a lesson not available to me throughout my schooling. The crowd which we had joined were, like us, mostly white. Many were of an age similar to me. The school bus pulled up and a tribal representive welcomed us onto the bus. He was dressed similar to us, save for a beaded wool vest that I assumed had been hand-woven.

    Up at the village we joined maybe a hundred or so people milling about buying fry-bread from a food cart and smelling cedar-plank salmon and venison roasting on a firepit. There was a traditionally-built council-house on the west side of the property with cedar bark shingles. Two stout men stood at the entrance, explaining that a ceremony was taking place and we would be able to enter in about a half hour. Along the south side of the village at the base of a steep hillside was a one-story stick-built house with weathered ship-lath siding. In the general vicinity were a half dozen single-wide Mobil homes that had seen better days. We would find, as we snooped around the small village, that there was no electricity available to the village except for gas generators. From where we stood, you could hit a golf ball to The Dalles Dam. Water was obtained from a pool at the base of the hill, fed by a natural spring. 

     A white tent welcomed us with native handicrafts available for purchase and more pictures of the village that had once been, and the natives working from the platforms. Further inside, a stout woman of about my age was patiently answering questions. She was joined by what most likely was her daughter and grand-daughter. They wore traditional wool dresses, blouses, and deerhide leggings and moccasins, all of them adorned with small beads, bone, and disks made from freshwater clams from the river. When my turn came, I asked where she was on this day, 50 years ago.

"I was in a Seattle hospital giving birth to my daughter", she nodded to the woman beside her. "As a girl I carried salmon in a back basket across the river on an overhead rope line. We had a wooden cart which we pulled by hand to the other side of the river. I was able to earn money for schooling at the agency and for my clothes and books". Someone else asked what she and her family had done when there was no more fishing platforms. Her answer was interesting: "white people (she did not say, you people) tried to starve us out, but the Great Mother showed us where the fish and game were. She protected our traditional foraging places where berries, mushrooms, camas, and other edible plants could be picked". 

     We thanked them and stepped outside so the next group could enter. Outside, in the cool spring sunshine, an old man was being questioned by a reporter from the Portland ABC affiliate and camera crew.  He told the crew that his name was Wally Yallup. His craggy face smiled as he told the film crew how his grandfather had been recorded by the registrar at the stockade as Pwee Yallup. He was a chief and had inherited a fishing platform. Later a white village in Western Washington would bear his name.  We watched patiently as the reporter asked questions. He was wearing a blue wool vest with military ribbons, among them a purple heart, and campaign ribbons. His hair was plaited in long braids that hung over his shoulders and down his chest. When the film crew had packed up he waited for us to take our place. When my turn came I asked the question I had asked the woman in the guest tent. He pointed to the top of the hill behind the village. "I climbed to the top of that bluff and watched our fishing grounds disappear. I cried all day until the falls were gone and the sun was sinking. We made a good living in those days. I made $20,000 my last year off of fishing from the plarforms. I payed cash on a new pickup to carry my catch to the market. I never made that kind of moneygain. At least the whiteman had not taken our fishing rights on the river". The concil building was opening and we took our place in line. Inside were local dignitaries and representatives of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. They had finished their pow-wow, but I wondered if the BIA officials had been grilled on the lack of water and electricity to the village and the dismal state of the housing a half century since they had been forced to move. They were mostly just shaking hands and talking privately so Aidan and I left. When we returned to the outside, slices of salmon and venison were being dished up and offered to us visitors. They were delicious.

     Aidan had said little all day though I had encouraged him to join in the questioning. I have not returned to Celilo since that day, though I often think about it, especially when I think of our domestic policy mistakes. That dam, and the others I grew up with, were a great boon to Oregon and the Nation. Woody Guthrie has memorialized the Columbia River dams in song. But it had come at great cost to the tribes, and that still continues to this day. This is the heritage from our forefathers going back to the European settlers on this continent. Lately I have been considering the similarity between our persecution of the NorthAmerican natives and the Palestinians since the creation of Israel less than a decade before that the demise of Celilo Falls. We white Eurpeans, descended from settlers, never seem to learn from our mistakes.