by Rich Wandschneider | Feb 17, 2026 | Ellen Bishop, Imnaha, Indian history, Indian treaties, Lewis and Clark, Minam, Nex Perce history, Nez Perce, Nez Perce Homeland, Nez Perce treaty, Nez Perce Tribe, Wallowa Country, Wallowa County, Wallowa History Center, wallowa homeland, Wallowa Lake, Wallowas
Wondering what it must have been like has been a growing yearning as I’ve lived in this Wallowa Country for 54 years and met old-timers, history keepers, and Natives from the three reservations in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon that have stories and questions about...
by Rich Wandschneider | Aug 31, 2024 | Alvin Josephy, Bartlett, Grace Bartlett, Nez Perce, Nez Perce Homeland, Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest, Nez Perce Tribe, Nez Perce War, Umatilla, Wallowa, Wallowa Country, Wallowa County, Wallowa Lake, Wallowas
This summer we have been doing Friday conversations on local and Nez Perce history. This Friday was the last session for 2024. We focused on Grace Bartlett and her book, The Wallowa Country, 1866-76. I hadn’t read the book in years, remembering always that it was a...
by Rich Wandschneider | Dec 3, 2022 | Celilo Falls, Columbia River, Wallowas
It was—and is—spectacular On Wednesday before Thanksgiving I rode with friends from Joseph to Portland. I sat in the back seat and spent time just looking. Leaving the Wallowa Valley along the Wallowa River is always a treat; the canyon always changes with weather and...
by Rich Wandschneider | Jun 27, 2021 | Chief Joseph, Indian treaties, Isaac Stevens, Nez Perce, Nez Perce treaty, Nez Perce Tribe, Walla walla treaty, Wallowa, Wallowa Country, Wallowas, walwa’ma
Above the Clearwater: Living on Stolen Ground is Bette Lynch Husted’s memoir of growing up on a dirt-poor, white, family farm in Nez Perce Indian country in Idaho. Their meagre plot had once—and long—been Indian country. Nez Perce Reservation lands were reduced by 90...
by Rich Wandschneider | Aug 24, 2015 | Alvin Josephy, Chief Joseph, Eliza Spalding, Marcus Whitman, Nez Perce, Nez Perce War, The Dying Grass, Wallowas
William Vollman’s new novel, The Dying Grass: A Novel of the Nez Perce War, is getting rave reviews. I have it, have glanced at the first few pages and looked at the extended notes and acknowledgements—and hoisted the 1350 page and what must be five-pound...
by Rich Wandschneider | Mar 27, 2013 | Alvin Josephy, Civil War American West, lynda lanker, Oregon Historical Society, Susan Armitage, The Women's West, Tough by Nature, Wallowas
Alvin Josephy cried loud and often about the omission of Indians from textbook histories, and often thanked the amateur historians—the “history buffs”—for keeping Western history alive when serious historians busied themselves with government reports and people and...
