I thought that I should briefly explain the banner at the top of the page. The picture at the left is the one that appeared on the cover of Walk Toward Oregon, Alvin Josephy’s memoir. It must be Alvin in his early forties, after he had found the Nez Perce story and country of Idaho and northeast Oregon.
The one in the middle was taken at Wallowa Lake Lodge in October of 1965 at the publication party for The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest. Alvin is standing at the left. His wife, Betty, and elder Gilbert Conner from the Umatilla Confederate Tribes (Tamastslikt Cultural Institute Director Bobbie Conner’s grandfather!) are seated. Standing behind them is Chester Kerr, President of Yale University Press, publisher of the Nez Perce book.
Alvin had worked on the Nez Perce book for ten years, taking time out to write the book, Patriot Chiefs, and several articles about Indians, including an early one on the “Naming of the Nez Perce” in the autumn 1955 edition of Montana magazine, and a 60 plus page entry on “American Indians” in the 1963 Colliers Encyclopedia. The latter eventually grew into the award winning Indian Heritage of America, published in 1968.
Oh — on the right is an architect’s rendering of a remodeled Coffin House–Fishtrap’s headquarters in Enterprise–with a new Josephy Library wing at its left.