forward

Early Native History

From Deward Walker, American Indians of Idaho, Volume 1: Aboriginal Cultures. 
University of Idaho Press.

      Dam development affected all the residents of the Pend Oreille River valley but social and environmental changes were not new to the area.  Kalispel Indians were the first residents of the region who felt the impact of changing land use patterns, initially brought on by white settlement in the 1880s.

    Sandpoint, Idaho sits on the northwest shore of Lake Pend Oreille, part of the traditional land base of the Kalispel.  Prior to white contact, the territory of the Kalispel people extended north just beyond what is now the U.S.-Canadian border and southeast into the present-day Flathead Reservation in western Montana.  This territory closely follows the contours of the Pend Oreille River and its considerable forested valley, an area of about 230 miles.  When Lewis and Clark crossed south of the valley in 1805, they estimated that 1,600 Indians lived in this region. 

Table of Contents     Photo Archive
Oral History Archive      Documents Archive      Bibliography
To Top of Sandpoint Exhibit