More On Celilo Falls
Celilo means "echo of falling water" or "sound of water upon rocks" in several native languages. Celilo falls was a cultural fishing and meeting place for 14 different tribes. Tribal oral stories believe that one day Coyote will trick the sisters who built the dam into letting him break the dam, so the salmon can go back upriver freely.
Native Americans used to fish primarily with dip nets. These are nets connected to hoops, sort of like a butterfly net except the poles are 20 feet long. Fishers at Celilo falls would stand on rocks or platforms built over the water, and dip the nets into the base of the falls. Over time non- native american fishers began fishing at the falls, collecting large numbers of salmon for canneries. The falls, and access to the falls, became a place where conflicts between Native Americans, and non Native people occurred.
Congress approved The Dalles Dam in 1950. At the time, they thought The Dalles Dam was a good idea, and they could just release salmon from hatcheries and it would not hurt the numbers of salmon.
"In 1947, biologist Harlan Holmes, who was employed by the US. Army Corps of Engineers to study fish passage at the Bonnevile Dam, described turbines as literal sausage grinders." In 1952 he estimated that the Bonnevile Dam alone, killed 15 percent of the juvenile salmon that passed through. But even though they had this information, they built The Dalles Dam anyway.
Thank you everyone for reading! If any of you have topics you would like me to research, please let me know in the comments below. If you do, I will write a few posts on that topic, depending on how much info I can find. Do any of you know how to customize the background?
~Annika Larraine
This was a really interesting article. Great job researching it. There is a viewpoint at the spot where Cielo Falls used to be (on the Washington side). It is near the Maryhill museum and a cool replica of Stonehenge. When this quarantine is over you should talk your parents into taking a road trip out there. It's a really beautiful drive along the gorge. The museum has lots of sculptures and views. Honestly, I've never gone inside the museum it always seems to be closed when I visit but it doesn't matter because the outside is amazing enough without going inside. The Stonehenge replica is pretty cool and it's neat to get to climb around on it.
ReplyDeleteI will be sure to ask them!
Delete