﻿NO. 7 SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I926 187 



In the more recent years of their occupancy of Kasaan and other 

 villages which are now abandoned, long voyages were undertaken by 

 the natives to Port Simpson, at the head of Dixon Entrance, in British 

 Columbia, for sawed boards and hardware to make a false front for 

 their houses after the fashion of the houses of white men with a 

 door and windows. This custom is reminiscent of the old pioneer store 

 of early villages in the West, when the false store front with its high 

 squared and impressive top section was almost an institution. It must 

 be conceded that the old style of Indian house with its entrance 

 through the base of the totem pole and its huge open smoke hole at 

 the center of the roof, although minus windows, was architecturally 

 more of a unit than the later Indian houses with their hardware and 

 windows from Port Simpson. 



During a recent visit by the writer to the village of New Kasaan, 

 rather deplorable conditions with regard to ventilation and sanitation 

 of native houses were observed. The Indian of today in southeast 

 .\laska lives in a house built of sawed boards throughout. There are 

 windows enough, but they are kej^t closed against the damp air with- 

 out. There is invariably a stove in the center of the living room which 

 consumes quantities of oxygen. If one were forced to choose between 

 the evils of the cold unlighted slab side native Indian house and the 

 poorly ventilated, unsanitary house of the Indian of today one would 

 not hesitate in preferring the old purely native type of dwelling 

 which was at once l)oth health jM-oducing and artistically beautiful. 



ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS IN THE COLU^IBIA 



RIVER VALLEY 



During the spring and early summer months of 1926 a regional 

 archeological survey of the middle and upper Columbia River valley 

 was made by H. W. Krieger, curator of ethnology in the U. S. N^a- 

 tional Museum, on detail to the Bureau of American Ethnology. The 

 project began with a study of the extensive collections obtained by 

 members of the Columbia River Archeological Society from burials 

 and surface finds at various ancient and historic Indian village sites 

 and cemeteries. 



Most noteworthy among the collections studied are those of Mr. 

 H. T. Harding, of Walla ^^'alla. ^^'ashington ; of Messrs. Earl Sim- 

 mons, Gibson, and Charles Simpson, of Quincy, \\^ashington : and of 

 Messrs. A. H. East, O. B. Brown, Guy C. Browne. Drs. R. T. Cong- 

 don, and T. H. Grosvenor, all of Wenatchee, Washington. Other 

 collections studied are those of Dr. F. C. Evertsbusch and others at 

 Pateros, Washington, the Eells collection at Whitman College, and 

 13 



