LET 'ER BUCK 



Long before the coming of the paleface, the red man 

 had pitched his tepees along the banks of the little 

 river which carries down the rains and the melted 

 snows of the Blue Mountains in northeastern Oregon 

 to the Columbia. These Amerinds were of the Uma- 

 tilla tribe from which the river itself and the town of 

 Umatilla at its mouth derive their names. How fitting 

 that in these cottonwoods, but a stone's throw from the 

 arena, the descendants of this and neighboring tribes, 

 these children of forest and plain, should come to live 

 again the old tepee life of an almost bygone day. 



Where do they come from, these autochthonous 

 Americans? A few miles east of Pendleton in the 

 Umatilla valley and on the slopes and in the draws of 

 the Blue Mountains lie their homes on what is left 

 of the Umatilla Reservation. This reservation was at 

 one time a territory four hundred and fifty miles 

 square bordering Pendleton on the southeast. 



Following the treacherous killing of courageous Dr. 

 Whitman, the Presbyterian missionary and pioneer 

 leader, at Wai'-letpu station by the Cayuses in 1847, 

 the going on the war-path by the Indians was the 

 greatest dread of the pioneers. These uprisings oc- 

 curred against settlers and United States troopers 

 every now and then, while the lone dweller in the wild- 

 erness often had much reason to fear attack at any 

 time. After the noted massacre of Whitman and his 

 associates, others occurred — from the Rouge (later 

 Rogue) River massacre and the Modoc War, down to 

 when the Snake tribe stole over the Blue Mountains 

 from Pocatello and slaughtered the unwary ranchers 

 in the vicinity of Pendleton, and to this day they are 

 known to many old pioneers by no other name than 

 " Twelka" — enemy. These conditions resulted mainly 



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