NATIVE PEOPLE SUSTAINED THROUGH MANY MILLENNIA
Native people hunted this area 9,000 years ago for bighorn sheep, elk and long-horned bison. Making "seasonal rounds" to specific locations, they maintained a comfortable lifeway by hunting, fishing and harvesting native plants.
Euro-Americans arrived around 1810. In 1855, Governor Isaac Stevens and leaders of the Salish and Kootenai tribes signed the Hellgate Treaty. Native peoples ceded much of western Montana while retaining the Flathead Reservation east of here. The tribes kept the right to hunt, gather and fish throughout their traditional homeland in perpetuity.
Today, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribes have over 6,500 enrolled members and maintain a sophisticated government with headquarters in Pablo, Montana.
SPEARING SUPPER
A highly effective weapon, the atlatl (throwinq stick) was used world wide for over 39,000 years before the bow and arrow was developed.
DIGGING DELICACIES
Native plants like camas, serviceberry and bitterroot have been harvested by native people in this area for thousands of years. The lily-like, blue-flowered camas produces bulbs that are sweet and nutritious when baked.
From the marker