Quinault

By Ian Skoggard

Quinaielt, Queniult.

The Quinault are named after their largest settlement kwi'nail (present-day Taholah) at the mouth of the Quinault river. Their original territory extended up the river to Lake Quinault and along the Pacific coast from the mouth of the Raft river to that of Joe creek (near Pacific Beach.) Historically, the Quinault were one of several tribes that lived on or near the coast in the state of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. These tribes included from north to south the Makah (on Cape Flattery), Ozette, Quilleute, Hoh, Queets (almost identical to the Quinault in language and customs), the Quinault, Copalis-Oyhut, Chehalis, Shoalwater Salish, Willapah, and Chinook on the Columbia estuary. All the above tribes engaged in an intertribal system of trade, marriage, feasting, and raiding, and spoke a Chinook lingua franca.

Since their relocation to the Quinault Indian Reservation, the name Quinault is associated with all the Indians who live on the 208,150-acre Reservation, regardless of their historical tribal affiliations. The contemporary Quinault have forged a common identity based on shared residency and the collective struggle for control over their natural resources. In 1975 the Quinault reorganized their government and ratified the Constitution of the Quinault Indian Nation (QIN). The Nation includes the descendents of the Quinault, Queets, Hoh, Quileute, Chehalis, Chinook, and the Cowlitz tribes.

The Quinault were a small tribe, their population never greater than the 1,000 that Lewis and Clark estimated in 1805 based on their count of 60 lodges. In the 1840s and 50s a series of epidemics decimated the Indian population in the region. In 1870, there were only 130 Quinault and in 1888, an Indian Agent counted just 95. By 1902 the Quinault population had climbed back to 136. The Quinault began to adopt members of other tribes into their own as a way to secure more land under the General Allotment Act. By 1911, there were 748 allottees. In the 1920s Olson estimated the population to be not more than 800. The 1990 census counted 1,216 people living on the reservation of which 943 were Indians of various tribal affiliations. The QIN membership was 2000 in 1990 and 2,453 as of September 9, 1999.

The Quinault speak a Salish dialect. In the past they spoke the languages of neighboring tribes, as well as, Chinook and Nootka.

The Quinault are one of a dozen small tribes who occupied the Washington Pacific Coast, living between the two major tribes of the region, the Nootka of Vancouver Island and Chinook of the Columbia River. Quinault shared features of both these major tribes. For example, the Quinault had the ocean-going, whale-hunting canoes and secret societies found among the Nootka and the gabled houses, mythology, and acorn diet of the Chinook and other southern tribes. All the coastal tribes were part of an interactive cultural sphere, which involved intertribal trade, marriage, feasting, and fighting.

The first recorded account of the Quinault Indians was in 1775, when the Spaniard Bruno de Hezeta anchored off of Point Grenville, a few miles south of the Quinault River. The British Charles W. Barcley followed in 1787 and the American Robert Gray a year later. Although friendly at first, these encounters took a bloody turn. The Quinault massacred landing parties of both Spaniards and British, who then retaliated in an equally violent way. Why the attacks? Some scholars argue that the Spanish massacre occurred because they planted a cross on the beach at the base of a sacred Quinault burial ground. Other scholars speculate that news of the brutality of Russian fur traders in the Aleutians and Alaska was known to the Indians all along the Pacific coast and therefore they were wary of the 'black-bearded ones.'

The lucrative fur trade with China spurred an increase of trade in the region. Unfortunately the traders brought infectious disease: malaria, smallpox, measles, whooping cough, and chicken pox. The first known incidence of measles in the area occurred in 1779. In the 1850s a series of smallpox and influenza epidemics decimated the coastal Indian population. Too weak to resist the advance of white settlers and anxious to preserve their control of the Quinault River, the Quinault along with the Queets, Quileutes, and Hohs signed the Quinault River Treaty in 1855, which established the Quinault Indian Reservation.

The 1850s saw the arrival of the first white settlers in the region and the beginning of the lumber industry, which would come to dominate the local economy. The successful marketing of lumber milled from timber that homesteaders cleared from their land quickly changed how settlers saw the forest: from a green desert to green gold. Lumber companies sprung up and soon turned Grays Harbor into the most productive logging area in the world.

Logging operations soon encroached on reservation land, where many of the best stands of timber lay. The General Allotment (or Dawes) Act of 1887 had opened the way for private ownership of reservation land, although forestland was initially excluded. Within 45 years the Quinault lost control of 32 percent of their land. Following a 1924 provision of the Dawes Act, lumber companies obtained the right to log on reservation land. The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) brokered land-use deals with lumber companies without consulting tribal officials. They also underestimated yields and charged below-market stumpage rates, both of which favored the logging companies. In 1936 the Quinault Tribal Council unsuccessfully challenged clear-cutting logging practices, which made remaining stands vulnerable to wind and fire, and also made it impossible for the forest to re-seed itself. It was not until the 1960s when a new generation of young college-educated activists successfully confronted the powers that be and won favorable judgements. In 1969, activists closed down a traditional claming beach to tourists and had it rezoned as a protected wildlife habitat. In 1971, following a dispute with the BIA over stumpage rates and clear-cutting practices, young Quinault leaders barricaded roads and bridges, shutting down logging operations. The lumber companies eventually acquiesced to their demands and in 1974 the Quinault initiated a reforestation project with the BIA.

Quinault leaders viewed natural resources as a single entity, each resource impacting on the other. Clear-cutting logging practices choked and poisoned the vital salmon rivers. A long hard fought campaign on this fisheries issue finally led to the Washington State Timber/Fish/Wildlife Agreement of 1987, which changed forever logging practices. The Quinault set up a Resource Development Project (QRDP) which implemented a scientific and highly acclaimed fish hatchery and management program. In 1978 the tribe secured a federal loan to begin to buy back land and resolve boundary disputes in order to consolidate its landholdings. By 1989 tribal ownership of reservation land increased from 2.2 percent to 17 percent. This vigorous defense of their rights against state government, federal agencies, and private corporations, has forged among the Quinault a new identity.

Quinault villages are found up and done the Quinault River. Olson documented 38 sites in the 1920s, although he believed that only 20 were occupied at any one time. Villages were located by favorable fishing spots and averaged in size from one to ten multi-family houses. Houses were built side-by-side facing the river. Quinault houses used a post and beam frame construction that was roofed and sided with 2-3 inches thick red cedar planks, one to two feet in width. Houses varied in size from 30 to 60 feet in length and 20 to 40 feet in width, and had gable roofs.

The main staple of the Quinault is salmon, which can be fished year-round in the creeks, rivers, and ocean. The black (or chinook) salmon run in June and August, the silver (or coho) and dog (or chum) salmon run from September to mid-November. The blueback salmon are a species unique to the Quinault river and the most plentiful. They run from late March to early July, with the peak in April. In the past, villagers busied themselves building common weirs and camps along the river a month before the run. Salmon was boiled or roasted for immediate consumption, or dried and salted for the winter. After the blueback salmon run, people hunted elk, bear, and deer in the mountains, or gathered clams on the beach. They also gathered bark, grass, and a variety of berries and edible roots. At the end of the summer, they returned to the river to fish the black, silver, and dog salmon. Besides fishing from weirs, the Quinault also fished with i) dragnets from small canoes in narrow streams of water; ii) spears in shallow water; iii) surf, or dip nets (looking like large butterfly nets) on the beach to catch candlefish and smelt; and iv) small nets in streams. May to August was also whale season for a few intrepid hunters under the guidance of leaders blessed with special whale-hunting powers. Fishing and hunting are still important subsistence and economic activities for the Quinault. In addition, Quinault earn incomes from working in the logging industry and in the tribal services, such as roads, sanitation, education, recreation, health, police, and fire protection.

The Quinault have been fishing commercially for a hundred years. Catches today are higher than at anytime in the past, largely due to a comprehensive fish hatchery and stocking program. A limited number of gillnetting licenses is given out annually on the Reservation for fishing in terminal salmon grounds. Quinault also fish in the ocean. They operate their own cannery and sell fish nad other products under their own brand name, Quinault Pride Seafood Products (see their online catalogue.) In 1978 nearly a third of the Reservation's income came from fishing.

Quinault fabricated a rich material culture from forest products. They used cedar bark, pine roots, hemp rushes, and grass to make clothes, nets, and baskets. They used wood to make houses, canoes, and storage trunks. They were carvers of great beauty and decorated their work with designs using red and yellow dyes made from the Oregon grape, hemlock bark, salmon eggs, and the ash of redcedar. They used the fur of marmots and otters to make shoulder robes and bed blankets.

With other tribes, the Quinault traded sea otter skins, dried salmon, and dried elk meat, for whale oil, dentalium shells, and dried razor clams. They traded skins to white traders for iron tools, cloth, guns, and rum.

Men built the weirs and fished salmon; Women dried and smoked them. Men and women both clamed. Women wove baskets, picked berries and dug camas bulbs, which was the main vegetable staple. Camas bulbs were pounded, dried and made into cakes for winter. Men hunted elk, bear, and deer, and trapped marmot, beaver, and otters.

Land on the Quinault Reservation is a quilt of trust, fee, tribal, and mixed ownership landholdings, which reflects a history of government land acts, sales to outsiders, logging, and reclamation. The traditional Quinault concept of ownership was one of stewardship; however, the General Allotment Act of 1887 imposed on the Quinault a system of individual property rights. The Act granted each adult male 80 acres of land for agricultural purposes and 160 acres for grazing. A 1924 revision of the Dawes Act allowed for other kinds of land use, including logging. Within a few years logging companies had control of a third of the reservation land. In recent years the Quinault have been struggling to reclaim control of their land as a way to protect their vital salmon fishery.

According to Olson there was no strong corporate organization such as a clan among the Quinault, rather he claims that there were nested identities which included family, household, village and tribe. All Quinault considered themselves kin no matter how distant the genealogical connection.

The Quinault call each other by kinship terms rather than personal names. Some terms vary if the speaker is a male or female. There were no separate terms distinguishing parallel and cross cousins.

A Quinault could not marry a blood relative. As the Quinault considered themselves all related, this meant that they should marry outside the tribe. Olson counted 58 out of 80 marriages that were exogamous marriages with partners from 16 different tribes. A man would consider marriage only after he acquired a supernatural power from a spirit in a vision quest. Women could marry after the five-month period of seclusion following their first menses. Only wealthy men practiced polygamy. Parents arranged the marriage. Once an agreement was made, the groom's parents and kin would visit the bride's village, bringing gifts and stay for a feast. The actual marriage ceremony would take place the next day back at the groom's village. Residence was patrilocal.

Two to six families formed a household. The head of the family with the most seniority, prestige, or wealth was considered the 'owner' of the house and occupied the rear of the house. Each family had its own hearth and cooked for themselves. A household was usually a group of agnates comprised of a man and his sons, brothers, uncles and nephews, or cousins. Households also includes wives, children, parents-in-law, slaves, and hangers-on.

Most of the deceased's personal items were destroyed. Large items such as canoes were distributed among the family with the eldest son receiving the bulk share. The 'ownership' of a house passed to the eldest son, a brother, cousin, or nephew.

The Quinault believe that children under five years old had no commonsense and therefore could not be held accountable for their actions. Between the ages of five and twenty, fathers and grandfathers would tell evening stories to their children to inculcate in them 'the mind of their fathers.'

As part of an assimilation policy in the Pacific Northwest, President Ulysses S. Grant assigned the Methodist Episcopal Church the area that included the Quinault Indian Reservation. The M.E. Church basically governed the reservation, until the U. S. Army took over. The Church established the Tahola Elementary School, which enforced strict behavioral codes and forbade the speaking of their native language. The tribe took control of the school in 1920 and began to change the curriculum to the study of Indian culture and history in order to recognize and preserve the inherent strengths of their community.

The village was the fundamental social unit outside of the family and household. The primary task of village members was to build and maintain the fishing weir, which was a collective effort.

There were three social classes: noble, commoner, and slave, who were distinguished according to a metaphor of blood. Nobles had 'good blood,' commoners, 'poor blood' and then there was 'slave blood.' One could have 'half-slave blood,' or 'partly slave blood.' Slaves were war captives and belonged to the leader of the war party. Only the wealthy owned slaves. A slave worked for his master cutting wood, fishing, and hunting; or gathering wood, carried water and cooked, in the case of women slaves. Slaves could marry, but their offspring would inherit their status. A slave could buy him or herself free. Slaves were freed between 1850 and 1900, however, Olson knew of several slaves during his fieldwork in the 1920s.

The Quinault had no formal tribal organization and authority. Traditionally, the man in the village with the largest house and the most wives, slaves, and property such as canoes, furs, blankets, and strings of dentalium would have the greatest authority and was considered chief. The word ALI'S meant 'rich man,' 'chief,' and 'noble.' The chiefs of the largest villages were the leading chiefs of the tribe. Chiefs had spokesmen who 'spoke the chief's mind' and represented the chief in negotiations with other villages and tribes. No one chief had absolute authority. Chiefs affirmed their status and privileges through potlaches, which would include members of other tribes. The chiefs also lead secret societies. In 1922 the Quinault enacted by-laws to establish a tribal council and in 1975 they adopted a Constitution which formed the basis of a modern-day government. A General Council meets annually to hold elections, accept new tribal members, allocate fishing grounds, and discuss other matters. Throughout the rest of the year, business and legislative affairs are entrusted to four executive officers and seven councilmen who sit on the Quinault Business Committee. The Tribal administration consists of the Departments of Finance, Human Resources, Natural Resources, Community Development, Social & Health Services, Facilities Management, Information Services, Public Safety, Judicial, and Education. In 1990, the BIA implemented the Self-Governance Act, which established the Quinault Indian Nation as a sovereign entity with the right to govern itself and deal with other tribes and nations on a government-to-government basis.

Chiefs would mediate in some disputes although they had limited authority. Kin revenged the murder of one of their kinsmen, either by killing the murderer (not his kin) or demanding a blood price from his or her kin. Today the QIN has its own court system and police department.

Every grown man was a potential warrior. Individual families from different tribes feuded with each other at times, but there were no all-out tribal wars. Warriors fought with bows and arrows, spears, and rocks. Captives were killed, usually burned alive in their homes, or enslaved. All the coastal tribes, including the Quinault, took heads as trophies. The Quinault had hostile encounters with European explorers and traders from the very beginning. Decimated by disease in the latter half of the eighteenth century, the Quinault were powerless to stop the influx of white settlers and sought refuge on a reservation, where they believed they would have some protection. However various land acts opened the reservation to private land ownership and the Quinault eventually lost control of their land to outside interests. Since the 1960s the Quinault have fought to regain control of their land, with some success.

The traditional religion of the Quinault was aimed at the acquisition and control of Power (TAMANOIS) in order to enhance one's fortunes, with respect to health, food, fame, or love. The two ways to acquire Power were to obtain a guardian spirit through a vision quest, or through the ritual and dancing practiced in the secret societies. The vision quest occurred for men shortly after puberty. More than one guardian spirit could be obtained. The famous shaman Bob Pope controlled over thirty different spirits. Some of these spirits were contained in sacred objects such as sticks, carved dolls, rattles, walking staffs, and 'powerboards.'

In the 1890s, many Quinault converted to the Shaker cult, a syncretic revitalization and reformist movement brought to the Puget Sound area by John Slokum. Shaker ceremonies involved all-night dancing and self-induced tremors, a sign of the Shaker spirit entering the body. Followers abstained from smoking, drinking, and gambling.

The Methodist Episcopal Church was one of the first European institutions on the reservation. Most Quinault today are Christian.

Shamans were considered ordinary persons albeit with exceptional gifts. They were called upon in times of crisis for example if the salmon were not running, the weather turned bad, or someone fell sick. Shamans also engaged in contests with other shamans and have been accused of killing people through sorcery.

In the past, the Quinault held a naming ceremony a year after birth. They also held a feast following the five-month period of seclusion following a girl's first menses. Chiefs held potlaches, which were usually three-day affairs involving feasting, dancing, and the giving away of gifts.

Quinault have a rich folklore, which they shared with other tribes. Dancing, face painting, and mask making were part of the secret society regalia and performance. They wove baskets from various kinds of material to make intricate patterns and designs.

In the past shamans cured the sick by either removing intrusive objects, which was one cause of disease, or with aid of his or her guardian spirits recovering the lost soul, the other major cause of disease. Herbal remedies included ferns and moss for heart ailments, tea of crab apple leaves for spitting blood, licorice fern for coughs, and deer fern for colic. Since the 1960s the Quinault have had a comprehensive ambulatory medical and dental care system based at the Roger Saux Health Center in Taholah. The center employs two physicians, a family nurse practitioner, a dentist, dental hygienist, four registered nurses, licensed practical nurse, pharmacist, medical technologist, pharmacy aide, referral clerk and several additional practitioners. It provides programs in medical, dental laboratory, pharmacy, sanitation, maternal child health, health benefits, contract health services, community health representatives, public health nursing, emergency medical service, and nutrition. The Tribe also operates an outpatient alcohol/substance abuse program that is part of the Tribe's Social Service Department. Other programs in the department are family services, mental health, senior citizens, utilities, and emergency medical services. The leading causes of death are heart disease, malignant neoplasm, cerebrovascular disease, accidents other than motor vehicle, and homicide .

In the past, the Quinault buried their dead in a canoe, or box, raised on stilts. They removed the corpse from a hole in the wall or roof of the house. A shaman then exorcised the ghost and sickness from the house. Personal property such as blankets, utensils, bows and arrows were broken and placed alongside the grave. Adult relatives cut their hair in mourning and avoided using the deceased person's name for a year. If the owner of a house died, the house was torn down and rebuilt. A short while after the funeral kinsmen held a minor potlach. Reburial was an option for wealthy families. The dead carried on in the afterworld much like the living: hunting, fishing, having children, fighting wars, etc.

Documents referred to in this section are included in the eHRAF collection and are referenced by author, date of publication, and eHRAF document number.

There are six documents in the Quinault file. One of two major works in the collection is Olson's monograph (Olson 1936, no. 1) based on his 1920s fieldwork. It is a classic ethnography in the Boasian style of Quinault culture. The other major work is published by the Quinault Indian Nation and is a history of the Quinault-European relations from early contact days up to the struggle with logging companies and state government to regain control of their land and protect their fisheries. In one of the earliest accounts of Quinault way of life, Willoughby (1886, no. 4) reports on several topics, including social organization, fishing practices, and religion. Farrand's (1902, no. 2) work is a collection of Quinault myths and legends. Barsh (1982, no. 5) provides an account of traditional and contemporary Quinault fishing practices, and com pares them to those of European-Americans.

This culture summary was written by Ian Skoggard, 1999-2000.

Storm, Jacqueline M. Land of the Quinault. Taholah, Washington: Quinault Indian Nation (1990).

Olson, Ronald L. The Quinault Indians. Seattle, Washington: University of Washington (1936).