Chief Kamiakin

Back in January a scoutmaster for the Boy Scouts asked if our club would carve four different subjects for their jamboree in July. Girard and I worked from a bronze plaque of Chief Kamiakin. He was distinguished as a warrior and buffalo hunter. He accrued substantial wealth, allowing him to marry five wife's from rival tribes. This created kinship with many tribes. He brought back cattle to the Yakima valley, a first. Kamiakin planted one of the earliest gardens and irrigated his land. In1850 he offered a Catholic priest a place on his property for a mission, if the priest would teach his tribe. Two Catholic Fathers arrived, and built St.Joseph's Mission on Ahtanum Creek. In 1853 the Washington Territory was established and the treaty process begin. Kamiakin died in 1877.