Kalispel Tribe

The Salish-speaking aboriginal Kalispel Indians, numbering about 3,000 souls, occupied a narrow region that extended 200 miles west from Montana's Flathead Lake, through Idaho and into Washington State. The bountiful plateau territory, which included mountains carpeted with forests, and the river, furnished the tribe with plentiful fish, other wildlife and plants for their subsistence. They were fishers, hunters and diggers. Other tribes called the Kalispel "lake and river paddlers," or "camas people" (camas being "Indian bread," a starchy root).

A reservation for the Kalispel (without a treaty) was ultimately established by an executive order of President Woodrow Wilson in 1914. They were relegated to a relatively puny 4,600-acre parcel of mountainside and flood plain along the Pend Oreille River, which failed to sustain the tribe. In 1924, to promote farming, the federal government divided the reservation into 40-acre parcels that were allotted to tribal members. However, the hillside and floodplain land proved stubbornly resistant to cultivation.

Timeline

1730 acquired horses
1760-1781 conflict with the Blackfeet, Apsaroke and Sioux - allies with the Spokan Tribe raids for horses - Nez Perce and Yakima
1841 Jesuits establish a mission
1855-1856 Yakima War
1855 July 16, Treaty
1858 Coeur d'Alene War
1872 reservation established for the Coeur d'Alene, Kalispel
1880 encroachments of non-Indians
1884 Chief Victor sought compensation of lost land and a separate reservation for the Lower Kalispel
1895 Indian Commissioner ordered Kalispel lands surveyed
1914 Kalispel Reservation was established

Agency Records

These agencies of the Bureau of Indian Affairs had jurisdiction over the Kalispel for the time periods indicated. BIA agencies were responsible to keep such records as census rolls, land records, school records, correspondence, annuity rolls, and other records of individual Indians under their jurisdiction.

• Spokane Agency
• Flathead Agency, -1905
• Colville Agency, 1885-1916
• Coeur d'Alene Agency, 1906-1937
• Northern Idaho Agency, 1938-

Census Rolls

Annual Indian Census Rolls, 1885-1940, were collected by the Commissioner's Office of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and are now located at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. They have been microfilmed and are also available on the internet.

Vital Records

Flathead Agency Births Deaths and Some Marriages 1924-1934 are available at FamilySearch

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