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Reviews
THE CAYUSE INDIANS: IMPERIAL TRIBESMEN OF OLD OREGON
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by Robert H. Ruby and John A. Brown
foreword by William L. Lang
introduction by Roberta Conner
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| University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 2005 Illustrations, maps, notes, bibliography, index. 433 pages. $29.95 cloth. |
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| IN 2002, ROBERT RUBY ATTENDED A meeting sponsored by the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation to discuss the forthcoming sesquicentennial observance of the historic Walla Walla Treaty signing. At the conclusion of the planning session, Ruby placed his arm around Roberta Conner, director of Tamastslikt Cultural Institute, and conveyed a heartfelt plea that the Confederated Tribes begin retrieving and writing their own histories. The Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla people were busily gathering oral histories and other materials for their museum, and Ruby was surprised when Conner informed him that they wanted to have reprinted The Cayuse Indians: Imperial Tribesmen of Old Oregon, the book that he and his longtime collaborator, the late John Brown, had written on the Confederated Tribes thirty years earlier. It remains the only comprehensive study of this American Indian group. That initial conversation sparked a series of discussions and decisions that culminated in the University of Oklahoma Press publishing this commemorative edition of Ruby and Brown's classic study. |
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When it appeared in 1972, The Cayuse Indians was considered on the leading edge of historical scholarship, belonging to an emerging school popularly known as New Indian History. Books that fit into this classification shared a number of characteristics that set them apart from their more traditional counterparts. The distinguishing features of this orientation included a reliance on Indian sources, a telling of stories from an Indian point of view, the incorporation of anthropological findings, the placing of Indians and Indian groups at the center of the narrative, and an expressed sympathy for the injustices that Indian people had endured. In pioneering Pacific Northwest histories of such noteworthy figures as Ezra Meeker, A.J. Splawn, L.V. McWhorter, and Click Relander, there was substantial precedent for this methodological approach. Those early practitioners paved the way for the new generation of writers who arrived on the scene in the 1960s and early 1970s, among them Alvin Josephy Jr., Robert Ignatius Burns, Stephen Dow Beckham, Keith A. Murray, and Ruby and Brown. |
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The highly collaborative nature of their relationship with American Indians colored every thread of Ruby and Brown's research and writing, which has spanned forty years and twelve books. This new edition expands on that operational principle. Working side by side to shape the scope and content of The Cayuse Indians, Ruby and Brown and the Confederated Tribes have added to the original publication an appendix consisting of several verbatim transcriptions of primary source documents. The most compelling of these is the bulky proceedings of the Walla Walla Treaty Council of June 1855. In the introduction, Roberta Conner explains that the council minutes constitute more than a simple re-creation of the past; they are an embodiment of the vision and dreams, the hopes and intentions of the elders, both in their time and in ours. "[W]e do this to honor the foresight, courage, steadfastness, and skill of our tribal ancestors," Conner writes. "Their words provide insight into the challenges they faced. Their speeches at the council shed tremendous light on this painful period of our Tribe's past. We cannot overstate the importance of our ancestors' actions at the Walla Walla Treaty Council. We owe them absolute respect for securing a place for us to live, for protecting our lifeways, and for being role models of leadership" (p. xvii). Also appended is a copy of the Walla Walla treaty document, so that readers can compare statements made by Native negotiators on the ground with provisions in the ratified treaty. |
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In many ways, the re-publication of The Cayuse Indians represents the fulfillment of the aspirations and attitudes espoused four decades ago by proponents of the New Indian History. It is also a product of the many close relationships that Ruby and Brown were able to forge while conducting their research in Indian Country. In another sense, it symbolizes a passing of the torch, a tangible expression of a fully realized approach to engaging in historical inquiry. Ruby and Brown speak to this positive development in their preface to the revised volume: "The tribes are aggressively researching their histories and collecting items of their material culture as well as recording stories, memories, and reminiscences of the past. The tribes will be the ones to write the history being made today" (p. xiv). In fact, the future has come rushing in more rapidly than Ruby and Brown anticipated. Members of the Confederated Tribes are currently writing a history of their people that will soon be published. |
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In helping refine the role of the historian and the ways in which American Indian history is researched, written, and presented to the public and through such enduring works as The Cayuse Indians, Ruby and Brown have amassed a substantial legacy of which current and future generations of readers — and writers — are and will continue to be the beneficiaries. |
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| CARY C. COLLINS
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| Maple Valley, Washington |
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