The Ozette Prairies of Olympic National Park - Natural Resources ...

Indians and non-Indians) comes forward with similar stories and not just in this area, but on Ts’oo-yuhs
Prairie too, there comes a point when we can not ignore it anymore.
Another limitation is that none of the Makah consultants interviewed for this report remembered
burning on the Ozette Prairies, only burning on Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie. This is probably due to the different
fates experienced by the Makah of Neah Bay and the other nearby villages, versus the Makah people of
the Ozette Village. The Makah have maintained cultural traditions, uninterrupted, for the length of time
they have inhabited the northwestern tip of the Olympic Peninsula at Neah Bay. The fact that the Makah
Reservation was established to encompass four of their pre-European contact villages, has helped ensure
cultural continuity. Thus, the passing down of certain customs and oral traditions were not broken. On
the other hand, the Makah at the Ozette Village, were not so fortunate, and while a reservation, the Ozette
Reservation, was established in their traditional territory, the people were forced to relocate early-on and
did not have continuous ties with their Village and the Ozette Prairies through to the present day. Their
interactions with the Ozette Prairies were by-and-large severed over 100 years ago.
The veracity of these oral accounts is strengthened through the process of cross-referencing the
information with other kinds of evidence (Anderson 1996). The newspaper article testimony from Lars
Ahlstrom, himself, who lived on the Ozette Prairie that was named after him, corroborates what four
non-Indians, Charles Keller, Emil Person, Bud Klock, James Wesseler, and one Native American Bob
Bowlby (Jamestown S’Klallam), all long-time residents of the area are saying (see Appendices 3 and 4).
Consistency of the information between regions also substantiates oral accounts. Makah consultants from
the Makah Reservation that were interviewed for this report were raised by parents and grandparents
who had witnessed burning firsthand on the Makah Reservation, specifically on Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie and
this knowledge was transmitted through oral tradition. Thus, there is consistency in information on burning
gathered for the Ozette Prairies and the Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie. This is important information because
some of the same culturally significant plant species occur on both Ts’oo-yuhs and the Ozette Prairies and
are not found readily outside wetlands in Olympic rain forests, but rather restricted to open swamps and
bogs. Bog cranberries, for example, were gathered on both the Ozette Prairies and Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie. A
month in the Makah calendar is named in their honor, suggesting the prominent place they held in the
Makah diet (see Table 2).
While Indian burning at Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie does not automatically mean that the Ozette Prairies
were burned as well, the fact that the same culturally significant plants occur on both sites, both wetlands
are experiencing encroachment by conifers, and knowing of the significance of this habitat type to the
Makah for useful plant resources, points to the likelihood that both wetlands were burned for similar
reasons. Soil studies should be undertaken to characterize both sites with regard to a variety of factors
55