The Forgotten Lands

Recently the family and I took trip through the easternmost portions of the state of Washington.  It is a bit surprising to realize that this is area is has experienced the white man longer than virtually any place else in the state of Washington.  Kettle Falls, was first visited by David Thompson in 1811 and and Hudson's Bay Company's Fort Colville opened in 1825.  In 1838 the Jesuits arrived and built St. Paul's Mission.  Not to mention that first peoples had been gathering around Kettle Falls for probably 9,000 years.  It is easy to overlook this sort of thing, as the history of Western Washington seems so much more important.  Tonight St. Paul's Mission, as it sits on a bluff above the Columbia River.  Note the pine trees were not there in the heyday of the mission, it would have been agricultural land, the Jesuits wanted to make the Indians into good farmers.