Chronicling Celilo Falls childhood: Indigenous elder’s memoir ‘My Name is LaMoosh’ remembers vanished way of life

A little girl once told Warm Springs elder Linda Meanus during a school visit that she didn’t know Native Americans exist at all anymore.

“She thought we were all gone,” Meanus says in “My Name Is LaMoosh,” a short memoir about her tribal childhood in the rapidly modernizing Columbia River Gorge.

The book was published this spring by Oregon State University Press with editorial help from Confluence, the Vancouver-based educational nonprofit that highlights the multicultural history of the Columbia River and its people.

“History is crazy,” Meanus says. “Native Americans were not considered U.S. citizens until 1924. And here we were always on this land. There are a lot of stories I could tell you.”

Her book tells them in such straightforward, easy style, it’s as if Meanus is chatting with us. That’s just what she did, said Confluence digital editor Lily Hart, who explained that the book was assembled entirely from oral history interviews with Meanus, conducted by Confluence staff and by Portland State University historian Katy Barber. (Most were conducted virtually during the height of the pandemic, Hart added.) Aside from a few annotations to add historical context, explain terminology and suggest discussion questions, all the words in the book are Meanus’ own.

“You know, I think our world is all topsy-turvy,” Meanus says in the book. “Some things are destroyed for ‘progress.’ But then that ‘progress’ has to be fixed somehow.”

“My Name is LaMoosh” introduces young readers to Celilo Village, the historic tribal fishing and gathering site on the Columbia River that was just upriver from today’s The Dalles Dam.

Celilo Village and its historic fish-netting falls were completely submerged when the dam was built. Today’s tourists and residents may not realize just how profoundly the contours of the Columbia River Gorge were altered over the last century by dam building. Meanus speaks vividly and lovingly about what Celilo used to be like.

“At Celilo Falls, the energy of the water was really powerful,” she says. “The falls had a roar that was so loud you could hear it from miles and miles away. … (T)he powerful sound feels like the truth of our way of life.”

Peaceful place

Meanus was raised by her grandparents.

“In our culture, when a mother has a first-born girl, the grandparents are responsible for teaching her about life, our culture and our language,” she says.

She grew up in a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers house without hot water for bathing. But plenty of warm feelings filled the home.

“We would drink water before our meal and then give thanks and then have water after our meal to honor the salmon and our First Foods. And then we’d sing a song,” Meanus says, adding that her grandmother “worked hard to make her home a very comfortable place. I remember it as so peaceful.”

Meanus also paints a loving portrait of her grandfather, a jokester who liked cowboy movies yet objected to movie star John Wayne’s anti-Indian violence.

“That’s where our Native pride comes in,” she says. “You know, we’re not Hollywood Indians.”

But Meanus’ life took a couple of unexpected child-star turns. A photograph became famous of Meanus and her grandparents at Celilo Falls, snapped to commemorate the disappearing spot and their mournful feelings about it. In her new book, Meanus also includes the version that never saw the light of day, in which she’s desperate to pet a nearby dog. That’s why, in the better-known photo, she looks like she’s about to cry, she says.

The other star turn was when a family friend, Martha McKeown, published a popular book called “Linda’s Indian Home,” which aimed to dispel myths and tell the truth about tribal childhood. “Linda’s Indian Home” became a classic, but it’s out of print today. Its 1956 publication just preceded The Dalles Dam and the disappearance of Celilo.

Decades later, Meanus suggested this book to Confluence. She was already working with the nonprofit organization on classroom visits.

“She wanted to write the story of her life from her own perspective,” Hart said. “She came to us with the idea, and we thought it was an honor to be asked.”

Trade and tradition

Money had little meaning for Meanus’ people.

“When they finally gave us money for Celilo, it was in the form of a check. Grandpa tore it up,” she says in the book. “He said, ‘You can’t buy us out.’ Two years later, he died from a broken heart.”

When her grandmother wanted to buy her first car, Meanus writes, she took a load of salmon instead of dollars.

“She took enough salmon that she traded it for a Studebaker,” Meanus says. “I thought, ‘Wow you traded salmon for a car?’

“Trading what we had was more important than money because it lasted longer. You can spend money right away, but the values of bartering you can keep forever and pass down the generations.”

Meanus’ book describes traditions like berry-picking, root digging, elk hunting and dancing, along with what they mean.

“Beadwork teaches us about patience and teaches focus. It teaches concentration,” she says.

Meanus was sent to a boarding school in distant Oklahoma because the Bureau of Indian Affairs didn’t want to send tribal children anywhere close to home, she says.

“They separated us from our homelands to try to assimilate us,” she says.

Meanus did well in boarding school and went on to business school. She attended community college on and off over the decades until finally enrolling in Portland State University and earning a bachelor’s degree in Indigenous studies.

These days, when Meanus pays classroom visits, she always introduces herself with her tribal name: “You can call me Linda, but my Indian name is LaMoosh.”