Catalog of British Columbiana and Pacific Northwest Americana

"To make a long story short, Oregon's out of easy water." So begins this timely look at how water is managed in Oregon. Rick Bastasch's in-depth examination of Oregon's water law and water issues provides a compelling perspective on a major environmental issue in the American West - the region's diminishing water supply. Starting with answers to the questions of where Oregon's water comes from and how much there really is, The Oregon Water Handbook explores how these water resources are used and what that has meant for Oregon - its people, environment, and economy. Bastasch offers thorough yet accessible explanations of a variety of water issues and controversies, bringing focus and clarity to a murky, complex subject. The book also features a comprehensive index to Oregon's water laws, a detailed listing of the state's water regulations cross-referenced to appropriate agencies, and a glossary of water terms. The handbook offers a key to understanding how we use this precious and scarce resource. It will be valuable to a range of readers, from Oregonians seeking interesting facts about their state's water riches to water specialists and users in need of a handy reference to Oregon's water law.

viii, 352 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

The book covers the period from the early exploration of the region by European explorers to the signing of the Convention of the Escurial in 1846, which settled the territorial dispute between the United States and Great Britain. The book begins by providing an overview of the geography and natural resources of the region, including the Columbia River and its tributaries, the Cascade Mountains, and the fertile Willamette Valley. It then delves into the early exploration and settlement of the territory by Spanish, Russian, and British explorers and traders, as well as the interactions between these groups and the native tribes of the region.The book also covers the territorial dispute between the United States and Great Britain, which began in the early 19th century and was finally resolved by the Convention of the Escurial in 1846. The convention established the 49th parallel as the border between the United States and British North America, and granted the United States control over the Oregon Territory.

264, iv pages + 24 pages publisher's catalogue ; 21 cm

C.G. Nicolay's The Oregon Territory provides a sweeping nineteenth-century geographical survey of the vast, contested frontier stretching from the towering Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. Written during the height of the international boundary dispute, the narrative maps the sprawling region that encompasses the entirety of modern-day British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. The text details the vital inland river networks, such as the Columbia and Fraser, as well as the strategic coastal harbors of Puget Sound and Vancouver Island that were highly coveted by competing British and American empires. By documenting this rugged, undivided topography alongside established fur-trading outposts like Fort Vancouver, the book captures the immense geographic scale of the Pacific Northwest just before its political partition.

226 pages : illustrations ; 21 cm

Published in 1846 at the height of the border crisis, Albert Gallatin’s The Oregon Question is a masterful diplomatic treatise advocating for a peaceful resolution to the fierce territorial dispute between the United States and Great Britain. Writing in direct opposition to the aggressive "Fifty-four Forty or Fight" expansionists, the elderly statesman systematically reviewed decades of treaties, geographic surveys, and international law to argue for a pragmatic partition of the Pacific Northwest. A keen insight drawn from the text is how Gallatin effectively weaponized his own unparalleled institutional memory—having personally negotiated the original 1818 joint occupation agreement—to expose the legal frailty of America's maximum territorial claims and demonstrate that a compromise at the 49th parallel was the only sound outcome. Ultimately, this rigorous pamphlet served as a crucial voice of reason that helped defuse jingoistic war fever and provided the exact diplomatic blueprint later adopted in the 1846 Oregon Treaty.

75 pages ; 23 cm

Frederick Merk’s The Oregon Question: Essays in Anglo-American Diplomacy and Politics examines the fierce nineteenth-century international dispute over the vast, undivided wilderness encompassing modern-day British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. The historical analysis maps the contested geographic lines that dominated the negotiations, particularly the British push to establish the mighty Columbia River as a natural southern border. The narrative heavily emphasizes the strategic geopolitical value of the region's coastal topography, focusing on the highly coveted deep-water harbors of Washington's Puget Sound and the vital maritime position of Vancouver Island. By detailing the diplomatic battles over these rugged shorelines and expansive inland watersheds, the book illustrates how the eventual drawing of the 49th parallel forever fractured the historic, interconnected geography of the Pacific Northwest.

xiv, 427 pages : map ; 25 cm

E. R. Jackman and R. A. Long’s The Oregon Desert provides a deeply personal and comprehensive chronicle of the vast, arid sagebrush steppe that dominates the southeastern quadrant of the state. The narrative meticulously maps the formidable, high-elevation topography lying in the massive rain shadow of the Cascade Mountains, stretching across ancient dried lake beds, jagged volcanic fault blocks, and the expansive alkali flats of the Great Basin. By detailing the arduous survival of early homesteaders, resilient cattlemen, and nomadic sheepherders who navigated this severe, water-starved environment, the authors illustrate how the extreme climate and sheer physical isolation forced a unique, self-reliant culture to develop in remote outposts like the Fort Rock valley. Ultimately, the text captures the stark geographic reality of Oregon’s inland empire, demonstrating how adapting to this unforgiving, sprawling desert landscape was the absolute prerequisite for any enduring human settlement east of the Cascades.

xiii, 407 pages : illustrations (some color) facsimile, map (on lining papers), portraits ; 24 cm

B. C. Payette’s The Oregon Country under the Union Jack, anchored by the meticulous journals of North West Company trader Alexander Henry, provides a primary-source chronicle of early British commercial hegemony in the Pacific Northwest. The compiled documents map the sprawling, treacherous geography of the Columbia River basin, detailing the rain-drenched, heavily timbered estuarine environment surrounding the coastal headquarters of Fort George (formerly Astoria) and the violent, rapid-choked inland waterways. By documenting the grueling logistical realities of the fur trade era, the book illustrates how the dense, impenetrable coastal rainforests and formidable alpine barriers entirely precluded standard overland travel, forcing European traders and indigenous populations to rely strictly on the region's volatile aquatic highways. The narrative highlights the lethal reality of this dependence—tragically underscored by Henry’s own drowning in the unpredictable tidal currents of the Columbia—revealing the extreme vulnerability of isolated frontier outposts tethered to dangerous maritime supply chains. Ultimately, the collection captures the defining physical severity of the early Oregon Country, demonstrating how navigating this massive, unforgiving riverine topography was the absolute prerequisite for monopolizing the region's ecological wealth and securing a fragile geopolitical foothold on the remote Pacific shore.

xxii, 682 pages : illustrations, maps, portraits ; 24 cm

Edited by prominent jurist and historian Charles Henry Carey and published by the Oregon Historical Society in 1926, The Oregon Constitution and Proceedings and Debates of the Constitutional Convention of 1857 serves as the definitive legal archive of the state's founding legislative assembly. The massive volume meticulously compiles the daily transcripts, committee reports, and fierce political arguments that culminated in Oregon's 1857 constitution, capturing the territory's transition to formal statehood. The detailed records highlight the pressing political concerns of the pioneer delegates: state finance, the regulation of corporations, and, most prominently, the deeply contested issues of slavery, suffrage, and racial exclusion in the looming shadow of the Civil War.

A keen insight drawn from the work is how the archive explicitly exposes the foundational legal architecture of the state as a meticulously engineered white supremacist project. By preserving the raw, unvarnished debates of the delegates, the text inadvertently shatters the myth of the pioneer as a purveyor of universal democratic liberty; instead, it reveals how the architects of Oregon statehood utilized the highest form of democratic bureaucracy to systematically codify racial exclusion—most notably through the infamous constitutional clause banning free Black people from the state, alongside strict prohibitions denying suffrage and property rights to Native Americans and Chinese immigrants. The preservation and publication of these proceedings in the 1920s subtly institutionalized this exclusionary heritage, framing the calculated legal construction of a white utopia not as a profound moral failure, but as a sober, deliberate act of frontier statesmanship.

543 pages : facsimile ; 24 cm

212 pages, 86 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 23 cm

Ruth Kirk’s The Olympic Seashore provides a comprehensive ecological and cultural chronicle of the rugged, storm-battered Pacific coastline that defines the extreme western edge of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. The narrative meticulously maps the formidable marine topography of this isolated frontier, where dense, nearly impenetrable temperate rainforests collide directly with violent oceanic swells, creating a treacherous shoreline characterized by towering sea stacks, jagged coastal reefs, and extreme tidal zones. By detailing the deep historical presence of indigenous maritime nations—who entirely bypassed the forbidding inland timber in favor of harvesting the rich marine ecosystem and hunting whales from massive cedar dugout canoes—the book illustrates how survival here strictly demanded mastering the volatile ocean. The text further highlights the perilous reality for later pioneer navigators attempting to transit this unforgiving stretch, whose frequent catastrophic shipwrecks underscored the hostility of the environment. Ultimately, the account captures the sheer physical severity of the coastal edge, demonstrating how the profound isolation and unyielding nature of this landscape successfully resisted dense industrial settlement, leading to its federal preservation as a pristine testament to the region's raw, primeval geography.

vi, 79 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Authored by Mike and Maxim Hurwicz, The Official Illustrated Orcas-American Dictionary and Phrase Book and Gazetteer presents a witty, satirical lexicon capturing the distinct cultural quirks, local geography, and insider vernacular of Orcas Island in Washington's San Juan archipelago. Through humorous definitions, phrase guides, and custom illustrations, the book lampoons the everyday realities of ferry schedules, rainwater catchment systems, and the peculiar friction between lifelong islanders and seasonal newcomers. The text uses self-deprecating humor to decode the unwritten social codes of a fiercely independent, geographically isolated community. A keen insight drawn from the work is how regional dialects and specialized humor serve as cultural gatekeeping tools in rapidly gentrifying rural areas; by codifying local jargon into a satirical dictionary, island residents establish a linguistic boundary that playfully rebuffs outsiders while reinforcing a shared, resilient identity.

17 pages : portrait

"In this engaging new memoir, a loose sequel to her earlier Prairie Reunion, Barbara J. Scot explores her reluctance and longing to reconnect with a much-loved brother, lost to alcoholism for thirty years. Scot uses long, meditative walks on the 'clothing optional' beach of the idyllic Sauvie Island near Portland, Oregon, to explore family responsibility, time' passage, and faith. She weaves entries from her notebook--a record of the island's wildlife, descriptions of the "Odd Ones" she encounters on the beach, and stories about the native people who once lived on the river--with the main narrative, tracing her search for her brother, her close friendship with a fellow writer, and daily life on the moorage. Scot considers the uses of fiction and non-fiction in memory as well as in writing, the brevity and beauty of human existence, and the inscrutable, enduring mystery of death"--Provided by publisher

198 pages ; 23 cm

"Boozy and boisterous. The Georges--the communities of South Fort George and Fort George that ultimately became Prince George--have had a seedy reputation since before the First World War, branded Canada's "most dangerous city" more than once. Is Prince George really such a bad lad? The Notorious Georges takes another look, exploring how the local pursuit of respectability collided with caricatures of a riotously ill-mannered settlement frontier in its early years. Anxious that the Georges were being overlooked by the provincial government and venture capitalists, municipal leaders blamed Indigenous and mixed-heritage people, non-preferred immigrants, and transient laborers for local crime. Jonathan Swainger combs through police and legal records, government publications, and media commentary to demonstrate that the reputation was not only exaggerated but also unfair. Repeatedly cast as the bad apple, there was actually little to distinguish the Georges from the rest of a province that was admittedly a truculent place before the 1930s. And "respectable" white residents were responsible for the lion's share of the disorder. This lively account ultimately tells us about more than a particular community's identity. It also sheds light on small-town disaffection and unease with a diminished place in modern Canada."-- Provided by publisher

xix, 288 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm.

This acclaimed volume offers a key to understanding the historic roots of one of today's most closely watched environmental issues, the fate of salmon in the Pacific Northwest. The history of the current salmon crisis is long and disturbingly consistent, with concern over declining salmon runs beginning in the 1800s. This book focuses on the human actions--and failures to act--that have helped drive many wild salmon stocks in the Pacific Northwest to the brink of extinction. For this first documentary history of the salmon crisis, knowledgeable observers of salmon history have chosen and commented upon the documents that they feel most clearly reveal the causes and implications of today's crisis. The eighty documents span a period of 140 years and address such issues as habitat, hatcheries, dams, fisheries, Indian fishing rights, and watershed management. Together, these mileposts in the sorry journey of the salmon provide a compelling perspective on an environmental crisis of growing national concern.

v, 374 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm.

"Lord & Schryver, the first landscape architecture firm founded and operated by women in the Pacific Northwest, designed more than two hundred gardens in Oregon and Washington, including residential, civic, and institutional landscapes. Elizabeth Lord and Edith Schryver met as young women and in 1929 established their highly successful firm in Salem; their work is acknowledged as one of the milestones in the history of garden design in the Northwest and beyond. Theirs is the only Oregon firm recognized in Pioneers of Landscape Architecture, compiled by the National Park Service. The Cultural Landscape Foundation describes them as "consummate professionals in the broadest sense, as they worked to raise the profile of landscape architects by involving an audience beyond their clients. Their work represented a transition from a formal symmetrical style of garden design to one which responded in a distinctive way to the unique features of Northwest climate, soil, topography, and plant material." Gaiety Hollow, their purpose-built Salem home, garden, and studio, is now owned by the Lord & Schryver Conservancy and is open to the public. The conservancy has lovingly restored the gardens at Gaiety Hollow according to Lord & Schryver's original plans. They have also restored and now maintain the gardens at Deepwood, a former residence that is now a public park. Students of landscape architecture, garden design, Pacific Northwest history, ornamental horticulture, and general readers who are interested in the contributions of women to once male-dominated professions will find inspiration in these pages. Learn more about Elizabeth Lord and Edith Schryver at www.lordschryver.org"-- Provided by publisher

xi, 220 pages, 24 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color) ; 26 cm

Published in 1857, James Gilchrist Swan's The Northwest Coast provides a vivid, firsthand account of early pioneer life and indigenous culture during his three-year residence around Shoalwater Bay in the Washington Territory. The narrative details the grueling yet lucrative early oyster trade that connected the isolated coastal settlements to San Francisco, while simultaneously offering meticulous records of the daily customs, language, and social structures of the local Chinook and Chehalis tribes. A keen insight drawn from the text is how Swan's approach profoundly contrasted with the era's prevailing settler hostility; rather than viewing Indigenous peoples merely as obstacles to Manifest Destiny, he actively integrated into their communities and learned the Chinook Jargon, rendering his account an exceptionally rare and empathetic ethnographic record of pre-reservation coastal life. Ultimately, the book stands as an indispensable primary source that captures the complex, interdependent, and multicultural reality of the Pacific Northwest frontier before large-scale American colonization fundamentally altered the region.

xxiii, 435 pages : illustrations ; 21 cm

"The Northwest Coast was irrevocably changed the day that Captain James Cook sailed into Nootka Sound in 1778. Cook's discovery of the sea otter population along the coast initiated the maritime fur trade, which in turn led to feverish competition among several nations, especially Britain, Russia, and the United States, as well as the celebrated rivalry between Spain and Britain for control of Nootka. By 1812, a toehold of British empire was established, and the aboriginal way of life was shattered." "The Northwest Coast documents Britain's rise to pre-eminence in this far-flung corner of empire. It shows how the relentless activities of its commercial interests, the adroit use of its naval power, and the steely resolve of its diplomats secured British claims to dominion and rights to trade along the Northwest Coast. Written by a leading maritime scholar and based on fresh research into all known manuscripts and printed works on Pacific trade and exploration, this book incorporates new interpretations on exploration and commercial activity in this area, significantly updating and expanding the author's award-winning book, Distant Dominion. The Northwest Coast documents the interaction, often violent, between British sailors and aboriginal people; depicts many of the rivalries among British mariners; and examines various claims to the discovery of the Northwest Passage. Gough's compelling narrative combined with his extensive use of quotations from the journals and correspondence of explorers and merchant traders provide insights into the motives and attitudes of these early pioneers of empire."--Jacket

1 online resource (xiv, 265 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates) : illustrations, maps

Brigham D. Madsen examines four distinct groups which comprise the Northern Shoshoni, focusing on the tribe since the arrival of the first white settlers. He describes the early days on the reservation and the tribe’s struggle to adapt to massive cultural changes.

259 pages : illustrations ; 29 cm

Philip Drucker’s The northern and central Nootkan tribes chronicles the profound indigenous mastery and aggressive maritime subjugation of a violently exposed, storm-battered coastal frontier situated along the jagged western edge of Vancouver Island. The narrative maps how the severe environmental realities of this unforgiving oceanic topography—defined by pounding open-Pacific swells, impenetrable coastal temperate rainforests, and plunging, rain-gorged fjords—strictly dictated all human settlement and movement, forcing these coastal populations to rely exclusively on specialized aquatic transit and the relentless exploitation of deep-water marine resources. By detailing the monumental material engineering required to survive this punishing maritime climate—specifically the construction of massive, heavily fortified cedar-plank villages and the deployment of highly specialized, ocean-going whaling canoes—the text illustrates how the accumulation of regional wealth and the rigid structuring of their society were entirely governed by the aggressive harvest of colossal marine mammals and dense coastal fish runs. Ultimately, the account demonstrates that systematically exploiting the raw, volatile kinetic energy of the open ocean and engineering robust nautical infrastructure to conquer the profound geographical isolation of the outer coast were the absolute prerequisites for establishing a resilient, fiercely territorial civilization long before the arrival of mechanized European industry on the Pacific edge.

ix, 480 pages, 6 unnumbered pages of plates (1 folded) : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Each year thousands of drivers travel Washington State’s breathtakingly beautiful North Cascades Highway (State Route 20), observing the region’s alpine flora and fauna and its dramatic geologic features. The North Cascades Highway, an illustrated natural history guide, helps travelers and readers to appreciate the deeper beauty behind the landscape. Organized as a series of stops at eye-catching sites along eighty miles of the highway, The North Cascades Highway reveals the geological story of each location. Plate tectonics, rock formation, erosion, and glaciation are explored to show how the features of the North Cascades landscape came into being as they exist today. Human history is also included, as the book describes how miners, climbers, and poets have been inspired by the geology and terrain of the North Cascades. For travelers on the road, the easy-to-use guidebook format includes mileage, parking information, and detailed maps. Stunning color photographs allow armchair travelers to enjoy the journey as well. Appendices provide detailed information on geologic time, rock types, glaciers, and the geologists who have decoded stories hidden in rock and ice. The North Cascades Highway provides a unique experience of a striking landscape that is also a rich, interwoven system of living things, climate, and geology.

xv, 104 pages : color illustrations color maps ; 29 cm

Derek Pethick’s The Nootka Connection: Europe and the Northwest Coast, 1790–1795 chronicles the intense diplomatic, naval, and commercial maneuvers between Great Britain and Spain following the Nootka Crisis, which transformed the Pacific Northwest coastline into an arena of competing imperial claims. Centered on the pivotal diplomatic anchorage of Yuquot (Friendly Cove) and radiating through the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the Strait of Georgia, and Haida Gwaii, the volume documents how British and Spanish naval expeditions systematically superimposed European toponymy and sovereign boundary lines over the maritime territories of the Nuu-chah-nulth, Coast Salish, and Haida nations. Pethick details the delicate frontier logistics of this naval presence, demonstrating that sustained reconnaissance by commanders like George Vancouver and Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra remained profoundly reliant on negotiated trade alliances and navigational intelligence provided by hereditary leaders such as Chief Maquinna and Wickaninnish. Ultimately, the work captures the transitional era when multilateral imperial treaties and maritime fur trade corridors laid the foundational cartographic framework that paved the way for Euro-American colonial settlement across the Pacific slope.

281 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

The Nootka: Scenes and Studies of Savage Life, originally written in 1868 by colonial magistrate Gilbert Malcolm Sproat and edited by Charles Lillard in 1987, is a foundational ethnohistorical account of the Indigenous Nuu-chah-nulth peoples of Vancouver Island. Based on Sproat's firsthand observations while establishing a settlement at Alberni Inlet, the work provides detailed documentation of the traditions, daily routines, and social structures of the region's First Nations prior to widespread colonization. Ultimately, it serves as a critical, albeit 19th-century-filtered, primary source for modern anthropologists and historians studying the early impacts of European contact on the British Columbia coast.

xxiii, 216 pages ; 24 cm.

This small booklet details the disastrous fire that destroyed Bandon, Oregon on September 26, 1936. Includes several black and white photographs of the town before and after the fire.

45 pages : photographs ; 22 cm

This is the story of the so-called Inland Empire of teh Northwest, that rugged and majestic region bounded east and west by the Cascades and the Rockies, from the time of the great exploration of Lewis and Clark to the tragic defeat of Chief Joseph in 1877. Explorers, fur traders, miner, settlers, missionaries, ranchers and above all a unique succession of Indian chiefs and their tribespeople bring into focus one of the permanently instructive chapters in the history of the American West

xx, 705 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

On a March evening in 1964, ten-year-old Tom Horning awoke near midnight to find his yard transformed. A tsunami triggered by Alaska’s momentous Good Friday earthquake had wreaked havoc in his Seaside, Oregon, neighborhood. It was, as far as anyone knew, the Pacific Northwest coast’s first-ever tsunami. More than twenty years passed before geologists discovered that it was neither Seaside’s first nor worst tsunami. In fact, massive tsunamis strike the Pacific coast every few hundred years, triggered not by distant temblors but by huge quakes less than one hundred miles off the Northwest coast. Not until the late 1990s would scientists use evidence like tree rings and centuries-old warehouse records from Japan to fix the date, hour, and magnitude of the Pacific Northwest coast’s last megathrust earthquake: 9 p.m., January 26, 1700, magnitude 9.0—one of the largest quakes the world has known. When the next one strikes—this year or hundreds of years from now—the tsunami it generates is likely to be the most devastating natural disaster in the history of the United States. In The Next Tsunami, Bonnie Henderson shares the stories of scientists like meteorologist Alfred Wegener, who formulated his theory of continental drift while gazing at ice floes calving from Greenland glaciers, and geologist Brian Atwater, who paddled his dented aluminum canoe up muddy coastal streams looking for layers of peat sandwiched among sand and silt. The story begins and ends with Tom Horning, who grew up to be a geologist and return to his family home at the mouth of the river in Seaside—arguably the Northwest community with the most to lose from what scientist Atwater predicts will be an “apocalyptic” disaster. No one in Seaside understands earthquake and tsunami science—and the politics and complicated psychology of living in a tsunami zone—better than Horning. Henderson’s compelling story of how scientists came to understand the Cascadia Subduction Zone and how ordinary people cope with that knowledge is essential reading for anyone interested in the charged intersection of science, human nature, and public policy.

322 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm