Nisqually Thurston County, Washington

Mapped Location

Nisqually: The mapped location is an approximation and should not be used for navigation or wayfinding.

 

Information

General information on Nisqually

  • Feature Type: Place

 

Official, historical, colloquial and alternative toponyms for Nisqually

A brief list of names that this geographic feature has been named

Name Description
Nisqually Official

 

Origin Notes and History of Nisqually

References to Nisqually that document the origin of its place name

Title Cover Image: Origin of Washington geographic names

NISQUALLY, an Indian word much used for geographic names. Rev. Myron Eells says it is the word Squally-o-bish, "from the tribe of that name." (American Anthropologist, January, 1892.) The Bureau of American Ethnology gives the spelling as Nisqualli and gives many varieties of other spellings in use such as Askwalli, Qualliamish, and Squalliamish. (Handbook of American Indians, Part 2, page 76.) In the medicine Creek treaty made with those Indians by Governor Isaac I. Stevens on December 26, 1854, the name Nisqually is used. The tribe lived at the mouth of a river flowing into Puget Sound and forming part of the present boundary between Pierce and Thurston Counties. The river became known as the Nisqually River; the large delta at the mouth of the river became known as Nisqually Flats ; the portion of Puget Sound into which the river flows was charted as Nisqually Reach; when the exploration of Mount Rainier revealed the main source of the river to be in a huge glacier the name of Nisqually Glacier was mapped. One of the earliest geographical uses of the name was for the river in the journal of John Work, Hudson's Bay Company Factor, on November 6, 1824. (Washington Historical Quarterly. July, 1912, page 211.) The first home of white men on Puget Sound was the Hudson's Bay Company's Fort Nisqually near the mouth of the river. ( See Dupont.) Nisqually Bluff or Nisqually Head, two miles west of the mouth of the river, is shown as Laa Point by the Wilkes Expedition, 1841. (Atlas accompanying Volume XXIII., chart 79.)

Edmond S. Meany in Origin of Washington Geographic Names
Meany, Edmond S., Origin of Washington Geographic Names, 1923 University of Washington, pp 190-191  |  Origin of Washington Geographic Names

 

Thurston County

Political Boundaries

Last updated: 2024-06-03