The Business of Trade

The Business of Trade. . The Chinook commanded the mouth of the Columbia and lands up the coast to Willapa Bay in the north and down the coast to Tillamook head in the south going back centuries. They lived at the heart of a vast trade network, and served as middlemen, who exchanged salmon, other raw materials and finished goods with tribal neighbors. The fishing harvest fueled the trade: men hooked and speared the salmon, sturgeon and eulachon, while women skinned, gutted and dried the fish, finely pounded them, and stuffed batches of as much as eighty pounds into baskets. The pounded salmon would keep up to three years and was full of protein and fat , highly desired by others because of its premium quality., The same network provided much more than materials for daily life , trade relations facilitated marriages, the exchange of information, the development of art and the mingling of cultures. This vigorous trade network likely fueled the pace of innovation in the region. As goods traveled, so did new ideas, social practices and technological developments that drove a sophisticated economy., Captions (top to bottom) , . The lower Columbia River valley was the primary homeland of Chinookan-speaking people. Some Salish- and Athapaskan-speaking people also lived there, and the groups often intermarried, traded and came together to fish. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service , . Waterways provided a network of trade routes that spread hundreds of miles along the coast as far as Vancouver Island and inland to Puget Sound, Hood Canal and Celilo Falls. Northwestern University Library, Edward S. Curtis's 'The Native American Indians': the Photographic Images, 2001 , . Chinese traders brought coins to the Northwest, like this one dating to the Qianlong era (1736-1795). Other trade items have been found at archaeological sites throughout the region, indicating long term Chinook contact with Asia. NPS Collections