Historic Hood River
“Native and Dugout Canoe”
6-26-2026
Notes
This image is from a popular Benjamin Gifford image entitled “Native and Dugout Canoe, Celilo, Columbia River. He published this series in 1897. This article from the Oregon History Project explains what we’re seeing in much more detail than I could provide. I’ll just add that there is some debate about whether Gifford “enhanced” some of these images or if they are fully authentic views of the Native Americans as he encountered them.
During this era Benjamin Gifford was living and working in the Dalles. We saw and discussed a related image in this post.
JKG
Great image. Are those power poles in the distance?
Pat A
I’ve tried to find where this was, but never have. The river has been changed so much.
Telegraph poles on the OWRN railroads original alignment on the Oregon south side? I believe.
Sadly I couldn’t afford a hand tinted version of this by Wilma Roberts, when I met her about 20 years back .
ArthurB
Good eyes JKG. I checked the scan and there are indeed four utility poles with two arms running across the image. I’m surprised the Oregon History Project article doesn’t mention them.
j nelson
What a beautiful and large canoe! Had to be quite a large and flawless tree. What species did they use for their canoes?
ArthurB
The linked article says they mostly used western red cedar. It says they were originally worked with stone tools, and later years with steel tools. I can imagine a search party looking for the best tree closest to a navigable body of water.
Thorn
“Medium” sized!