Portrait of a Wasco youth of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, Oregon in 1903

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#20DaysofNativeColors 📸 19/20

This photo marks the nineteenth in a series of twenty photos I've given color of Indigenous and First Nations people who lived a century ago in America

*Photo by D. D. Wilder (Library of Congress)*

I wish I knew to what special occasion his face was painted. This young man would belong to the same tribe as Hash-Nash-Shut.

Wasco comes from the word Wacq!ó, meaning "cup" or "small bowl," the name of a distinctive bowl-shaped rock near the tribe's primary historic village. They traditionally lived on the south bank of the Columbia River. This tribe, with the Wishram (also known as Tlakluit and Echeloot), on the north side of the river, were the easternmost branches of the Chinookan family.

In 1822, their population was estimated to be 900. They joined in the treaty of 1855, and removed to the Warm Springs Reservation, Oregon, where about only 200 now reside. The Wasco occupied a number of villages, some of these being used only for wintering during the salmon runs. (via Access Genealogy: Indian Tribal Records)