Me-Schal village

birth

Quiemuth was born in the late 1790s and his half-brother, Leschi, was born in 1808, both in the village of Me-schal on the Mashel River, a tributary of the Nisqually.

camas

When the camas was in bloom, the Me-Schal traveled down to the meadows and encamped along side other Nisqually to dig up the bulbs. They had to wait for the camas to bloom to tell them which bulbs were safe and which were toxic. If the bloom was white, it meant the camas was poison. A lavender bloom signaled a safe bulb to pound down and process to eat or store back home for later use.

history

The Me-Schal or Upper Mountain Nisqually of Eatonville (eatonvilletorainier.com) The original natives of the Eatonville area were the Me-Schal or Upper Mountain Nisqually. While the villages closer to the Puget Sound had a greater population, the Me-Schal and other Nisqually villages closer to mountain had fewer members. According to Nisqually historian Cecilia Carpenter, these villages were among the earliest as the majority of people made their way across the Natchez Pass to the other side of Mt. Rainier and on down to the Puget Sound.

lost village of

Mashel River

random

“Hardworking families are struggling to make ends meet today. And with soaring mortgage rates and sky-high childcare costs, they’re also struggling to plan for tomorrow.”

tags

lost village of the Nisqually people