Thanks to ancestors

On May 25, 1828, my paternal great-great-great-great grandfather Jacques “Jocko” Raphael Finlay (1768-1828) passed away at the confluence of the Spokane and Little Spokane Rivers, close to the site of Spokan House, that he built for the Northwest Company of Montreal, in the spring of 1810. My grandfather Jocko, was considered to be the “First Citizen of Spokane” however, his wife, was the older sister of Spokane Garry, whose family, has lived here, always.

In our Sinaikst (Arrow Lake Band of Indians) oral history, the weather was a lot like it is now, green and lush, creek and river levels, going down and the cotton, from the cottonwood trees, was beginning to blow in the wind. My elders Charlie and Julia Quintasket, told me, that when the cotton was blowing in the wind, the salmon were coming up the Columbia. Julia told me that “pretty, pretty birds, would arrive, at Kettle Falls, three days before the salmon made their appearance.”

I would very much like to thank my ancestors and elders, for the ancient details of their time-honored calendars of seasonal events, that were quite significant to their and their family’s survival, preparing and providing, with each new seasonal cycle.

James Perkins

Colville