The Coquille Indian Tribe ( ) is the

federally recognized This is a list of federally recognized tribes in the contiguous United States. There are also federally recognized Alaska Native tribes. , 574 Indian tribes are legally recognized by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) of the United States.

Native American Native Americans or Native American usually refers to Native Americans in the United States. Related terms and peoples include: Ethnic groups * Indigenous peoples of the Americas, the pre-Columbian peoples of North, South, and Central America ...

tribe of the

Coquille people The Coquille ( , sometimes spelled Ko-Kwel or Ko'Kwel) are a Native American people who historically lived in the Coquille River watershed and nearby coast south of Coos Bay. They were signatories of the Oregon Coast Tribes Treaty of 1855 and w ...

who have traditionally lived on the southern

Oregon Coast The Oregon Coast is a coastal region of the U.S. state of Oregon. It is bordered by the Pacific Ocean to its west and the Oregon Coast Range to the east, and stretches approximately from the California state border in the south to the Columbia ...

History

Pre-contact through the mid-19th century

Beginning in 1847, following the Cayuse Indian slaughter of the white, Presbyterian missionaries at the "Whitman Mission", a series of retaliatory attacks ensued against the indigenous peoples all throughout the

Oregon Territory The Territory of Oregon was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from August 14, 1848, until February 14, 1859, when the southwestern portion of the territory was admitted to the United States, Union as the Oreg ...

, perpetrated by both miners and settlers. By 1854, several dozen miners who were angry over an altercation with a native man, went into the Coquille Indian village in what is now

Bandon, Oregon Bandon () is a city in Coos County, Oregon, Coos County, Oregon, United States, on the south side of the mouth of the Coquille River (Oregon), Coquille River. It was named by George Bennet, an Republic of Ireland, Irish peer, who settled nearby i ...

, and killed all the members of that tribe that they could find there, burning their houses and slaughtering all women and children.

Treaty with the United States

In 1855,

Joel Palmer General Joel Palmer (October 4, 1810 – June 9, 1881) was an American pioneer of the Oregon Territory in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. He was born in Upper Canada, and spent his early years in New York and Pennsylvania before se ...

, Oregon Superintendent of Indian Affairs, negotiated a treaty with the Coquille and surrounding tribes that set aside of coastline extending from the

Siltcoos River The Siltcoos River is a stream on the central coast of the U.S. state of Oregon. It begins at Siltcoos Lake, which straddles the border between Douglas and Lane counties. The river meanders generally west to the Pacific Ocean. It is located abo ...

to Cape Lookout to form the

Coastal A coast (coastline, shoreline, seashore) is the land next to the sea or the line that forms the boundary between the land and the ocean or a lake. Coasts are influenced by the topography of the surrounding landscape and by aquatic erosion, su ...

(or Siletz) Indian Reservation near present-day

Florence Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italy, Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in Metropolitan City of Florence, its metropolitan province as of 2025. Florence ...

. The Coquille people were forcibly marched to the reservation in 1856; however, the treaty was never ratified by Congress. Disease and overcrowding were problems on the reservation, which was eventually reduced to a fraction of its former size. The remnants of the original Coastal Indian Reservation are contained in the

Siletz Reservation The Siletz Reservation is a 5.852 sq mi (15.157 km2) Indian reservation in Lincoln County, Oregon, United States, owned by the Confederated Tribes of Siletz. The reservation is made up of numerous non-contiguous parcels of land in east-centr ...

and associated tribally owned lands. Over the years many Coquilles returned to their traditional homeland and fought for acknowledgement of the Treaty of 1855.

Termination and restoration

The U.S. federal government terminated its recognition of the Coquille as part of the Western Oregon Indian Termination Act. In 1989 the tribe regained its federal recognition. With restoration came

tribal sovereignty The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide use of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. The definition is contested, in part due to conflict ...

, which gives the tribe authority to form its own government and have jurisdiction over tribal lands, businesses, and community members. The Coquille Tribe opened The Mill Casino on May 19, 1995, at a former waterfront

plywood Plywood is a composite material manufactured from thin layers, or "plies", of wood veneer that have been stacked and glued together. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured boards, which include plywood, medium-density fibreboa ...

mill between North Bend and Coos Bay. The mill had been built in 1961 by

Weyerhauser The Weyerhaeuser Company ( ) is an American timberland company which owns nearly of timberlands in the U.S., and manages an additional of timberlands under long-term licenses in Canada. The company has manufactured wood products for over a c ...

and closed in 1991; it was sold to the tribe for $7 million. The site was criticized by the

Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians The Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians of Oregon are a federally recognized Native American tribe of Hanis Coos, Miluk Coos, Lower Umpqua (or Kuitsh), and Siuslaw people in Oregon.NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The N ...

football player Bruce Anderson. Anderson was later found to have used federal funds earmarked for tribal housing to pay for personal expenses and his own home. He was indicted by a federal

grand jury A grand jury is a jury empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a person to testify. A grand ju ...

in 1999 of illegal dumping of

asbestos Asbestos ( ) is a group of naturally occurring, Toxicity, toxic, carcinogenic and fibrous silicate minerals. There are six types, all of which are composed of long and thin fibrous Crystal habit, crystals, each fibre (particulate with length su ...

from the casino's construction.

Name origin

According to the Tribe's website, the name comes from a native word for

lamprey Lampreys (sometimes inaccurately called lamprey eels) are a group of Agnatha, jawless fish comprising the order (biology), order Petromyzontiformes , sole order in the Class (biology), class Petromyzontida. The adult lamprey is characterize ...

, a staple food for the tribe. European settlers approximated the word as but it came to be spelled Coquille (the French word for shell). Eventually the pronunciation of the

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

and

river A river is a natural stream of fresh water that flows on land or inside Subterranean river, caves towards another body of water at a lower elevation, such as an ocean, lake, or another river. A river may run dry before reaching the end of ...

shifted to , but the tribe's name retained the older pronunciation.

Coquille Indian Reservation

The

Confederated Tribes of Siletz The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians in the United States is a federally recognized confederation of more than 27 Native American tribes and bands who once inhabited an extensive homeland of more than 20 million acres from northern Califo ...

, based in

Siletz, Oregon Siletz ( , Tolowa language, Tolowa: sii-let-ts’i ) is a city in Lincoln County, Oregon, Lincoln County, Oregon, United States. The population was 1,212 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. The city is located next to the Siletz Reserva ...

, recognize the Coquille people as one of the tribes that make up their confederation. The Confederated Tribes of Siletz continue to live on the

Siletz Indian Reservation The Siletz Reservation is a 5.852 sq mi (15.157 km2) Indian reservation in Lincoln County, Oregon, United States, owned by the Confederated Tribes of Siletz. The reservation is made up of numerous non-contiguous parcels of land in east-centr ...

. In addition, by an Act of Congress in 1996, the Coquille Tribe now has reservation area totaling . The reservation's lands are located in numerous non-contiguous parcels of land in southern Coos County, mostly in and to the southeast of the

Coos Bay Coos Bay (Hanis language, Coos language: Atsixiis or Hanisich) is an estuary where the Coos River enters the Pacific Ocean, the estuary is approximately 12 miles long and up to two miles wide. It is the largest estuary completely within Oregon sta ...

- North Bend urban area. Parts of the communities of Bandon, Barview, Coos Bay, and North Bend extend onto reservation lands. The 2000 census listed the reservation's official resident population as 258 people.

Forest management

The "Oregon Resources Conservation Act of 1996" (part o
Public Law 104-208
restored to the Coquille Tribe approximately of forest in Coos County, Oregon. The act's author, Oregon Senator Mark Hatfield, said of the Coquille Forest: "I hope this proposal, with its relatively modest acreage and the required adherence to the most environmentally friendly forest management plan ever implemented in the Pacific Northwest—President Clinton's forest plan—is successful and can become a model for how our Nation deals with other claims by native American tribes." The Forest was formally taken into trust for the Tribe by the U.S. government on September 30, 1998. The Coquille Forest comprises fourteen separate parcels of former BLM timberlands in eastern Coos County. Unlike other forests held in trust for and managed by federally recognized tribes, under the National Indian Forest Resources Management Act, the Coquille Forest has the additional requirement of meeting the "standards and guidelines" of adjacent federal forests, such as the Northwest Forest Plan. While most federal forests have not met their timber production expectations under the Northwest Forest Plan, the Coquille Forest is widely considered the only entity to meet both the ecological and economic outputs of the Northwest Forest Plan. In 2011, the U.S. Secretary of Interior endorsed the first component of th
landscape management proposal
in which the Coquille Indian Tribe and the BLM would work together to develop a demonstration timber sale pilot in coordination with professors Norm Johnson and Jerry Franklin. This pilot will demonstrate the professors' ecological principles of variable retention regeneration harvest in the Oregon Coast Range. The timber sale will be designed under the Northwest Forest Plan and comply with all BLM requirements. Management of the Coquille Forest has earned recognition for being environmentally sound and sustainable. The Forest Stewardship Council certified the Coquille Forest in September 2011.

Government

The tribal government is based in North Bend. In 2008 the tribe legalized

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same legal Legal sex and gender, sex. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 38 countries, with a total population of 1.5 ...

, becoming the first tribal nation in the United States to do so. Although the Oregon voters approved an amendment to the

Oregon Constitution The Oregon Constitution is the governing document of the U.S. state of Oregon, originally enacted in 1857. As amended the current state constitution contains eighteen sections, beginning with a bill of rights.

in 2004 to prohibit such marriages, the Coquille are not bound by the Oregon Constitution, because they are a federally recognized

sovereign nation A nation state, or nation-state, is a political entity in which the state (a centralized political organization ruling over a population within a territory) and the nation (a community based on a common identity) are (broadly or ideally) con ...

. The Coquille Indian Tribe Library contains information on the Coquille Indian Tribe and other Tribes of southwest Oregon including the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Indians. Policing is handled by the Coquille Tribal police force.

Economy

The Coquille Tribe owns several businesses, including The Mill Casino in

, and ORCA Communications, a

telecommunication Telecommunication, often used in its plural form or abbreviated as telecom, is the transmission of information over a distance using electronic means, typically through cables, radio waves, or other communication technologies. These means of ...

s provider. In September 2012, the tribe announced plans for a casino in Medford, to be built in a bowling alley that was acquired for $1.6 million. The tribe is also leasing an adjacent golf course.

Notes

References

*
Coquille Reservation and Off-Reservation Trust Land, Oregon
United States Census Bureau

External links

Coquille Indian Tribe
official website

the newsletter of the Coquille Indian Tribe
CEDCO Coquille Economic Development CorporationMap of the original Coastal Indian Reservation as of 1855
{{authority control Native American tribes in Oregon Federally recognized tribes in the United States Coos