1460R Hoh Indian Reservation Locator Map

The Hoh or Chalá·at ("Those-Who-Live-on-the-Hoh River" or "People of the Hoh River") are a

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 in western

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

state in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The tribe lives near the Pacific Coast of Washington on the

Olympic Peninsula The Olympic Peninsula is a large peninsula in Western Washington that lies across Puget Sound from Seattle, and contains Olympic National Park. It is bounded on the west by the Pacific Ocean, the north by the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the ...

. The Hoh moved onto the Hoh Indian Reservation at the mouth of the

Hoh River The Hoh River is a river of the Pacific Northwest, located on the Olympic Peninsula in the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington. About long, the Hoh River originates at the snout of Hoh Glacier on Mount Olympus (Washington), Mount Olym ...

, on the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

Coast of Jefferson County, after the signing of the

Quinault Treaty The Quinault Treaty (also known as the Quinault River Treaty and the Treaty of Olympia) was a treaty agreement between the United States and the Native American Quinault and Quileute tribes located in the western Olympic Peninsula north of Grays ...

on July 1, 1855. The reservation has a land area of and a 2000 census resident population of 102 persons, 81 of whom were Native Americans. It lies about halfway between its nearest outside communities of

Forks In cutlery or kitchenware, a fork (from 'pitchfork') is a Eating utensil, utensil, now usually made of metal, whose long handle terminates in a head that branches into several narrow and often slightly curved tine (structural), tines with whic ...

, to its north, and

Queets Queets is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Grays Harbor and Jefferson counties, Washington, United States. The population was 136 at the 2020 census, down from 174 at the 2010 census. The primary residents of th ...

(on the

Quinault Indian Reservation The Quinault Indian Nation ( or ; QIN), formerly known as the Quinault Tribe of the Quinault Reservation, is a federally recognized tribe of Quinault, Queets, Quileute, Hoh, Chehalis, Chinook, and Cowlitz peoples.

), to its south. The river is central to their culture. The main resources they used included cedar trees, salmon, and the nearby vegetation. They also traded and bartered with other tribes closer to

Eastern Washington Eastern Washington is the region of the U.S. state of Washington located east of the Cascade Range. It contains the city of Spokane (the second largest city in the state), the Tri-Cities, the Columbia River and the Grand Coulee Dam, the H ...

, near the Plateaus and Great Plains.

Name

The name of the Hoh River, and the Hoh who were named after it, is derived from the Quinault language name for the river, húxʷ. The Hoh call themselves Chalá·at or Chalat' (′People of the southern river, i.e. Hoh River′) after their name for the Hoh River Cha’lak’at’sit or Chalak'ac'it, which means the "southern river".

History

In aboriginal times, there was nothing secluded about the Hoh Watershed, even its upper reaches. No less than ''seven permanent settlements'' were situated along the banks of the Hoh, most with a fish trap. The river served not only as a riverine thoroughfare leading to their fishing sites and their hunting, trapping, and foraging grounds, it was also the nursery of the salmon and home of freshwater fishes that they harvested as part of their annual cycle. The watershed included the sites of the burials of their ancestors, the hidden locations of their empowering guardian spirits, and the family campgrounds and upstream summer-homesites near resource gathering areas that were heritable family property. Besides that, there were named landmarks, sites associated with ritual and mythic occurrences, and riverside trails. The Hoh (Chalá·at) people refer to both their traditional lands and their reservation as ChalAt’i’lo t’sikAti, (′the land belonging to the people who live at the Hoh River′). The lifestyle of the Hoh, like many Northwest Coast tribes, involved the fishing of

salmon Salmon (; : salmon) are any of several list of commercially important fish species, commercially important species of euryhaline ray-finned fish from the genera ''Salmo'' and ''Oncorhynchus'' of the family (biology), family Salmonidae, native ...

. They also hunted large marine mammals off the coast, including seals, sea lions, and whales, for food and other uses. The tribe's population declined significantly following contact with European American explorers in the 19th century, which brought a

smallpox Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by Variola virus (often called Smallpox virus), which belongs to the genus '' Orthopoxvirus''. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (W ...

epidemic. A census conducted in 1901 counted 64 total members. Though the Hoh (Chalá·at) are today considered to be a band of the

Quileute The Quileute () are a Native American people in western Washington state in the United States, with 808 enrolled citizens in 2018. They are a federally recognized tribe: the ''Quileute Tribe of the Quileute Reservation''. The Quileute people ...

tribe, the original Hoh language was actually the

Quinault language Quinault () is a member of the Tsamosan (Olympic) branch of the Coast Salish family of Salishan languages The Salishan languages ( ), also known as the Salish languages ( ), are a Language family, family of languages found in the Pacific No ...

and they were related to the

Quinault Quinault may refer to: * Quinault people, an Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast **Quinault Indian Nation, a federally recognized tribe ** Quinault language, their language People * Quinault family of actors, including: * Jean-Bapt ...

. After intermarriage with the Quileute, the Hoh became a

bilingual Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. When the languages are just two, it is usually called bilingualism. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolin ...

tribe, speaking both

and Quinault, until the Quileute language was favored. Today, however, all three tribes have overwhelmingly adopted

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the Languages of the United States, most widely spoken lang ...

as their

home language A first language (L1), native language, native tongue, or mother tongue is the first language a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother tongue'' refers ...

Ethnobotany

The

Hoh Water () is a polar inorganic compound that is at room temperature a tasteless and odorless liquid, which is nearly colorless apart from an inherent hint of blue. It is by far the most studied chemical compound and is described as the "univer ...

make use of

Vaccinium myrtilloides ''Vaccinium myrtilloides'' is a North American species of blueberry with common names including common blueberry, velvetleaf huckleberry, velvetleaf blueberry, Canadian blueberry, and sourtop blueberry. Description ''Vaccinium myrtilloides'' is a ...

. They eat the fruit raw, stew the berries and make them into a sauce, and can the berries and use them as winter food.Reagan, Albert B., 1936, Plants Used by the Hoh and Quileute Indians, Kansas Academy of Science 37:55-70, page 67

Hoh Indian Reservation

The Hoh Indian Reservation was established on September 11, 1893, by an

executive order In the United States, an executive order is a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government. The legal or constitutional basis for executive orders has multiple sources. Article Two of the ...

signed by President

Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, serving from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. He was the first U.S. president to serve nonconsecutive terms and the first Hist ...

. The Hoh had originally been assigned to the

per the terms of the 1855

, which was not signed with their knowledge. The reservation lies on the Lower Hoh River and includes a co-managed

fishery Fishery can mean either the enterprise of raising or harvesting fish and other aquatic life or, more commonly, the site where such enterprise takes place ( a.k.a., fishing grounds). Commercial fisheries include wild fisheries and fish far ...

for salmon.

References

External links

Tribal websiteHoh Reservation, Washington
United States Census Bureau
Hoh tribe profile
at the website of the

Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board The Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board (NPAIHB) is a non-profit tribal advisory organization in Portland, Oregon, run and organized by participating tribes. It was established in 1972 to focus on four areas as they pertain to the health o ...