Ancient Indian Fishing Grounds

This panel stands at Celilo Park, above the water that has covered Wyam since 1957. Its closing claim, that treaty fishing rights are still exercised on the river, was won in court. In 1968 fourteen Yakama tribal members, Richard Sohappy first among them in the case name, sued Oregon's fish and game commissions. The United States joined on behalf of the Warm Springs, Umatilla and Nez Perce. In July 1969 Judge Robert Belloni ruled that the 1855 treaties reserved the tribes a fair share of the fish, and that Oregon could regulate their fishing only as conservation required.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Celilo Village — 0.3 mi
  The village that stayed on the bluff above the drowned falls, rebuilt half a century late by the government that flooded them, where the salmon season still opens each April.
• Rowena Crest and the Tom McCall Preserve — 17 mi
  A crest where the Ice Age floods jammed against a basalt promontory, above a plateau of mounds no one has fully explained, and a few in the parking loop that the highway department built.

More markers nearby

• Deschutes River Crossing — 2.6 mi
• Cutoff to the Barlow Road — 22 mi