Nez Perce

The board ends with the band sent to Washington instead of the Wallowa; Joseph kept asking. In 1899 and again in 1900 he came back to the valley, the second time with Inspector James McLaughlin, to ask for a small piece of land. Settlers heard him courteously and refused, and McLaughlin reported strongly against it. In May 1901 he dictated that if the government would give his people land in the Wallowa, "with a teacher, that is all I would ask." He died at Nespelem on September 21, 1904; the agency doctor said of a broken heart.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Joseph and the Bronze Foundries — 5.8 mi
  A ranch town under the Wallowas that became a bronze-casting center after local sculptors talked a resident into opening a foundry in 1982, with seven monumental bronzes now on Main Street.
• Wallowa and the Tamkaliks Celebration — 15 mi
  The town in the valley the Wallowa band of the Nez Perce was driven from in 1877, where since 1991 their descendants have come home each summer for a celebration named for where you can see the mountains.

More markers nearby

• Wallowa Lake — 7.2 mi