The Annual Salmon Harvest on the Yakima
Indigenous and white residents alike flock to the Prosser dam to harvest salmon as the fish struggle to leap the obstruction.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The salmon have begun running in the Yakima river on the way to their spawning grounds, and the Indians, both red and palefaced, have begun their annual fish harvest. The fish are caught by means of a hook on the end of a pole and the fishing is done at the foot of the different dams along the stream, where the salmon congregate because of the difficulty in reaching the water above the dam, which they must overcome by leaping. A Spokesman representative stood on the Prosser dam and in an hour’s time saw at least 20 salmon taken, none of which weighed less than 20, and some as high as 50 pounds. The fish are in excellent condition and nearly every one along the river is feasting on them. Some are eaten fresh, but most of them are smoked or canned, to be eaten next winter.
“The salmon have begun running in the Yakima river on the way to their spawning grounds, and the Indians, both red and palefaced, have begun their annual fish harvest.”
The article uses the dehumanizing epithet 'Poor Lo,' typical of the era's dismissive treatment of Indigenous people, while describing a practice (dam-side harvesting) that reflects the historical and ongoing conflict over the impact of dams on salmon runs in the Pacific Northwest.
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