Yesteryears - Feb. 15, 2025

2021 — When the Tribe began offering COVID-19 vaccines to the community, to ensure that none of the vaccine doses went to waste, people drove from across Oregon and Washington to accept the offer. One family drove from Reno, Nevada; another person arrived from North Dakota. The vaccines took two hours to thaw and were only viable for six hours. Former Tribal Council Chairman Reyn Leno invoked the words of Tribal Elder and Restoration figure Kathryn Harrison in saying that the Grand Ronde Tribe would care for the community after Restoration because the community cared for the Tribe during its 29 years of Termination.

2016 — Tribal Council approved an agreement with Marion Polk Food Share to continue operating the Grand Ronde Food Bank for two more years. The Tribe built iskam mǝkʰmǝk-haws in 2014, with the help of two federal grants.

2011 — The Tribe held a naming ceremony for its new plankhouse, achaf-hammi, a Tualatin-Kalapuya word meaning “a house built of cedar planks,” translating to “plankhouse.”

2006 — Spirit Mountain Community Fund awarded $20,000 to the Wisdom of the Elders Curriculum Project, to develop multi-media curricula for Native American K-12 classrooms.

2001 — Grand Ronde Tribal representatives attended the winter conference for the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians, and sponsored the Victory Celebration Reception honoring Tribal Council Chairwoman Kathryn Harrison and the exit of Washington Sen. Slade Gorton, seen by many Natives in the region as a threat to sovereignty. Harrison thanked Oregon Sen. Mark Hatfield and Rep. Elizabeth Furse, long-time allies of Tribes.

1996 — Shortly after Spirit Mountain Casino opened in 1995, people began leaving offerings, varying from flowers to cash, at the statue of Martha Jane Sands and her granddaughter. When the accumulated cash reached more than $2,000, the casino donated the funds to three local Head Start programs. In addition, the casino matched the offerings in its donations.

1991 — The Tribe opened a new Economic Development Center with the aid of a $1.5 million federal grant, to benefit the community as well as Tribal members.

1986 — Tribal Council Chairman Mark Mercier and Tribal Council members Kathryn Harrison and Merlo Leno attended the Siletz Tribal Council meeting in Siletz to request that Siletz Tribal members Dee Pigsley and Art Bensell attend the next Grand Ronde General Council meeting, to brief the Tribe on their experience in completing the process that led to the establishment of the Siletz Reservation.

Yesteryears is a look back at Tribal history in five-year increments through the pages of Smoke Signals.