Two weeks ago my daughter Mimi and her husband, Cliff,
both from Durango, Colorado, and this writer pulled our canoes from the
Salmon River at a tiny settlement called Shoup in Idaho’s Frank Church
River of No Return Wilderness.
We had just completed a nine-day river trip down the Salmon’s middle branch.
One of the original eight rivers designated Wild and Scenic (1968), the
middle branch flows 106 miles northeast through one of the deepest gorges
in North America. It's a route of continuous rapids (over 100 in all),
many of which are downright intimidating. Fortunately, I had Mimi, a nationally
ranked paddler, in the bow of the our white-water canoe and Cliff, a former
Utah river guide, helping to pick the proper course in the more difficult
sections that required thorough study and scouting to avoid the holes and
cataracts that have flipped eighteen-man rafts end over end. Rapids with
names like Powerhouse, Pistol Creek, Haystack, and Redside to name a few.
The kind of rapids that make you nervously bite your lip, give you a sick
feeling in your stomach, and push your heart rate beyond the max. The kind
that makes you wonder if you perhaps shouldn’t have gone to church more
often. The kind where you hope God doesn’t think you are a hypocrite as
you mutter a silent prayer before you enter the maelstrom, asking that
He lets you make it through safely. Moments of anxiety aside, and ignoring
a discussion of what causes us to express some deep-seated need to take
risk and to participate in activities close to the metaphorical edge where
danger, skill, and fear combine to give us a sense of pushing our personal
boundaries, the river we ran is beautiful.
The water is an emerald green and so clear you can see the bottom in twenty
feet of water. Honed by wind and water over thousands of years, the canyon
walls rise high and bold from the river’s edge. The river itself rushes
like a run-away train through the Big Horn Crags among the most rugged
and wild mountain ranges in the nation.
If that were not enough, it also has numerous, narrow sand beaches for
camping, many with hidden hot springs of warm mineral waters to soothe
aching muscles and revitalize clammy and cold feet soaked for too long
in the frigid river water that had slashed into our open canoes.
All too soon, it seemed we found ourselves entering the main Salmon, and
at a take-out called Cache Bar we unloaded our gear and tied our canoes
on Mimi’s station wagon, which had been left there by a shuttle service.
We were reluctant to leave the river, having achieved, we felt, just the
kind of alchemy that such trips, whether we know it or not, often are designed
to engender.
Our first stop after leaving the river was a traditional one for Salmon
River paddlers. A small general store just upstream from the take-out which
advertises itself as making “the thickest milk shakes available anywhere.”
The owner turned out to be an attractive girl in her late thirties. She
could have been straight out of a Louis L’Amour western novel. Lanky but
graceful in her movement, she was wearing a wrist bracelet of stunning
turquoise gem stones, and a wide belt fastened with a large buckle on which
was welded a caliber 45 silver bullet that held up a pair of loose-fitting
carpenter jeans with deep pockets and a hammer loop. The jeans were tucked
into a pair of well-worn, hand-tooled cowboy boots. Hanging from her belt
was a mini mag flashlight in a holster, a sheathed leatherman tool, and
a pager.
She appeared the quintessential rugged individual who holds our imagination
as a symbol of the wild West.
I soon learned that the modern gadgets on her belt were due to her being
not only the owner of the Shoup Store, Cafe and Cabins, but she was also
an outfitter and the resident paramedic in Shoup, Idaho, population 60.
As you might suspect, business in the cafe was not like McDonald’s during
lunch time, and between spoonfuls of milk shake, I was able to engage her
in conversation: “The backboard and the stokes litter behind the counter?”
She was also the river medic, she informed me. “Had she lived here long?”
“Yep!” came the reply. “All my life, born here. Family came to these parts
around 1880.” Seems a fellow named Bill McKay discovered lead in the dump
of a badger hole on which he had sat down to rest while hunting stage horses.
The result was a mining boom that created the Viola Mine and attracted
her great grandfather. It became one of the richest lead mines in the world,
but when the mine ran out, so did most of the 3,000 inhabitants who had
been lured by the discovery. But her ancestors had stayed. “No regrets,
Mister. I love it here. Clean air, clean water, unsurpassed mountains,
great fishing and hunting. This is the last frontier.” Sensing my interest,
she pulled up a chair, straddling it backwards like she was riding one
of her horses, which filled the corral in the rear of the store. Looking
me straight in the eye, she threw out a question, half query, half informative:
Did I know that the first white men to come to these parts were members
of the Lewis and Clark Expedition? She explained that the explorers were
seeking a contact with the native Shoshoni Indians in order to obtain horses
to enable the expedition to cross the mountains as they sought out a route
to the unmapped Pacific Ocean.
“It was a well-known fact,” she continued, “that the Shoshoni Indians had
taken horses from the Spaniards in earlier times.” During their winter
stay at Fort Mandan in 1804, the explorers discovered a young Shoshoni
squaw who had been captured when about eleven years of age and sold as
a slave to an enemy tribe. At fifteen years of age, she had become the
wife of a French Canadian trapper named Charbonneau. In order to secure
her services as an interpreter, Lewis and Clark induced Charbonneau to
join the expedition.
When the explorers finally found the Shoshonis, the Indian girl who came
to be known as Sacajawea joyfully recognized the place of her birth and
her own people. (Unable to speak English, Sacajawea suddenly began sucking
her fingers and dancing with joy among these people who had suckled her
as a baby.) When she was called to the council to interpret, she recognized
the Shoshoni chief as her brother, afterward called Cameahwart. This remarkable
coincidence together with the promise of future trade for the white man’s
goods were what induced the Indians to supply horses for the journey over
the mountains and the eventual success of the expedition.
At this point, our new friend paused to take a sip of black coffee flavored
with a splash of Jim Beam. My own hometown pride refused to be stilled
and I interjected that I was fascinated by her stories and to be informed
that I was sitting near the birth place of Sacajawea was not only exciting
but slightly incredible, particularly because there was a connection: Touissant
Charbonneau was the uncle of Michael Charbonneau, also originally from
Eastern Canada and Tupper Lake’s first settler! I went on to explain that
I also lived in a special place where some of the rivers still ran free
and wild and the mountains, while more gentle than her Bitterroot Range,
were also spectacular in their own way. I wanted to tell her more about
the Charbonneaus, but just then Mimi gave me a gentle kick under the table
with the suggestion that “Dad, we have a ten-hour drive to Boise and if
you want to catch your flight to Chicago, we had better hustle along.”
Reluctantly, I agreed, and we made our goodbyes and thank yous for what
had been a pleasant and informative half hour with a very interesting and
charming young lady from Shoup, Idaho, birthplace of Sacajawea, the bird
woman, captive wife of Touissant Charbonneau.
Next column: Sacajawea is chosen as the main image of the new silver dollar
due out in a couple of months.
| Transitions No. 40 September 8 , 1999 |
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