The Nez Perce are an Indigenous people of the Plateau who still live on a fraction of the lands on the southeastern Columbia River Plateau in the Pacific Northwest. This region has been occupied for at least 11,500 years.
Blaine County is a county in the U.S. state of Montana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 7,044. Its county seat is Chinook. The county was named for James G. Blaine, former United States Secretary of State. It is on the north line of the state, and thus shares the southern border of Canada opposite Saskatchewan.
Chinook is a city in and the county seat of Blaine County, Montana, United States. The population was 1,185 at the 2020 census. Points of interest are the Bear Paw Battlefield Museum located in the small town's center and the Bear Paw Battlefield, located 20 miles (32 km) south of Chinook.
Belt Creek is a tributary, approximately 80 mi (129 km) long, of the Missouri River in western Montana in the United States.
Arrow Creek is a tributary of the Missouri River in Montana in the United States. Approximately 45 miles (73 km) long, it rises in the Lewis and Clark National Forest near Highwood Baldy in the Highwood Mountains in southern Chouteau County. It flows south then east, then northeast and joins the Missouri in the White Cliffs Area on the border between Chouteau and Fergus counties.
Cow Creek is a tributary of the Missouri River, approximately 35 miles (56 km) long, in north central Montana in the United States. Cow Creek rises in the southern foothills of the Bear Paw Mountains in western Blaine County and flows east and then south, joining the Missouri approximately 25 air miles (40 km) northeast of Winifred, Montana—or 22 miles (35 km) upstream from the Fred Robinson Bridge.
Big Sandy Creek is a tributary of the Milk River, approximately 50 miles long, in northwestern Montana in the United States.
Fort Assinniboine was a United States Army fort located in present-day north central Montana. It was built in 1879 and operated by the Army through 1911. The 10th Cavalry Buffalo Soldiers, made up of African-American soldiers, were among the units making up the garrison at the fort. Determining that this fort was no longer needed after the end of the Indian Wars, the US Army closed and abandoned it.
Camas prairies are found in several different geographical areas in the western United States, and are named for the native perennial camas (Camassia). The culturally and scientifically significant of these areas lie within Idaho and Montana. Camas bulbs were an important food source for Native Americans.
The Battle of Bear Paw was the final engagement of the Nez Perce War of 1877. Following a 1,200-mile (1,900 km) running fight from north central Idaho Territory over the previous four months, the U.S. Army managed to corner most of the Nez Perce led by Chief Joseph in early October 1877 in northern Montana Territory, just 42 miles (68 km) south of the border with Canada, where the Nez Perce intended to seek refuge from persecution by the U.S. government.
The Gros Ventre, also known as the A'aninin, Atsina, or White Clay, are a historically Algonquian-speaking Native American tribe located in northcentral Montana. Today, the Gros Ventre people are enrolled in the Fort Belknap Indian Community of the Fort Belknap Reservation of Montana, a federally recognized tribe with 7,000 members, also including the Assiniboine people.
Looking Glass was a principal Nez Perce architect of many of the military strategies employed by the Nez Perce during the Nez Perce War of 1877. He, along with Chief Joseph, directed the 1877 retreat from eastern Oregon into Montana and onward toward the Canada–US border during the Nez Perce War. He led the Alpowai band of the Nez Perce, which included the communities of Asotin, Alpowa, and Sapachesap along the Clearwater River in Idaho. He inherited his name from his father, the prominent Nez Percé chief Apash Wyakaikt or Ippakness Wayhayken and was therefore called by the whites Looking Glass.
White Bird, also referred to as White Pelican, was leader, war chief and tooat of the Lamátta or Lamtáama band of the Nez Perce tribe with the Lamata village along the Salmon River. His band and the village took its name from Lahmatta, by which White Bird Canyon was known to the Nez Perce.
The Fort Belknap Indian Reservation is shared by two Native American tribes, the A'aninin and the Nakoda (Assiniboine). The reservation covers 1,014 sq mi (2,630 km2), and is located in north-central Montana. The total area includes the main portion of their homeland and off-reservation trust land. The tribes reported 2,851 enrolled members in 2010. The capital and largest community is Fort Belknap Agency, at the reservation's north end, just south of the city of Harlem, Montana, across the Milk River.
The Battle of Canyon Creek was a military engagement in Montana Territory between the Nez Perce Indians and the United States Army's 7th Cavalry. The battle was part of the larger Indian Wars of the latter 19th century and the immediate Nez Perce War. It took place on September 13, 1877, west of present-day Billings in Yellowstone County, in the canyons and benches around Canyon Creek.
Pierre's Hole is a shallow valley in the western United States in eastern Idaho, just west of the Teton Range in Wyoming. At an elevation over 6,000 feet (1,830 m) above sea level, it collects the headwaters of the Teton River, and was a strategic center of the fur trade of the northern Rocky Mountains. The nearby Jackson's Hole area in Wyoming is on the opposite side of the Tetons.
Union Pass is a high mountain pass in the Wind River Range in Fremont County of western Wyoming in the United States. The pass is located on the Continental Divide between the Gros Ventre mountains on the west and the Wind River Range on the east. A triple divide exists nearby, where water may flow to the Mississippi River, Columbia River, or Colorado River. The pass was historically used by Native Americans and early mountain men including the Astor Expedition in 1811 on its way west. On the return trip, fearing hostile Indian activity near Union Pass, the Astorians chose a southern route and discovered South Pass.
The Big Snowy Mountains are a small mountain range south of Lewistown in Fergus County, Montana. Considerably east of and isolated from the main crest of the Northern Rockies, they are one of the few points of significant elevation in the immediate area and are considered one of Montana's island ranges. The range's highest elevation is 8,681 feet (2,646 m). The smaller Little Snowy Mountains are a contiguous range immediately to the east.
The Nez Perce native Americans fled through Yellowstone National Park between August 20 and Sept 7, during the Nez Perce War in 1877. As the U.S. army pursued the Nez Perce through the park, a number of hostile and sometimes deadly encounters between park visitors and the Indians occurred. Eventually, the army's pursuit forced the Nez Perce off the Yellowstone plateau and into forces arrayed to capture or destroy them when they emerged from the mountains of Yellowstone onto the valley of Clark's Fork of the Yellowstone River.
Big Spring Creek is a tributary of the Judith River in Fergus County, Montana near Lewistown, Montana. The creek originates from a first magnitude artesian spring approximately 6 miles (9.7 km) south of Lewistown and flows north, northwest for 30 miles (48 km) to its confluence with the Judith River. The spring is one of the largest in the world flowing at approximately 50,000 to 64,000 US gallons per minute out of the Madison-Limestone formation in the foothills of the Big Snowy Mountains. The creek flows through and under the town of Lewistown. For three blocks spanning Main Street, the creek runs underneath the town in a man-made channel that was created as the town was built over the creek. The spring provides Lewistown's water supply, which requires no treatment for use by consumers.
