The Columbia River is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river forms in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada. It flows northwest and then south into the U.S. state of Washington, then turns west to form most of the border between Washington and the state of Oregon before emptying into the Pacific Ocean. The river is 1,243 miles long, and its largest tributary is the Snake River. Its drainage basin is roughly the size of France and extends into seven of the United States plus a Canadian province. The fourth-largest river in the United States by volume, the Columbia has the greatest flow of any North American river entering the Pacific. The Columbia has the 36th greatest discharge of any river in the world.
Maya Ying Lin is an American designer and sculptor. In 1981, while an undergraduate at Yale University, she achieved national recognition when she won a national design competition for the planned Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.
Wishram is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Klickitat County, Washington, United States. The population was 342 at the 2010 census, up from 213 at the 2000 census. The site of the historic Celilo Falls is nearby.
The Columbia River Gorge is a canyon of the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. Up to 4,000 feet (1,200 m) deep, the canyon stretches for over eighty miles (130 km) as the river winds westward through the Cascade Range, forming the boundary between the state of Washington to the north and Oregon to the south. Extending roughly from the confluence of the Columbia with the Deschutes River in the east down to the eastern reaches of the Portland metropolitan area, the water gap furnishes the only navigable route through the Cascades and the only water connection between the Columbia Plateau and the Pacific Ocean. It is thus that the routes of Interstate 84, U.S. Route 30, Washington State Route 14, and railroad tracks on both sides run through the gorge.
The Dalles Dam is a concrete-gravity run-of-the-river dam spanning the Columbia River, two miles (3 km) east of the city of The Dalles, Oregon, United States. It joins Wasco County, Oregon with Klickitat County, Washington, 300 miles (309 km) upriver from the mouth of the Columbia near Astoria, Oregon. The closest towns on the Washington side are Dallesport and Wishram.
The Lewis and Clark National Historical Park, located in the vicinity of the mouth of the Columbia River, commemorates the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Administration of the park, which includes both federal and state lands, is a cooperative effort of the National Park Service and the states of Oregon and Washington. The National Historical Park was dedicated on November 12, 2004.
Celilo Falls was a tribal fishing area on the Columbia River, just east of the Cascade Mountains, on what is today the border between the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington. The name refers to a series of cascades and waterfalls on the river, as well as to the native settlements and trading villages that existed there in various configurations for 15,000 years. Celilo was the oldest continuously inhabited community on the North American continent until 1957, when the falls and nearby settlements were submerged by the construction of The Dalles Dam. In 2019, there were calls by tribal leaders to restore the falls.
The Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail is a route across the United States commemorating the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804 to 1806. It is part of the National Trails System of the United States. It extends for some 4,900 miles (7,900 km) from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon.
Cape Disappointment State Park is a public recreation area on Cape Disappointment, located southwest of Ilwaco, Washington, on the bottom end of Long Beach Peninsula, the northern headlands where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean. The state park's 2,023 acres (819 ha) encompass a diverse landscape of old-growth forest, freshwater lakes, freshwater and saltwater marshes, and oceanside tidelands. Park sites include Fort Canby, the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center, North Head Lighthouse, and Cape Disappointment Lighthouse. Cape Disappointment is one of several state parks and sites in Washington and Oregon that are included in Lewis and Clark National Historical Park.
The Long Beach Peninsula is an arm of land on the southern coast of the state of Washington in the United States. Entirely within Pacific County, it is bounded on the west by the Pacific Ocean, the south by the Columbia River, and the east by Willapa Bay. Leadbetter Point State Park and Willapa National Wildlife Refuge are at the northern end of the peninsula and Cape Disappointment is at the southern end, with Pacific Pines State Park located in between.
The Touchet River is a 55-mile (89 km) tributary of the Walla Walla River in southeastern Washington in the United States. The Touchet River drains an area of about 740 square miles (1,900 km2) in Columbia County and Walla Walla County.
Lewis and Clark State Recreation Site is a state park in eastern Multnomah County, Oregon, near Troutdale and Corbett, and is administered by the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department. It is located on the Sandy River, near its confluence with the Columbia River. Broughton's Bluff marks the westernmost extent of the Columbia River Gorge at the site.
Sacagawea was a Lemhi Shoshone woman who, in her teens, helped the Lewis and Clark Expedition in achieving their chartered mission objectives by exploring the Louisiana Territory. Sacagawea traveled with the expedition thousands of miles from North Dakota to the Pacific Ocean, helping to establish cultural contacts with Native American people and contributing to the expedition's knowledge of natural history in different regions.
Vancouver is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington, located in Clark County. Incorporated in 1857, Vancouver has a population of 190,915 as of the 2020 census, making it the fourth-largest city in Washington state. Vancouver is the county seat of Clark County and forms part of the Portland-Vancouver metropolitan area, the 25th-largest metropolitan area in the United States. Originally established in 1825 around Fort Vancouver, a fur-trading outpost, the city is located on the Washington–Oregon border along the Columbia River, directly north of Portland, and is considered a suburb of the city along with its surrounding areas.
Eva Emery Dye was an American writer, historian, and prominent member of the women's suffrage movement. As the author of several historical novels, fictional yet thoroughly researched, she is credited with "romanticizing the historic West, turning it into a poetic epic of expanding civilization." Her best known work, The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis & Clark (1902), is notable for being the first to present Sacagawea as a historically significant character in her own right.
Sacajawea State Park is a public recreation area and historical preserve in the city of Pasco, Washington, covering 267 acres (108 ha) at the confluence of the Snake and Columbia rivers where the Lewis and Clark Expedition camped on October 16, 1805. The state park bears the name of the Shoshone woman Sacagawea, who was an active member of the expedition married to expedition member Toussaint Charbonneau, a French-Canadian interpreter and explorer. The park's Sacajawea Interpretive Center features exhibits about her and about the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
The Sacagawea Heritage Trail is a relatively flat 23 miles (37 km) multi-use recreational trail in the Tri-Cities, Washington. It travels along the Columbia River for its entire length, forming a loop that connects Pasco, Richland and Kennewick. The entire trail is paved. Mile markers count up from Sacajawea State Park at the confluence of the Columbia and Snake Rivers.
The following is a timeline of the history of the Tri-Cities, an area of the U.S. state of Washington encompassing the cities of Kennewick, Pasco, and Richland.
The Vancouver Land Bridge connects Vancouver Waterfront Park to the Vancouver, Washington portion of the Fort Vancouver National Historic Site using a path similar to an ancient Native American trail. The bridge, which spans Highway 14, has been described as "the most visible part of the larger" Confluence Project.
The Sandy River Delta is a natural area at the confluence of the Sandy and Columbia rivers in Oregon. Also known as "thousand acres", Sandy River Delta is composed of 1,400 acres administered by the United States Forest Service as part of the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area near the Portland metro area and the city of Troutdale.
