Indians did not have wheels. They'd never seen wheels until Whitman, Spaulding and wives came west in a wagon in 1836. Their motive hauling possessions was by means of an "A" shaped drag, called a Travois. It consisted of two long shafts, tied crosswise on each side of the horse, just above the neck, with a thick rawhide rope, then each shaft was tied to the sides of the saddle. Behind the horse a platform was made by weaving rawhide strips back and forth between the shafts. It was made and owned by the women, who took great pride in the construction. Clothes, weapons, household goods and tepee covers could be loaded and hauled away in a hurry. The sound of these travois being dragged on the ground struck terror in some of the early settlers - especially if there was a large movement of Indians.
A.J. McFarland's Payette Store, on the mouth of Big Willow, was a stopping place for bands of Umatilla Indians on their way to and from the Columbia River Basin. They traded their beaded moccasins and gloves for sugar, flour and tobacco. The return trip from the Camas Prairie of central Idaho were bands of four or five hundred dragging their travois loaded with Camas bulbs, buffalo meat and hides.
To hunt buffalo, the most important thing was a good horse. Next was iron-tipped arrows and a lance to bring the large beast down. The 50-70 caliber rifle, handled by buffalo hunters, often put many holes in the tough hides and was not preferred by Indians. A mature bull could be 6 feet tall and weighs 3000 pounds. Lucky was the man who had several wives to help with the skinning and butchering.
On the Idaho-Montana border, northwest of Yellowstone Park, where several "Buffalo Jumps." A hunting party, upon sighting a herd, could segregate a few animals from the herd and stampede them over a cliff where they would fall to their deaths.
The Indian women would gather at the foot of the cliffs, remove the hides and butcher the carcasses. Meat was not wasted. The entrails were cleaned and filled with meat scraps, seasoned with wild onions and sage. The marrow was removed from the bones and boiled for soup. The tongue and fat from the hump was prized. Chunks of meat were cut in strips and hung on a tripod over a fire. The stomach lining could be made into a cooking pouch to hang on a tripod, to which hot rocks were added to the stew to cook it. The brains were removed for use in the tanning process of the hides that had been stretched out and pegged to the ground to dry. It was a tremendous job to scrape the hides and remove any flesh particles. Special knives were used. A tanning solution was made of a mixture of brains, livers and animal fat which was worked into the cells and fibers of the hides. It was made pliable by pulling back and forth over a stretched rope and then smoking over a fire for waterproofing. The whole tanning operation would take about a week and was the work of the women. Buffalo hearts were left behind. They believed that the mystical powers of the hearts would help to regenerate the depleted herd.
The women would have to prepare three meals a day for the men who frequently left the camp, hunting for other game. Deer and elk hides were used for wearing apparel. Soles of moccasins were made of thick, tough hides. The tepee covers were usually of buffalo skins and extremely heavy. Some would weigh over 200 pounds. After the demise of the buffalo, white canvas was used on tepees as it was available and lightweight. These white dwellings could be seen on reservations until the time of World War II, when the government started providing reservation Indians with houses.
Because of the availability of salmon, Northwest Indians did a lot of fishing. They'd travel upstream on the Snake River to the mouths of small rivers, such as the Payette and Weiser. A fish trap was built by placing a log on the river bottom in riffles held in place by stakes driven upright. Between the upright stakes, near the top, another log was lashed in place. Small, green willows were tied to the upper and lower logs, close together, allowing water to go through but not the salmon. Large, coned-shaped baskets were placed in the water upstream from the willow dam and held in place by rocks. The fish would swim into the baskets, which were lifted out and contents emptied on shore. It was a cold task and those working in cold water would have to warm up on shore afterwards by jumping up and down. This amused many on-lookers.
On shore the fish were split through the back to remove the backbone, then hung by the tail to dry. Small willows were inserted to spread the sides apart so they could be smoked over a fire.
A small cake, called Pemmican, was made from long, thin strips of meat (jerky) that had been dried and pulverized. The powdered meal was mixed with wild berries, such as service berries and fat, then dried. It was a high-protein food that could be stored for months. Some tribes would store dried meat, corn, fruit and vegetables in large jugs in the ground.
When the reservations were set up, barrels of salt pork were distributed. Army posts got large shipments, also. Army generals, who were in charge of reservations, figured that what was good for the Army was good enough for the Indians. They found out that salt pork made the Indians sick and they wouldn't eat it.
Every few years, hordes of large crickets invaded areas of the west. There was a demand for pork to sell to the Army, so some early settlers would drive their pigs to where the insects were devouring the foliage. The pigs got fat. In areas not overrun by pigs, Indians with scoop up the crickets and thread them on long rye grass straws. After drying, they were pounded into a powder and boiled over a campfire they said it was tasty, but to each his own.