Two Centuries of Lewis and Clark: Reflections on the Voyage of Discovery by William L. Lang, Carl Abbott, Roberta Conner, Christopher Zinn

Abstract

not adequately explained, and there is little mention of the inter-and intratribaldisputes overwho could fishatCelilo,which was a "usual and accustomed place" ? as fishing siteswere identifiedin the treaties ? foronly some of the people who ultimatelyclaimed rightsthere. The treaty fisheryand thecommunityboth survived the dam, although in diminished form, and theirpersistence deservesmore attention than itreceiveshere.To be fair, Cone's documentary ismore awork of advocacy than of history. It asksviewers to reconsider theColumbia's future aswell as itspast, offeringa useful introduction forsecondary school and college teachers look ingto raise the issueof riverdevelopment. One merely wishes thatCone had told the storyina more compelling way. Andrew Fisher The College of William andMary, Williamsburg TWO CENTURIES OF LEWIS AND CLARK:REFLECTIONS ON THE VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY by William L. Lang andCarlAbbott with a conversation with Roberta Conner and ChristopherZinn Oregon Historical Society Press, Portland, 2004. Photographs, notes, bibliography, index. 158pages. $18.00 paper. The number of new Lewis and Clark books published during the bicentennial would fill a large bookcase. What sets Two Centuries of Lewis and Clark apart from the crowd is that two leading historians of the West assess the long-term significance of theExpedition. The introductory chapterby William L. Lang, pro fessor of history at Portland StateUniversity, dissects the well-known celebratory narra tive to ask questions about what it meant for the new nation represented by Jeffersonian America to explore a foreign country domi nated by various Indian nations living along theMissouri, Snake, and Columbia rivers. In particular,Lang directs readers' attention to the diplomacy of Lewis and Clark. In the end, Lang reaffirmsthat"the signifi cance of the Lewis and Clark Expedition and its personnel is an open and contested matter. Those who find it preeminently a story of adventure, achievement, and nationalistic ac complishment have plentyofdrama to support theirviewpoint. Those who see it as part of a long history of paternalistic and damaging engagementswith Indian people in theNorth west can cite incidentupon incidentwhere the explorers appear arrogant and dismissive of native peoples" (p. 56). Carl Abbott, professor of urban studies and planning atPortland StateUniversity,examines the significanceof theExpedition fromtheper spectiveof theLewis and Clark Exposition, the world's fairheld inPortland to commemorate thecentennial of thevoyage ofdiscovery. What he finds is that littleof the 1905 fairwas truly about Lewis and Clark. If anything, itwas a commercial exploitation of Lewis and Clark in an efforttopromote thePacificNorthwest. The Lewis and Clark Expedition servedmerely as a way to direct popular attention to the region and its claims of greatness. Boosterism ran rampant inOregon and Washington at the start of thetwentiethcentury,and so thenarrative of theLewis and Clark Expedition was transmuted to suit theneeds of regional promoters. Can itbe said that two centuries afterLewis and Clark, even regional boosterism has been elbowed aside by a variety of entrepreneurs determined only tomake a fast buck from anything associated with thenames Lewis and Clark and Sacagawea ? from candy bars to quickie guide books to the trail? I think itcan, with a particularly outrageous example being amap of theOregon Trail on a postcard sold to unwary tourists as a map of the route of Lewis and Clark. The thirdportion ofTwo Centuries ofLewis and Clark, and in some ways themost lively because of its conversational format, is an ex tended discussion of themeaning(s) of Lewis 4^4 OHQ vol. 107, no. 3 and Clark with Lang,Abbott, Roberta Conner, and Christopher Zinn, executivedirectorof the Oregon Council for theHumanities and for mer professor ofAmerican literature. Conner, who is amember of theConfederated Tribes of theUmatilla Indian Reservation and vice president of theNational Lewis and Clark Bi centennial Council Board ofDirectors, brings to the roundtable discussion a valuable Native American perspective thathelps explain why the Lewis and Clark commemoration (not a "celebration" for Indians, Conner is quick to explain) did not degenerate into the ugly accusations of genocide thatmarred the 1992 Columbian Quincentennial. All conversation alists agree that it isverydifficultto convey to Americans the multifaceted dimensions of the Lewis and Clark storybecause of thepopular and abiding appeal of the triumphalist nar rative. That narrative helped make Stephen Ambrose's Undaunted Courage a best seller. Two Centuries ofLewis and Clark isa valu able book forreaders already familiarwith the dominant narrative of...