Tenino people

The Tenino people, commonly known today as the Warm Springs bands, comprised four local subtribes: These bands split their time between inland winter villages close to water and fuel supplies and summer camps with rich fisheries located on the south bank of the Columbia River in today's North-Central Oregon.

"[2] Up to the 19th Century the Warm Springs bands were semi-nomadic peoples, engaging neither agriculture nor the raising of domesticated food animals.

[2] The fishing of salmon, the hunting of game animals, and the gathering of wild foodstuffs were essential activities of the tribal bands.

[3] Women preserved the meat and fish for later use by drying or smoking and engaged in most of the work in collecting plant-based foods, which included berries and other fruit, roots, acorns, and pine nuts.

[2] In the summer months, generally April through October, the band would relocate to the river, where families would construct rectangular temporary dwellings with poles and mats.

[2] This ritual of the First Fish was common to most of the Native American peoples of the Pacific Northwest coast and Columbia River plateau.

[4] The fish was never to touch the ground, but was laid upon a mat made of reeds and butchered with a traditional knife before being cooked in a prescribed manner and shared by designated members of the tribal group.

[2] Following this festival the community would again divide, with half remaining to catch and smoke salmon while the others departed to gather nuts and berries and to hunt.

[2] The Tenino people were first noted by the Lewis and Clark Expedition late in October 1805, when several members of the band were recruited to help the Corps to port their boats and equipment around the impassable Celilo Falls.

[2] The Dalles Tenino, Tygh, Wyam, and Dock-Spus were effectively forced from their historic homelands to the new reservation in 1857, with the Wasco bands and other Chinookan-speaking neighbors following in 1858.

As the 20th Century came to a close the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs counted a total membership of 3,405, including descendants of the Tenino, Wasco, and Northern Paiute tribal groups.