Klamath History 8,000 B.C. to Present

10,000 years ago

The Wisconsin Ice Age having ended about 2,000 years earlier, the climate in the Klamath Basin becomes generally similar to today's climate. Early peoples inhabit areas throughout what we now call the Pacific Northwest.

7,500 years ago

11,000 foot tall Mount Mazama erupts 50 miles north of Klamath Lake. In a blast 42 times greater than Mount Saint Helens it covers the Klamath Basin in a deep blanket of pumice ash. Today we know Mazama as Crater Lake.

5,000 B.C.

Early evidence of settlements around Lower Klamath Lake. The archaeological records points to more or less continuous inhabitation of the area for 7,000 years, up until the present day. (Download Klamath River Canyon Prehistory and Ethnology)

4,000 B.C.

Seed cultivation by early inhabitants begins

600 B.C.

Early evidence of fishing by native people in the region

1500 A.D.

More than 6,000 years after first arriving in the Klamath Basin, native people flourish around the river, lakes and wetlands - fishing and hunting animals and birds, and creating pottery and figurines. This example of thousands of years of sustainable living in an area of extreme biological importance - never mind the fact that it was a natural paradise to boot - is under-recognized in light of today's problems in the Basin.

1810

The land that will become the Klamath Refuges is still foreign territory, claimed by Spain.

1826

First European contact with Modoc people around Tule Lake.

1848

The land that will become the Klamath Refuges becomes part of the United States after the Mexican-American war. Mexico cedes about 15% of the current U.S. territory under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and is paid $15 million by the U.S.

Above entries written by Brett Cole. All remaining entries are excerpted from "Refuges and Reclamation," Doug Foster, Oregon Historical Society, unless noted (*)

1860

U.S. Swamp Land Act (extended to Oregon) - Allows the state to acquire title to public wetlands and supervise their reclamation. This law had been extended to California in 1850.

1864

U.S. Govt. signs the Council Grove treaty with the Klamath, Modoc and Yahooskin Indians, in which they give up their territory and are moved to an area on the North shore of Upper Klamath Lake.

1870

Oregon Swamp Land Act - Allows citizens to acquire title to wetlands by reclaiming them for agricultural use. A similar law had been passed in California in the 1850s.

1872-3

A group of Modoc refuse to re-settle to the new reservation, which is on Klamath land. Led by Kientpoos, or "Captain Jack," they rasie the ire of the government and a series of violent confrontations lead to the Modoc War. Captain Jacks' men eventually turn him. He and other Modocs are hung or sent to Alcatraz.

1902

Federal Reclamation Act - Authorizes the interior secretary to develop irrigation and hydropower projects in 17 western states and establishes the Reclamation Service (later renamed the Bureau of Reclamation) to turn "unproductive" land into small family farms.

1903

Reclamation Service engineers begin studies for a large reclamation project in the Klamath Basin.

1903

President Roosevelt establishes the first federal wildlife refuge, at Pelican Island, Florida.

1905

Oregon and California Cession Acts - Convey title to the beds of Tule Lake and Lower Klamath Lake to the federal government for purposes of the Reclamation Act

1908

Executive Order No. 924 - President Roosevelt creates Klamath Lake Reservation (later renamed the Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge), desgnating 81,619 acres of lake and surrounding marshland as a “preserve for breeding birds.” (Private citizens had already filed claims to about a third of the refuge area under the state swamp land acts.

1911

Warren Act - Amends Reclamation Act, allowing sale of water to farmers outside a federal reclamation project, provided each farmer irrigates no more than 160 acres.

1912

Reclamation Service completes damming of Lost River, cutting off Tule Lake’s main supply of water. The lake begins to dry up.

1915

Klamath Drainage District established - Swampland owners organize under Oregon law to collectively develop drainage and irrigation works and to contract with the federal government.

1915

Executive Order 2202 - President Wilson withdraws over 7,000 acres from the refuge, making the land available for homesteading.

1917

Klamath Drainage District signs contract with Reclamation Service and agrees to repay over $100,000 of reclamation survey costs in exchange for shutting off the water supply to Lower Klamath Lake to facilitate reclamation and farming. Within a few years, the lake is dry.

1920

Raker Act - Allows homesteading on Lower Klamath Refuge lands valuable chiefly for agriculture, if reclamation survey costs are repaid. No land passed into private ownership under the act.

1921

The Klamath Drainage District and the federal government sign a contract for the sale of Klamath Irrigation Project water to the district (allowing irrigation of about 27,000 acres of land.

1928

Executive Order 4975 - President Coolidge designates 10,300 acres of Tule Lake sump as a federal wildlife refuge.

1936

Executive Order 7341 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt more than triples the size of the Tule Lake wildlife refuge, to 37,000 acres.

1942

Reclamation Service completes construction of a tunnel to carry excess agricultural runoff from Tule Lake sump to the dry bed of Lower Klamath Lake. The lower portion of the lakebed is reflooded and becomes a productive bird refuge.

1942-1946

Japanese Americans are imprisoned at the Tule Lake Camp, the largest and most controversial WWII Japanese Internment camp, with a peak population of almost 19,000 people. Photos (*)

1954

Klamath Termination Act - Terminates federal recognition of and government services to the Klamath Tribes. The U.S. acquires 800,000 acres of Klamath tribal land.

1956

Tule Lake Irrigation District established - Homesteaders organize under California law to manage parts of the Klamath Project that service their farms.

1964

Kuchel Act - Provides that 21,000 acres of refuge land within the Klamath Reclamation Project be managed for waterfowl and leased for farming; prohibits further homesteading; moves management of refuge land under the secretary of the interior. (Download the Kuchel Act)

1966

Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge is placed on National Register of Historic Places.

1973

Endangered Species Act - Provides for the conservation of ecosystems upon which threatened and endangered fish, wildlife, and plant species depend, both through federal action and by encouraging the establishment of state programs.

1983

Federal appeals court rules that the Klamath Indians hold in-stream water rights to support their hunting and fishing rights on over 800,000 acres within their former reservation. Almost all of this land, now part of Winema National Forest, lies in the watershed that generates irrigation water for most project farms.

1986

Federal legislation “restores” the Klamath Tribes. The Tribes file a petition to have two indigenous species of suckers listed under the Endangered Species Act. Two years later the fish are listed.

1999

FWS finds that diverting scarce water from wetlands harms the refuges.*

2001

Federal government cuts off water to 90 percent of the farmers in the Klamath Reclamation Project in order to maintain higher water levels to protect endangered fish.

2002

The Bush administration FWS rescinds a 1999 decision that found that diverting scarce water from wetlands harmed the refuges. The FWS instead announces that it will give priority to commercial agriculture within the refuges, even if the refuges' marshes run dry.*

2002

Ten conservation groups file suit in Federal Court to end commercial agriculture on the Klamath Basin Refuges.* (Download the filing)

RETURN TO TOP | Download this text in a Word file (doc)