Whitman Mission National Historic Site

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Stewart L. Udall, Secretary
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE George B. Hartzog, Jr., Director
HISTORICAL HANDBOOK NUMBER 37
This publication is one of a series of handbooks describing the historical and archeological areas in the National Park System administered by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. It is printed by the Government Printing Office and can be purchased from the Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D.C., 20402. Price 45 cents.
By Erwin N. Thompson
National Park Service Historical Handbook Series No. 37 Washington, D.C.: 1964
here they labored among the Cayuse Indians
It is a distinct pleasure to acknowledge my indebtedness to Jack Farr, formerly with the National Park Service, and Robert L. Whitner, Whitman College, Walla Walla, Wash., who prepared the material on which most of this manuscript was based.
E. N. T.
Waiilatpu is the site of the mission founded among the Cayuse Indians in 1836 by Marcus and Narcissa Whitman. After 11 years of ministering to the Indians and assisting emigrants on the Oregon Trail, these missionaries were killed and their mission destroyed by the Indians whom they sought to help. The Whitmans’ story of devotion, nobility, and courage places them high among the pioneers who settled the Far West.
In 1836 five people—Dr. Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, the Reverend Henry and Eliza Spalding, and William H. Gray—successfully crossed the North American continent from New York State to the largely unknown land called Oregon. At Waiilatpu and Lapwai, among the Cayuse and Nez Percé Indians, they founded the first two missions on the Columbia Plateau. The trail they followed, established by Indians and fur traders, was later to be called the Oregon Trail.
Narcissa Whitman and Eliza Spalding were the first white women to cross the continent; the Whitmans’ baby, Alice Clarissa, was the first child born of United States citizens in the Pacific Northwest. These two events inspired many families to follow, for they proved that homes could be successfully established in Oregon, a land not yet belonging to the United States.