Flathead Reservation History
The Flathead Indian Reservation in Northwestern Montana was established by the 1855 Hellgate Treaty, creating a 1.3 million-acre homeland for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT), including the Bitterroot Salish, Upper Pend D’Oreille, and Kootenai peoples. The reservation, which includes the southern half of Flathead Lake, has been inhabited for thousands of years and faced significant land loss through the 1904 Flathead Allotment Act.
The subsistence patterns of our Tribal people developed over generations of observation, experimentation and spiritual interaction with the natural world, creating a body of knowledge about the environment closely tied to seasons, locations and biology. This way of life was suffused with rich oral history and a spiritual tradition in which people respected the animals, plants and other elements of the natural environment. By learning from our Elders and teaching our children, those Tribal ways of life continue to this day.
