The Dalles Daily Chronicle The Dalles, Oregon August 26, 1931 INDIAN TOO OLD FOR BATTLE 59 YEARS AGO STILL PEEVED, FOUND Portland, Aug. 26 (UP) Fifty-nine years ago, the white soldiers battling Captain Jacks Modoc Indians in the desolate Klamath lava bed country told Wah-mak-ana he was too old to fight. You are fifty-seven, they told him. Go sit with the old women. Now this made Wah-mak-ana very sore indeed, being an insult both to his pride and his manhood. Ill show em, he told himself, and proceeded to muscle right in on the final battle that saw Captain Jack defeated. Now 106 years old and still going strong, Wah-mak-ana is still a little angry about it, he confided to the United Press today as he arose from a refreshing nights sleep on a bunk at the police station. Clad in nondescript clothing, and with a battered sombrero perched jauntily atop his gray braided hair Wah-mak-ana walked into the police station last night. His English wasnt so good, but by mixing it with his tribal tongue, the universal Indian jargon and sign language, he finally got over the idea that is looked like rain outside and that hes like to sleep inside. Proudly he presented letters to the effect he was a good Indian and a Christian. Captain Jack, the fiery Modoc Indian warrior, was quite a general, Wah-mak-ana explained. For two years, Jack and his 53 warriors outwitted a pursuing army of 1,000 federal soldiers. The Modocs killed 65 white men, and suffered only 13 casualties themselves before they were finally rounded up. Wah-mak-ana knows why he came to Portland and how long hes going to stay, but no one else does, he explained at length, but in a tongue that may have been Modoc, or perhaps Chinese. Offhand, he apologized, he couldnt think of the English for what he wanted to say. Earline, Columbia Gorge Genealogical Society http://community.oregonlive.com/cc/genealogy 78th Annual Wasco County Pioneer Association Reunion May 5 & 6, 2000 The Dalles, Oregon http://w3.gorge.net/dzopf/wcpa.htm