Yesteryears - Oct. 1, 2011

2006 - Tribal Elder Leon "Chip" Tom and Tribal youth Leland Butler were the featured Tribal members in a commercial promoting Spirit Mountain Community Fund. Tom also appears prominently on billboards honoring the Tribe's "tradition of giving."

2001 - An estimated 400 people attended an event at Spirit Mountain Casino to honor retiring Tribal Chairwoman Kathryn Harrison. Attendees included Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Chairwoman Sue Shaffer, State Sen. Kate Brown and former Oregon Gov. Vic Atiyeh. "You clearly passed the test," Shaffer said about Harrison's years of service to the Grand Ronde Tribe and Indian Country.

1996 - Repairs paid by a grant from the federal Highway Administration to Agency Creek Road were completed. In the Great Flood of 1996, 600 feet of the road were washed out, which was the only significant damage that occurred on the Reservation as a result of the flood.

1991 - The Oregon Native American Business & Entrepreneurial Network, a coalition of four Oregon Tribes working together to provide consistent and appropriate business counseling to Native Americans, was in the process of hiring two business consultants to work full-time with clients. The consultants would divvy up the four Tribes with one working with Grand Ronde and Siletz and the other working with Warm Springs and Klamath.

1986 - The Tribe was advertising for a Housing Coordinator to work three-quarters time for $12,000 per year while a full-time bookkeeper was being sought for an annual salary of between $11,000 and $15,000.

Yesteryears is a look back at Tribal history in five-year increments through the pages of Smoke Signals.