Old Missoula

Buffalo Saved by Walking Coyote

Other Days by John Toole

Some time in the winter of 1884-85, the body of Walking Coyote, a Pend d’Oreille Indian, was found frozen under the Higgins Avenue Bridge. Walking Coyote was dead from a monumental binge, made possible by his sale of ten buffalo for $250 each. These were probably the only buffalo on the face of the earth at this date. The millions of these animals which had roamed the plains had been systematically slaughtered by the whites for their hides and tongues.

In 1874 Walking Coyote and his tribe had traveled to Milk River for a buffalo hunt. Four calves were cut out of a herd, and in accordance with a peculiar characteristic of buffalo, pathetic to observe, followed the horses of the hunters who had either slain or separated their mothers from them. Walking Coyote took his four strange little protegees with him to St. Ignatius Mission, the calves faithfully following the ponies across the Rocky Mountains. They soon became unusually tame, and were real pets. When the heifers were four years old, each had a calf. From that time on, they increased slowly year by year until their Indian owner, finding them too great a tax on his resources, decided to dispose of them in 1884.

C. A. Allard, a rancher of the Flathead Reservation, became impressed with possibility of a profitable investment in this small herd of what was then regarded as practically an extinct animal. He interested his friend, Michel Pablo, in the scheme and bought the ten head. This sale probably saved the buffalo from extinction, since they increased rapidly under capable supervision. At length, a large herd roamed free on the Flathead Reservation. Allard and Pablo sold their animals all over the world. The large herds in Canada and Yellowstone Park all had their genesis on the Flathead. Periodic roundups provided excitement and adventure for local cowboys, and Charles M. Russell came over to participate and to illustrate the stampeding of the great beasts. About 1908 Theodore Roosevelt became interested in the herd and induced Congress to establish the National Bison Range at Moiese. Thus was this great animal preserved forever.

The photo shows one of Walking Coyote’s bulls at full maturity.

I am indebted to Jack Weidenfeller for this photo and material, as well as the story and photos on the hanging of the four Indians in last Sunday’s Missoulian.

The above article appeared in The Sunday Missoulian on March 16, 1975.

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