People of the White Wolf : Okanagan Grand Chief N'Kwala and the Interior Salish Alliance

Grand Chief of the Okanagan for five decades during the time of first contact, N'Kwala led his people and allied nations through wars, treaty-making, and geopolitical intrigue. He was a fearsome war chief, heir of the enormously influential Pelkamulox Dynasty, and the charismatic ruler of the Interior Plateau.

Yet, until now, there has never been a substantial biography of the Grand Chief, nor a history of his time. Craig E. Jones combines original written sources from the early fur trade with the recorded oral histories of Indigenous peoples in the region to build a fascinating narrative about a time after contact but before colonization.

People of the White Wolf provides a rich portrait of a complicated and conflicted leader and sheds some light on the nature of the entities we call First Nations. Through N'Kwala, Jones explores their political frameworks and legal institutions and the extraordinary relationships of trust and collaboration their leaders had with the first whites. This history holds out the possibility that perhaps reconciliation is not something that needs to be invented, so much as remembered.