Location? Location? Location?

As a writer with a considerable interest in history, I spend a great deal of my time on research.  I look for source materials to verify foggy facts and I hunt for corroborating “evidence” when there are discrepancies in the historic record.  In addition, I also read with avidity about the process that other writers of history use.  It’s not always a pretty picture.

In early January, for instance, there was a guest column in the Chinook Observer by Rex Ziak of Naselle who skyrocketed to national attention at the time of the Lewis and Clark bicentennial.  His “claim to fame” was his ‘discovery’ of heretofore unknown sites right here in Pacific County that were important in the Corps of Discovery’s eighteen-day stay on this side of the Columbia in 1805.  About his research process he wrote:

Back in December 1991 I stumbled upon a curious “mathematical problem” while looking into local Lewis and Clark history.  I happened to notice that William Clark said they had arrived within view of the ocean on Nov, 7; later he tells us they arrived at Fort Clatsop on Dec, 7.  The distance between these two places measures approximately18 miles.  Naturally I could not help but wonder, ‘Why’?

What I wondered was how Mr. Ziak could seriously write that paragraph. Happened to notice.  Where?  He doesn’t cite his source, but I’d like to assume he was reading the best source available which should have been the Journals of Lewis and Clark in one of their several editions.

Moffitt House Press, 2002

But, if that was the case, why does he end the paragraph with Why? and spend the next paragraph posing questions like Why did Lewis and Clark spend one entire month traveling such a short distance? and Where did they go?  The Journals clearly answer those questions.  In their day-by-day entries the journal writers talk about their struggles with the weather, their exploration of the area, their interaction with the Indians, their uncertainties about where to spend the winter, and much more.

Or perhaps Mr. Ziak is simply posing those questions for the benefit of his readers… so that it will seem that he ferreted out the answers all on his own.  That is probably uncharitable of me.  So, back to that very interesting paragraph and the statements concerning Fort Clatsop.

Did I not know better, I would think from Mr. Ziak’s column that Lewis and Clark were recalcitrant in not meeting a predetermined deadline at a well-known destination.  His implication seems to be that a place called Fort Clatsop was holding a reservation for them.  Never mind that their instructions from President Jefferson were …to explore the Missouri river, & such principal stream of it, as, by its course & communication with the water of the Pacific ocean may offer the most direct & practicable water communication across this continent, for the purposes of commerce and by reading the Journals Mr. Ziak would not have needed to ponder his “mathematical problem.”  They had no preset destination; they were still exploring.

I hasten to say that I read the entire column several times and that there were many more statements that were disturbing – not so much from a research perspective but from a consideration of professionalism and good taste.  I’m surprised that no one else has spoken out in defense of truth and fairness but I am well aware that Mr. Ziak is considered the Poster Boy for Local Lewis & Clark Lore.

Later in his column, Mr. Ziak states that he is not a trained historian. (Nor am I.) According to the credits at the end of the article, however, he has been presented with numerous awards for historic research and preservation.  (I have not.)  So it is probably presumptuous of me to be critical.  My name will no doubt be mud… just like that kid who said the emperor was naked.