A Chief of the Multnomah Tribe

This sculpture was designed as part of a monument called The Coming of the White Man, erected in 1907 near Portland, Oregon. There is historical evidence that Multnomah was in fact the name of a great chief of the Willamettes in the 1700s. He commanded a network of more than forty other tribes in the region between the Cascade mountains and the Pacific coast. MacNeil’s depiction of the chief was widely admired, and the artist cast and sold a number of smaller statuettes based on the original.