The Story of How Jennie Riggs and Frank Norwest Knew They Were Family (Part two)

Series: Beyond the Paper Trail: Unlocking Jennie McKay’s Roots in Oregon History

← Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 → 

When you start digging into Pacific Northwest genealogy, certain surnames keep popping up like structural pillars in the old community archives. One of those names is Norwest.

As I’ve spent countless hours staring at our DNA matches and trying to map how we fit together—especially seeing how those matches descend right down through two of Frank Norwest’s children—the big question always comes back to: How are we connected?

Frank Norwest Second in from the Left. Grand Ronde, 1909. 

The History Behind the Name

Tracking the Norwest surname can present quite a puzzle if you rely solely on standard paper trails. As my cousin Sam pointed out, the name itself has deep roots in the early economic and social engine of the region: "Norwest" originated from the men who worked for the North West Fur Company, originally known as "Nor'westers" before the name eventually shortened and formalized over generations.

When you look at the roots of families like the Norwest's—such as Tyequariche Norwest and Judith Walla Walla in the tree—you find a multi-ethnic, deeply interwoven world. 

These lines represent the classic tapestry of early Oregon: French-Canadian, Iroquois, and Scottish fur trade employees intermarrying with Indigenous women from regional tribes like the Walla Walla and Chinook.

When you look deeper into how these family lines intersect—especially with our connection pointing most strongly toward the lower Chinook lineage—the puzzle pieces fall entirely into place. Because French-Canadian, Iroquois, and Scottish employees frequently married into Chinook and other regional families, it created a tight-knit community pool where kinship and geographic proximity went hand in hand.

A Web of Kinship

1910's Leo Norwest sitting, Alpheus Norwest standing. 

You can see how those bonds echoed down through the decades in unexpected places—like a 1950s Salem newspaper clipping capturing Abraham Tom (Jennie's grandson) and Leo Norwest (son of Frank Norwest) crossing paths in an automobile crash. Long before anyone took a DNA test, these families were living side-by-side because the deep historical ties ran in their blood.

Pictured in this 1950s Salem newspaper clipping are Abraham Tom (Jennie's grandson) and Leo Norwest (son of Frank Norwest), capturing how deeply intertwined these families remained generations down the line as they lived and built their lives in Salem.

What the DNA Tells Us

Today, when our DNA matches light up across multiple children of Frank Norwest, it’s not a coincidence. It is the genetic echo of those fur trade networks and early Oregon communities.

Unraveling the Norwest line reminds us that our ancestors didn't live in isolation. They were part of a massive, moving historical wave that shaped the Pacific Northwest—and tracing those threads helps bring our own family story sharply into focus.

Handwritten family tree mapping the descent from Tyequariche Norwest and Judith Walla Walla down through Frank Norwest, highlighting the six shared DNA matches and branching lines.  (living family member names redacted for privacy)

The DNA Mystery: How the Riggs-Tom Line Connects to the Norwests

If you look at the family tree, you won't see the surname Norwest in our direct line of ancestors. Yet, across shared DNA match lists, there is a distinct cluster of 11 to 17 cM shared segments connecting down from direct descendants of the Norwest family.

How is this possible without carrying the Norwest name? The answer lies higher up the tree hidden in shared bloodlines from the early 1800s.

1. Oral History Was the "DNA Test" of Their Time

Long before modern genetic testing, Tribal communities maintained flawless oral genealogies. Elders tracked multi-generational connections to protect family legacies, prevent close marriages, and pass down hereditary rights. As a recognized Traditional Knowledge Keeper at Grand Ronde, Jennie McKay-Riggs knew these lineages by heart.

This wasn't just community lore: in a documented 1934 interview, Frank Norwest explicitly stated that Jennie Riggs was his cousin—proving that the exact kinship network we see in our DNA matches today was already a matter of spoken history a century ago.

Jennie McKay-Riggs—Traditional Knowledge Keeper,
 daughter of Dr. William 'Billy' Cameron McKay,
 and a vital bridge in our shared Pacific Northwest heritage.

2. They Shared History and Reservation Life

As contemporaries on the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Reservation, Jennie and Frank lived through the shared trauma of the 1856 forced removals from their ancestral riverways. When communities are uprooted, existing family ties become vital. Jennie and Frank would have constantly cross-referenced their elite maternal backgrounds—Chief Comcomly's Chinook line and Chief Tamatapam's Walla Walla line—as a matter of shared heritage and mutual respect.

3. A Much Closer Connection

Specifically, our lineages trace back through the following ancestral branches: While a 4th or 5th cousin DNA match feels distant to us today, it was much closer to them. To us, Chief Comcomly and Chief Tamatapam are 18th-century historical figures; to Jennie and Frank, they were direct grandfathers. 

Jennie’s relationship with her father was unique; Dr. William "Billy" McKay and her mother shared only a brief relationship before the forced removal to Grand Ronde left Jennie to be raised by her mother and aunt. Her youth was marked by intense displacement and severe hardship—including being torn from her Klickitat relatives, losing her mother, and suffering further trauma when her aunt sold her off. Having a father who walked in a different community meant she was separated from the day-to-day presence of those ancestral roots.   Yet, even through that forced displacement and silence, this information stayed safely with her.

It is remarkable that this history wasn't lost! When Jennie stated she was related to Frank Norwest, she wasn't guessing; she carried the deep knowledge of the heritage that connected her back to the roots forged along the Columbia River. Our modern DNA match results simply provide the genetic validation of what Jennie and Frank already openly talked about on the reservation over a century ago.

Where the DNA Connects: The Upper Lineage

Because 11–17 cM matches indicate 4th to 5th cousins (or variations like 4th cousins twice removed), our families do not connect through a recent marriage. Instead, the biological link traces back to the powerful Chinook families of the lower Columbia River:

• The Riggs-Tom Upper Line: Tracing back through Jennie McKay-Riggs, the lineage connects to her father, Dr. William "Billy" Cameron McKay. Dr. McKay was born to T-Ikul "Timmee" (Cincola)—a direct daughter of the prominent Chief Comcomly of the Lower Chinook.

• The Norwest Upper Line: Descendants of the Norwest family trace their line back through Deanna Rae Norwest, Marcellus Jr., Marcellus Sr., and Leander "Leo" Norwest to Frank Norwest. Frank’s mother was Charlotte (Monique), who was deeply rooted in parallel Chinookan and Walla Walla bloodlines.

Pictured here is Marcellus Norwest Sr.—a veteran whose legacy lives on through the annual Marcellus Norwest Sr. Memorial Veterans Powwow at Grand Ronde, and the direct ancestor through whom my DNA matches descend today. 

The Takeaway

Before the 1856 forced removal to the Grand Ronde Reservation, the Columbia River, French Prairie, and Willamette Falls tribal families were deeply interconnected. Those tiny 11–17 cM segments are ancient ancestral threads passed down from that shared regional pool, surviving over 200 years to keep us connected to our Norwest cousins today.

Mapping the ancient Chinook and Walla Walla connections across Grand Ronde lineages

Page from Walking in the Great Circle

When you look at how the Lower Chinook and Walla Walla communities operated in the late 1700s and early 1800s along the Columbia River, that genetic overlap isn't an accident—it is the natural result of how societies were built.

  Marriage wasn't just about two people falling in love; it was a deliberate, high-stakes diplomatic and economic strategy. Elite families sealed alliances, secured trade routes, and bound communities together through careful intermarriage across tribal lines.

Because of these enduring kinship networks, people sharing that specific gene pool weren't isolated strangers—they were part of a closely woven, interconnected regional family. When the reservation era later forced these communities together at Grand Ronde, they didn't need a DNA kit to tell them they were related; they already knew the lineage by heart.

When you put these pieces together, Jennie McKay’s background sits right at the intersection of Comcomly’s Lower Chinook leadership and the regional networks shared with families like the Norwest's. When people ask how the Norwest's are connected to the Riggs and McKay families, the answer bridges both sides of the Columbia River: they share common descent from the elite leadership and extended kinship networks of the Lower Chinook and Walla Walla nations.

Through generations of high-level intermarriage, fur trade alliances, and shared community life—first along the river corridors and later gathered at Grand Ronde—families like the Norwest's and the McKay's weren't just neighbors; they were close collateral kin.

Modern DNA matching isn't rewriting history—it's simply providing the genetic receipt for what oral history and documentation in Living in the Great Circle have always maintained: those tiny matching segments survived centuries of displacement because the cultural bonds of these communities were too strong to ever truly break.

Sources:

Olson, June L. Living in the Great Circle: The Grand Ronde Indian Reservation 1855–1905. Meadowlark Publishing Services / A. Menard, 2011.

Norwest, Frank. Interview by [Interviewer/Project Name, e.g., Northwest Indian History Project], 1934.

"Five Injured, Cars Wrecked In South River Road Crash." Newspaper article, Page 5. Salem, Marion, Oregon, USA, 13 Nov. 1950.