The Daily News-May 14, 2005 Longview, Washington By Amy M. E. Fischer Tribe's matriarch exemplied what it meant to be Cowlitz-- When Evelyn Bashor Byrne's granddaughter was invited to join an all- white girl's club in Longview in the early 1960s, the Cowlitz Indian Tribe's matriarch didn't try to dissuade her. A quiet but forceful woman, Evelyn told her 13-year-old granddaughter it was wonderful that the club wanted her. But Evelyn, with her Indian features and dark hair, said she couldn't attend the club's functions because people would realize neither of them was the "proper" color. The teenager decided not to join. "She let us make our own decisions," said Evelyn's granddaughter, Geri Hogman, now 56. "She would teach you, and then you made up your own mind…She would never denounce you for not believing the way she believed." One thing Evelyn belived strongly was that the Cowlitz Tribe deserved federal recognition. She worked tirelessly for decades to see it become a reality. Evelyn was born in the Cowlitz Prairie area. Her mother, Louise Plomondon, was Cowlitz Indian. Her father, John Baptiste St. Germain, was French Canadian. Evelyn and her siblings attended school at St, Francis, a small Indian mission in the Vader area. She and her family would work in farmer's fields, harvesting hops. The family eventually moved into a floathouse on the Columbia River in Cathlamet. In 1929, Evelyn bore a daughter, Laurine Newberg, after a brief marriage. In the 1930s, Evelyn would take the Georgiana ferry to Astoria and then board a train to Portland, where she worked for Fred Meyer himself at his original store. She later waitressed at the Golden Gate restaurant on Interstate 5 and sewed police and firefighter uniforms. She met her husband, Clarence Bashor, while working in Weyerhaeuser's lumberyards during WWII. Their little house on Sandy Bend Road near Castle Rock lacked running water and electricity, and the couple would drive to town once a week to buy ice. When Clarence Bashor fell ill, they moved into an apartment above the Columbia Theatre. Evelyn managed the apartments until Bashor died in the late 1960's. In 1970, at age 62, Evelyn married Ed Byrnes. Over the next several years, she became increasingly active in the Cowlitz Tribe and fought for the tribe's federal recognition. By the time the government approved the Cowlitz Tribe's petition in 2000, Evelyn was 92. Eventually, she and her husband moved to Campus Towers. After he died in 2001, she moved to Crawford House in Kelso. Hogman relished the time she spent with her grandparents on Sandy Bend Road on weekends, recalling memories of the delicious roasts and pies Evelyn managed to cook to perfection in her wood stove. Her grandmother entertained her and her sister, Roxie Eby, with stories about the animals that roamed their hilltop. "She was the grandma, the person that was there when the world was always falling apart," said Hogman, her eyes brimming with tears. Hoggman fondly recalls the secret to her grandmother's baby- soft skin: Pond's cold cream, which Evelyn and her sisters applied to their faces every morning and night. In the final weeks of her battle with stomach cancer, Evelyn stopped doing her nightly beauty ritual. But on the night before she died, she got out of bed, sat in her chair and smoothed on the Pond's, Hogman said. As she lay dying, her pain dulled by morphine, she reached into the air and closed her fingers. Nine decades earlier in Cathlamet, Evelyn had often played baseball with her brothers and sisters. Lying in bed at Longview's Hospice care center, she told her daughter she was waiting for them to come play ball with her. "She died that night." Laurine Newburg said. It was May 1, 2005, and Evelyn was 97. Survivors include a daughter, F. Laurine Newberg; seven grand- children, Geri Hogman, Roxie Eby, Sandra Pickerall and her sister Christy, and Paul, Mike and Billy Bashor; three great-grandchildren; three great-great-grandchildren; a cousin, Sudie Clevenger; and one niece, Ruby Keating. Evelyn Mamie (St. Germain) Bashor Byrnes Burial place unknown 19 Jan 1908-01 May 2005 (As compiled by the Wahkiakum County Historical Society 2005.)