Photo courtesy of Gene Dixon/Pullman Chamber of Commerce

The Palouse region of southeastern Washington is known for its gently rolling hills of wheat and other crops. Depending on who you ask, Palouse Country stretches from southern Spokane County in the north down to the Snake River or even into Walla Walla County in the south. The region also stretches east into Idaho. The area includes many small agriculture-based communities, such as Rosalia, St. John, Tekoa, Colfax and Palouse. Of course, it’s also where Pullman and WSU are located, as any loyal Coug will proudly tell you.

Palouse (pronounced puh-LOOS) was the name of a Native American tribe that inhabited the region. According to the book “Washington State Place Names,” scholars speculate that the original Indian name for the tribe – Palus, Palloatpallah, or Pelusha – was converted by the French-Canadian fur traders to the more familiar French word pelouse, meaning “ground covered with short, thick grass.” The result of the transliteration was palouse.

To learn more about the Palouse region, go here and here .