Go to any of Washington’s four corners and you’ll see stunning beauty. In the northeastern part of the state, many of those gorgeous views are dominated by the mighty Columbia River.

The Columbia’s appearance has changed over the years. This 1928 shot of Kettle Falls’ Lower Falls shows how the Columbia looked before dams altered the landscape. Kettle Falls was an ancient and important salmon fishing and trading site for Native Americans. The falls were flooded in 1940 when the waters of the reservoir Lake Roosevelt rose behind Grand Coulee Dam.

The photo is part of the Crossroads on the Columbia Photograph Collection, which contains more than 500 scanned historic photographs of northeast Washington. This collection contains a variety of images taken between 1890 and 1964, with a majority of these photographs taken from 1920 to 1945. These photographs include school pictures, family albums, industrial sites, and stunning photographs of Kettle Falls.

The collection is found in the State Digital Archives.