Much of the history of the Sheep Eaters emanates from archeological and ethnographic research. Many scholars believe their origins are in the Great Basin, though that continues to be debated. Trappers like Osborne Russell were among the first Euro-Americans to leave written accounts about the Sheep Eaters. Russell noted that a group of about 22 Sheep Eaters he met were “neatly clothed in dressed deer and Sheep skins of the best quality and seemed to be perfectly contented and happy … [They had] about 30 dogs on which they carried their skins, clothing, provisions etc on their hunting excursions. They were well armed with bows and arrows pointed with obsidian…” Early descriptions provide useful information, but they also often encouraged stereotypes. For example, Philetus Norris, Superintendent of Yellowstone National Park in 1877, described the Sheep Eaters as “vanished” and “hermits." The Sheep Eaters domesticated dogs they used to carry packs and pull travois. Their name came from their main source of food, Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep, which the dogs may have assisted in hunting. Pots and pipes carved from steatite represent another distinguishing characteristic of Sheep Eater culture. The Sheep Eaters participated in the Rocky Mountain fur trade from the 1820s through the 1850s. During the 1870s, the Lemhi Valley Agency was created to oversee the removal of the Sheep Eaters, Bannocks, and Shoshones to Lemhi Valley in central Idaho. In 1880, they began to be relocated to Fort Hall, but some Sheep Eaters remained in Yellowstone, eventually joining the Eastern Shoshones on the Wind River Reservation. Idaho censuses continued to list Sheep Eaters as a distinct group through the early part of the twentieth century. It is important to note that the Sheep Eaters did not “vanish” or go extinct as Norris and others described. Today, some of the Sheep Eater descendants live on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming and the Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho. In 2023, the town of Jackson, Wyoming issued a land acknowledgement concerning the Sheep Eaters:
- We recognize that the land we are gathering on is the ancestral homeland of the Mountain Shoshone People who stewarded it for thousands of years and that many other tribes also lived upon and cared for this area … With gratitude, we honor Indigenous peoples, past and present. We also acknowledge the sovereignty of the Native nations closest to Jackson whose land was taken through broken treaties that resulted in the creation of the Wind River and Fort Hall Indian Reservations. We recognize this acknowledgement is simply a first step. The Town of Jackson is committed to continued and informed action to connect with Indigenous people.