St. Joseph's Mission (Slickpoo, Idaho)

Catholic missionaries did not approach the Nez Percé until 1867, more that thirty years after Henry Spalding had begun his Presbyterian mission at Lapwai. Jesuit Fr. Joseph Cataldo found a cool reception, if not from overt anti-Catholic sentiments of Spalding's "mission band," then from the general animosity stemming from ever increasing White encroachemt on Indian lands. For his first two years in the area Cataldo had to content himself with extending his religion to the miners then filling Lewiston (Idaho). He finally performed his first Indian baptism in March 1869, in a small cabin his miners had helped him build just outside Lewiston. Though this outpost was abandoned later that same year, Cataldo's initial foray was not a complete failure. In the course of his visits to local Indian camps he had managed to convert Chief "Slickpoo" (transliteration of "Zimchiligpusse"), a latent success that would show fruition in subsequent attempts.