especially the Haida, Kwakwaka'wakw, and Tlingit, which were intensified by the first fur traders and the steady influx of arms, may have done considerable damage to the trade in some years. What economic changes the looted people led to among the northern tribes seems to have been little explored. Europeans and Americans First contacts and mass deaths The first contacts with Europeans occurred among the southernmost Salish tribes. Here, two Spanish ships appeared in 1775, at least one of which, the Santiago led by Bruno de Hezeta, probably introduced smallpox to the Quinault. This catastrophic smallpox epidemic is estimated to have cost the lives of at least one-third of the Pacific Coast Indians; among the Salish in what is now the United States, the losses were probably much higher, so high that they could hardly defend themselves against raids by the initially less affected peoples from the north. Again and again the disease flared up, as in 1790, when the visit of a ship led by the Spaniard Manuel Quimper to the Beecher Bay First Nation transmitted the disease; among the Lower Elwha Klallam alone, at least 335 skeletons were found at Tse-whit-zen in 2005. Overland trade soon played as large a role in the spread as it did in transmission by the crews of fur trader ships. Thus, among the inland Salish of the Flathead, Spokane, and Coeur d'Alene living in the backcountry, a "great disease" occurred in 1807 to 1808, but it is not until the epidemic of 1853 that it can be said with certainty that it was smallpox. Other important trade goods were otter and beaver pelts, fish oil and fat (especially the buttery fat of the candlefish), but also timber for the plank houses and for the forts of the fur trading companies. In addition, there were blankets, some of which were made from the hair of goats, around the Juan de Fuca Strait also often from the specially kept dogs. Dogs were probably kept like flocks of sheep and provided white and dark fibers for blankets, mats, baskets, and clothing that were widely traded. With the severance of numerous trade contacts, blankets became an important commodity soon traded by the Hudson's Bay Company. They were also offered as barter for abandoned land when reservations were established. The raiding and pillaging campaigns of the tribes living north of the Salish, especially the Haida, Kwakwaka'wakw, and