The Steilacoom are a Coast Salish people whose historic lands are near the current town of Steilacoom, southwest of Tacoma. The Steilacoom consisted of five bands: Steilacoom, Sastuck, Spanaway, Tilhlow, and Segwallitchew. Unlike many of their neighbors the Steilacoom did not live near a glacier-fed river, but on land featuring a group of lakes and creeks. The Steilacoom were affected by settlers earlier than most other Indigenous peoples in Washington. Settlers encroached on their land starting in the 1830s, and the first incorporated town north of the Columbia River was in Steilacoom territory. In 1854, Steilacoom leaders signed the Medicine Creek Treaty and ceded their land to the United States. The US government expected Steilacoom land to be heavily populated with settlers and so did not assign the Steilacoom a reservation. Instead, the Steilacoom were assigned to live on neighboring reservations. Many refused to leave, however, and have remained on their historic lands. The Steilacoom Tribe is not federally recognized.

Steilacoom John was a leader of the Steilacoom Tribe and a son of Ce-col-quin, a signer of the 1854 Medicine Creek Treaty. In this photograph, John and his wife Goe-lit-sah (also called Anna or Annie) are seated in front of their home with a basket and other household items. This image is a stereograph – two nearly identical images printed together to produce a 3D effect when seen through a special viewer. A caption on the image describes John and Annie as "Siwash Indians." The term "Siwash" was once used as a general term for Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest, but it is now considered derogatory.

Caption on image: "Steilacoom John and Annie. (Siwash Indians)" ; "Views of the Cascade Mountains, Puget Sound, and the Pacific Northwest." ; "Copyrighted, 1905, by J.A. Blosser, Snohomish, Wash."

Caption information source: "Steilacoom Tribe History," retrieved from http://steilacoomtribe.blogspot.com/2009/01/history.html.
Caption information source: "Summary under the criteria and evidence for proposed finding Steilacoom Tribe of Indians," Bureau of Indian Affairs, retrieved from https://www.bia.gov/sites/default/files/dup/assets/as-ia/ofa/petition/011_steila_WA/011_pf.pdf