coulee

[Mike Cleven]

"Alan H. Hartley" wrote:
>
> Here's the OED entry:
>
> coulée. Also (U.S.) -ee, -ie, coolie, -ey.
> [a. F. coulée flow, f. couler to flow. Sense 2 appears to have arisen
> among the French trappers in the Oregon region.]
> 1. Geol. A stream of lava, whether molten or consolidated into rock; a
> lava-flow.
> 1839 Murchison Silur. Syst. i. xxxii. 428 Large stratiform and
> horizontal coulées of volcanic rock.
> 1879 Rutley Stud. Rocks iv. 32 Molten viscous lava, forming flows or
> coulées.
> 2. In the Western regions of Canada and the United States: A deep ravine
> or gulch scooped out by heavy rain or melting snow, but dry in summer.
> 1807 in Amer. State P., Publ. Lands (1832) I. 313 Bounded in front by
> the river Detroit, and in rear by a coulée or small run.
> Ibid. 346 Bounded..above by a creek (or coulée) called ventre de bœuf.
> 1860 in Bartlett Dict. Amer.
> 1881 Chicago Times 14 May, These ‘coolies’ are dry during the summer
> season, but are flooded in the spring of the year.
> 1881 N.Y. Times 18 Dec. in N. & Q. 6th Ser. V. 65/1 Every ravine short
> of an inhabitable valley is called a ‘cooley’.
> 1884 Lisbon (Dakota) Clipper 13 Mar., She [a cow] was discovered in a
> cooley.
> 1890 Harper’s Mag. Aug. 383/1 Reno came quickly to a shallow ‘cooley’
> (frontierism for gully), that led down..to the stream.
> ----
> Contrary to usual OED practice, the earliest-attested sense is not
> placed first, probably because the editors believed that sense 1. was
> clearly the primary one even though it lacked earlier attestation than
> 2. I think it's more likely that the two senses developed
> (semi-)independently from the root-meaning 'flow'.

Wouldn't we expect to find a citation of the word "coulee" from before
1807, or am I missing a date in there somewhere?  I'm thinking of the
records and journals of the HBC, both on the Prairies and in the Oregon
Territory.  Who named Grand Coulee, anyway, and when?