Pierce County is located just 30 miles south of Seattle and about the same north of the state capital of Olympia. It is the 2nd most populous county in the state. It is also home to the Puyallup Indian Tribe one of the most commercially successful Native American communities in the country. Pierce County has been recognized as one of the most livable communities in the nation. To the north lie the beckoning waters of Puget Sound and to the south stand the glacier slopes of 14,410 ft Mount Rainier. In between waits world-class restaurants, renowned museums, zoos, theaters, beautiful lakes, rivers, trails, shopping, and galleries.

The Puyallup River flows from the slopes of Mount Rainier and enters Puget Sound in a broad delta at the head of Commencement Bay. For millennia the Puyallups lived along the river embracing a semi-nomadic and tribal lifestyle with governmental organization and land ownership unknown concepts in their culture. When the first white settlers arrived in 1852, there were several extended family groups living on the delta with the hills that would one day be Tacoma to the west. The natives fished, hunted, and trapped and never had to go far to fulfill their village needs. They called this inland sea “Whulge”, or big saltwater and the mountain in the sky “Tacobet”, mother of waters.