Wendy Louise Wilson was born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1956, and grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She earned a degree in natural resources from the University of Michigan, then headed the Ecology Center of Ann Arbor for five years. In 1984, she became executive director of the Idaho Conservation League (ICL) in Boise, Idaho. In the late 1980s, she participated in the Friends of the Payette campaign, which prevented the construction of a dam on the Payette River. In 1990, she co-founded Idaho Rivers United and became its first executive director. Around 2000, she joined the River Network, a national environmental organization, then served as executive director of Idaho-based Advocates for the West from 2013 to 2015. From 2016 to 2019, she was executive director of the Snake River Alliance, which advocates for clean energy in Idaho.

Sources: Vital records on Ancestry.com; information provided by Wilson in her interview; “Wendy Wilson named executive director of Snake River Alliance,” by IBR staff, Idaho Business Review, September 20, 2016 (accessed November 2025), https://idahobusinessreview.com/2016/09/20/wendy-wilson-named-executive-director-of-snake-river-alliance/; Snake River Alliance newsletters, Winter 2018 and Summer 2019 (accessed November 2025), https://snakeriveralliance.org/newsletters/

In 1990, the Washington State Historical Society, Portland State University, and Washington State University Vancouver formed the Center for Columbia River History (CCRH) to promote research, education, and public programs about the Columbia River Basin. The center operated for more than 20 years. Among its work was the Columbia River Basin Project (CRBP), an umbrella project supported by a 1997 grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The CRBP included online exhibits, oral histories, and high school curricula about the history of the region's land, wildlife, and people.

As part of the project, CCRH partnered with the Oregon Historical Society Research Library’s oral history program, headed by Jim Strassmaier, to gather interviews. Oral Historian Michael O’Rourke spearheaded the Northwest Power Planning Council Oral History Series, while Oral Historian Clark Hansen oversaw the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series, with aid from two Portland State University research assistants, Dannette Rowe and Tania Hyatt. In addition, CCRH conducted oral history interviews for a third project, Columbia Communities, and later donated the interview recordings and transcripts to the OHS Research Library, where they are designated SRC 1.

The Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series culminated in 59 interviews (approximately 184 recorded hours) conducted between 1998 and 2001. Interviewees included Native people, activists, farmers, conservationists, fishers, and others who contributed to the shaping of policies that have had, and continue to have, significant impacts on the Columbia River Basin in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and British Columbia. The interviewees opposed policies by agencies such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Bonneville Power Administration, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and advocated for alternative visions of management and use of the Columbia River.

Sources: “Voices of the Columbia,” by Bryan White, PSU Magazine, Fall 1998, Page 17; Center for Columbia River History brochure, undated (circa 2000); Center for Columbia River History website (accessed July 10, 2025), https://columbiariverhistory.org/; email correspondence with Donna Sinclair, 2025; email correspondence with Tania Hyatt, 2025; Oregon Historical Society Research Library internal documentation.