In 1855, Shoalwater Bay chiefs refused to sign the Chehalis River Treaty, believing it gave them too small an amount of land to call home. Eleven years later, in 1866, President Andrew Johnson established the Shoalwater Bay Reservation by executive order. It was located in northwestern Pacific County west of Tokeland. When the reservation was visited in 1875 by an Indian agent, he reported that only two families were living there: Lighthouse Charley and his brother — who was believed to be Toke — described by James Swan 20 years earlier as “Men of a great deal of importance among the Indians.”

Lighthouse Charley was appointed chief of the Shoalwater Bay Tribe in 1876, and served his people until 1889, when he drowned in the Columbia River. After the establishment of the Shoalwater Bay Reservation, the few Indians who had chosen to live there moved onto the land reserved for them. The Superintendent of Indian Affairs later opened the reservation rights to all the Indians who lived around Shoalwater Bay. Traditionally, residents of the area called the settlement “Georgetown.” Some still do.