Dead Indian Summit
Overlook

Dead Indian Summit (elevation 8,048 feet) is a mountain pass on Chief Joseph Scenic Highway in Park County, Wyoming, between Cody and the Clarks Fork Valley. The summit and the road are named for the dramatic events of 1877, when Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce people made their extraordinary flight from the U.S. Army across 1,170 miles of mountainous terrain. The Nez Perce passed through this area during their attempted escape to Canada, fighting multiple engagements with pursuing Army forces along the way.

The Chief Joseph Scenic Highway (Wyoming Highway 296) follows portions of the Nez Perce flight route through some of Wyoming's most spectacular scenery. The highway connects Cody to Cooke City, Montana — the northeast entrance to Yellowstone — crossing the Absaroka Range through dramatic canyon and mountain terrain. Dead Indian Summit Overlook provides panoramic views of the Sunlight Basin, Clarks Fork Canyon, and the surrounding mountains that make this one of the most scenic drives in the American West.

The naming of geographic features after Indigenous peoples, sometimes using terms now considered offensive, reflects layers of American history that communities are actively reconsidering. Wyoming has numerous places with Indigenous names, some respectful and some that preserve language of a different era. The Dead Indian Summit name has been discussed for potential renaming, as has been the case with similar place names across the American West. Whatever the name, the landscape itself bears witness to one of the most dramatic and tragic episodes in the history of the American West — the dispossession and pursuit of the Nez Perce people.