Willow trees are sturdy, well anchored trees growing along river banks or near streams, lakes and ponds. Native Americans recognized many useful medicinal and technological qualities of the willow tree. This chemical is the active ingredient in common aspirin. Native Americans chewed or boiled a tea from the willow's leaves or inner bark to relieve fever or other minor pain like toothaches, headaches, or arthritis. Aside from medicine, Native Americans developed many technological applications for willow.
Willow branches are straight, pliable and flexible.
Because of these sturdy qualities, the branches provide excellent an excellent raw material for making a multitude of items. Many Native American groups used willow to make their arrow shafts. Drawing or painting by Native Americans sometimes used a brush made by bruising the end of a willow twig. Willow has also been used by Peoples such as the Kiowa and Blackfoot to make backrests with parallel branches bound together with sinew threads and hung from a tripod. The Arapaho people made a veritable bed by attaching a willow backrest to a platform raised a foot off the ground.