Tamara Hicks, age 15, of Pittsfield, Mass., for her question:

WHO WAS SACAGAWEA?

Sacagawea was a Shoshoni Indian woman who was probably born in Idaho. She was captured by members of another tribe in 1800 and sold to a Canadian trapper named Toussaint Charbonneau, and became one of his wives.

In 1804 Charbonnesu was hired as an interpreter and guide for the Western expedition of the American explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, but it was Sacagawea who proved invaluable to the explorers during their passage through western Montana and Idaho, where she saved them from destruction by the Shoshoni.

One of the two Indian wives of Charbonneau died in 1812 and was thought to be Sacagawea. However, an old Indian woman who died on a reservation in 1884 also claimed to be Sacagawea and displayed considerable knowledge of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Of the many memorials to Sacagawea, the most famous is a statue in Washington Park, in Portland, Ore. Her name is often spelled Sacajawea.