Included were many mestizos who were part Native American and part Spanish or Mexican and mulattoes and blacks.
In addition to the relatively few people who could be considered Hispanic, having been born in Spain or of solely Spanish ancestry, the vast majority of the colonists came from Mexico, where some of their families had lived for at least two generations. 5įrom the beginning, families were sent to these outposts for the express purpose of increasing the population of Spanish citizens. Between 17, twenty missions, four presidios (forts), and three civil communities known as pueblos were built, stretching from San Diego to just north of San Francisco. Incursions by the British and Russians, and the fear that others might attempt to claim additional areas of the North American continent, motivated Spain to create a strong military and human presence along the California coast. There is, however, an abundance of written source material about the second wave of immigrants who settled the borderlands in the northernmost portion of the Spanish empire. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Although new information about Indian life in California is emerging, the complete story of their journeys and experiences has yet to be told. Other examples are available in the online collection, Edward S. 3 The illustration at the left shows one type of gathering activity. What is clear, however, is that the Indians altered the physical environment through planting, pruning, irrigating, and periodically burning vegetation and that Indian women played major and very specific roles in these activities. A map produced by August Wilhelm Kuchler, Natural Vegetation of California, in the Geography and Map Division, provides the best information available at this time regarding the native vegetation as it existed before the arrival of Spanish explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo in 1542. Our understanding of the native peoples of California is limited by the absence of written cultural artifacts, except for a few drawings on cave or canyon walls, and is further hampered by a lack of understanding of the ecology of California's landscape before European contact, which took place over several centuries. Today's wilderness was then human homeland.” 2 harbored human gathering and hunting sites, burial grounds, work sites, sacred areas, trails, and village sites.
What is labeled ‘wilderness’ in today's popular imagination. 1 A prevalent myth that the rich land was empty, ripe for colonization, is refuted by recent studies indicating that “at the time of Euro-American contact, California was more densely populated than any area of equal size in North America, north of central Mexico. The first immigrants were Native Americans who had lived in California ten to fifteen thousand years before the region was visited by Old World explorers. Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division.Īt the time Anglo-Americans began arriving in California in large numbers during the nineteenth century, they were part of the third wave of migration to the Pacific Coast. Emigrant party on the road to California. Even fewer people are aware that these women were relative latecomers to the Golden State, as California came to be known. A few might also mention that some of the women came by ship, interrupting their voyage with an arduous trek-on foot or by mule-across the Isthmus of Panama, all the while with small children in tow. The picture that comes to mind for most Anglo-Americans when women are discussed in the context of historical travels to California is that of the overland wagon trains moving westward, peopled by sturdy and daring pioneers who arrived in California after the discovery of gold in 1848.