the broadcast is now starting all attendees are in listen only mode hi good evening welcome
to the Sanctuary Exploration Center my name is Lisa Woonick I'm the superintendent of
the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and it is my honor to be here and to welcome
you today to the 36th Ricketts Award so yes and we have some great recipients I won't
say more about that because there's going to be another group of people after me speaking
but I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you to the Research Activity Panel that
um really puts together the Ricketts award every year and the research activity panel
has was instrumental in designating the sanctuary they were in place they helped put together
our first action plan and they are still meeting going strong and we really appreciate everything
that the research activity panel does every year this last year they've been working on
some of our priorities kelp and climate and one of our other priorities is to expand our
connections with communities that we don't typically reach and I am very pleased that
this year the recipients of the Ricketts award represent that um sector um Linda Yamane and
Tim Thomas are really leaders in the field of connecting us to the history of our sanctuary
so and I also wanted to say thank again say thank you to all of the research activity
panel members some of you are here so thank you for all of your years of service and um
I'm going to now allow Erica Burton to follow with some more words of welcome so thank you
thanks thank you is this on Becky okay I noticed it wasn't really
elevated great thank you everyone for coming my name is Erica Burton I'm a research ecologist
at the sanctuary office and I'll be MC-ing in tonight guide us through the night and
just to let you know how we're going to proceed tonight I'll give a brief background on the
RAP and the Ricketts award in general and then we have Steve Haddock the vice chair
of the RAP he is going to present the awards today he's also a senior scientist at the
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, and then we'll start with the speakers I'll
introduce speaker number one Linda Yamane. We're going to hold questions until after
both speakers tonight so after Linda speaks then I'll introduce Tim, he'll speak. Each
will be about 30 minutes and then we'll hold questions in the end and we'll probably wrap
up around 8:00 if not sooner. So in general about the Ed Ricketts award: the award was
created to honor scientists who have exhibited exemplary work throughout their career and
advance the status of knowledge in the field of Marine Science. And as Lisa said the first
award was presented in 1986 at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and this is the 36th year. Recipients
are selected by the RAP and they are working group of the Sanctuary Advisory Council. And
recently as Linda sorry as Lisa alluded to the rap broadened the criteria of the award
to be for lifetime achievement in the field of marine conservation, science, or education
based in part on Edward Ed Ricketts' exemplary ability to study the natural history and share
knowledge in a compelling fashion. And just a little bit about Ed I think you probably
all know who he was but just to wrap up for those online too he was born in Chicago in
1897 and he spent a little bit of time at the University of Chicago. Didn't finish there
but he moved to Monterey in 1923 and he opened the Pacific Biological Laboratories and he
provided specimen and slides to many research institutions and then Ricketts met John Steinbeck
in 1930 he became a major influence on the author's writings and his philosophy and he
served as inspiration from many of his books including Cannary Row. And they were on their
famous trip aboard the vessel Western Flyer who it's been refurbished it's in Monterey
again you may have seen it this weekend he and Ricketts Ricketts and Steinbeck explored
the Gulf of California and collaborating in the book The Sea of Cortez but famous in the
scientist World also is that Ricketts also wrote the Between Pacific Tides which continues
to be a textbook for universities around the country. But in the spirit of Ricketts and
especially this year his work and unconventionally holistic approach to science has inspired
generations of researchers so it reflects who we've selected this year for the award.
So now I'm gonna hand it off to Steve Haddock the vice chair to do the presentations of
the
awards. Good evening everyone. So as has been mentioned the rickets award traditionally
has gone to a scientist or researcher, and I think this kind of reflects a lot of people's
perception of the sanctuary itself where we're focused on the organisms and the habitats
and and the environments but one of the core missions of the sanctuary is to preserve the
cultural heritage and the history of that region it's not just about the animals that
we're so attracted to so it was really nice this year that we could expand the rickets
award to recognize two people who have made um great contributions to those aspects of
of our surrounding area and the sanctuary itself first Linda Yamane she's a Rumsen Ohlone
artist you can see some of her work back there a historian and a culture Bearer. She lives
in Seaside she spent nearly four decades researching
and reviving Rumsen basketry, language, stories,
songs, and a variety of traditional Ohlone technologies. And through pain staking work
she's pieced together aspects of alone culture and Rumsen history that were once thought
lost. One thing that I found fascinating was there are actual wax cylinder recordings from
1902 of songs and there's some subsequent aluminum recordings but she's been able to
use that to return some of these traditional songs back into the community which is really
remarkable. She is known throughout the state and internationally as a master basket weaver,
having brought this Ohlone art back into every day practice. She as an artist has Illustrated
information signs for Monterey Bay and and San Francisco Bay region interpretive science
for for various agencies. She's written two books of Ohlone stories one book on weaving
and she's contributed to other books that are promoting this traditional environmental
knowledge, and as we will hear she continues
to rally Rumsen groups and pass on these traditional
arts throughout the community through educational programs. So Linda it is my pleasure Linda
to present to
you this Ed Ricketts award oh thank you
congratulations can you get away from
the
[Laughter]
Alright, so the other, no less distinguished, Tim Thomas worked as a curator for the Monterey
maritime and history museum for 16 years and he has developed programs with the Monterey
Bay Aquarium with California State Parks and with the sanctuary itself. He was part of
the expedition team, I I think it really put the archaeological undersea archaeology on
the map for the sanctuary, he was part of the expedition that mapped the wreck of the
airship Macon back in 2006 with MBARI and with the sanctuary. He's the author of four
books about Monterey history he leads walking tours of Monterey, and he's also on the board
of directors for the Japanese American citizens League of the Monterey Peninsula. He's the
curator of the Japanese American Heritage Center and he's the current chair of the city
of Monterey's Museums and Cultural Arts Commission.
So in recognition for his contributions to
preserving our history and knowledge and as you will hear tonight um some very interesting
examples, Tim Thomas's the other
And if you didn't have a chance I know a lot of people were hovering around the food table
this evening but Linda and Tim both brought some artifacts and art basketry and books
to look at so as you're leaving tonight after
the question please stop by there's some fascinating
things over there. Alright, I'd like to introduce Linda. So Linda is going to share her journey
of discovery of her native heritage culture through language, songs, baskets, boats, dance
regalia, and material harvesting, it's a lot, all of which reflect the richness of the Monterey
Bay area, the relationship its indigenous people have always had the land, and the depth
of their resourcefulness and aesthetic values. I give you the floor Linda. In 30 minutes
or less [Laughter]
Well um [Rumsen Ohlone spoken] good evening and welcome everyone um Linda Yamane Rumsen
Ohlone in Monterey, Carmel, [Rumsen Ohlone spoken] my name is Linda Yamane I'm Rumsen
Ohlone and the area of Monterey lower Carmel River and Valley is my ancestral homeland
so I wanted you to hear Rumsen Ohlone language spoken, not that would have been spoken here
but in the Monterey area because it's beautiful to have our languages heard again.
uhoh there you go wait how am I doing it oh I just had to click on it okay okay so I would
like to acknowledge that Santa Cruz is the ancestral homeland of the indigenous Awaswas
speaking Ohlone people with whom we Rumsens are closely related though another alone tribal
group has for several years been active in Awaswas territory, I look forward to awaswas
people becoming active and representing themselves in their own traditional homeland. When earlier
this year a young Awaswas friend told me that she and other Awaswas people were being erased
it really struck me, and she felt that they were being erased because Santa Cruz was being
popularly identified as another tribe's homeland I knew at that time that I had to stop being
silent on the issue and so I need to respectfully state the fact that Santa Cruz is traditional
Awaswas territory and homeland. Yay it works now, okay. So I grew up knowing of my native
heritage but very little of the specific culture. My grandmother in this photograph here um
still practiced the use of plant medicines, but aside from knowing that our native ancestors
had been baptized at Carmel Mission we knew very little else at that time. I later learned
this was the case for essentially all contemporary Ohlone families. I really wanted to know more
and as a young adult had a hard time finding what I was looking for because there were
no readily available resources, and I really didn't know where to begin but eventually
I realized that in order to learn about our culture, I needed to do some deep genealogy
work to find out exactly who my early ancestors were and where they lived. When I traced my
lineage back to the Village of Tucutnut in lower Carmel Valley I finally had something
I could work with. Here's my family tree from myself to my dad to my grandma, my great grandma,
then to her dad, his mom, her father, and finally to my fifth great grandmother in the
Rumsen village of Tucutnut in lower Carmel Valley. So I think it's beautiful to see faces
put faces to kind of this vague concept of
ancestor. She was only the 32nd person to be baptized at Mission San Carlos in Carmel,
giving you an idea how early our families were physically, socially, and culturally
impacted by the Catholic church and Spanish colonization. I think it was growing up knowing
of my heritage but not the culture that led to a burning desire to find what was lost
and I've spent the past nearly 40 years working on that, digging through far-flung ethnographic
documents, some unpublished, and archaeological reports learning ancient technologies, plants,
and other natural resources they require, then putting these technologies into practice.
In the process I've had a few decades of up-close and personal experiences with these plants,
learning their ways throughout the seasons and refining and expanding my skills and knowledge
of ancient technologies, which have in turn given me many insights into the lives of Rumsen
people of the
past. Well I was about 35 years old when a random encounter with this poster printed
by the Santa Cruz County Archaeological Society got me started on my quest to find Ohlone
baskets, which in turn allowed me to begin making them myself. I had previously read
what Anthropologist Alfred Crober had written that all of our baskets had perished um that
none remained in the world but this poster contradicted that and taught me that there
were indeed a few of our old baskets still remaining, so I set out to find them and then
to begin making them. Of course this happened step by step over a long period of time. Since
then I visited all but one of the baskets Illustrated on this poster and many others.
There are only about 20 or 25 thereabouts oldtime Ohlone baskets remaining in the world
and I've made 24 new ones which has basically doubled that number and it all started with
this
poster. Which was a Santa Cruz thing so all right. So in order to begin making baskets
myself I needed to study some of these old baskets to see how they were made of what
materials and scrutinize a whole lot of technical details. I visited a few of the old ones in
distant museums studying counting stitches measuring taking detailed photos learning
everything I could from the baskets
themselves. Some of the things I observed I was then able to incorporate into my own
baskets such as these little olivella shell beads woven into the inside of the basket
that was like the biggest mind-blowing thing about visiting this Basket in Paris it's like
oh there are little tiny olivella beads on the inside and of course we had only ever
seen photos of the outside of the basket and when visiting the museum even though I had
made advance arrangements and they knew I was coming still there was a funny little
glitch when we got there and they initially were not going to take the basket out of its
exhibit case. And it was mounted on a really tall ... whatever in this museum and so I
basically would be looking at it from here up like so and I thought "wow this really
isn't going to do anything for me" I could see that much in the pictures that I had seen
without going to France so I kind of pleaded a little bit and they relented and opened
the cases for a short while before they opened to the public. That was when I had a chance
to really look at these baskets up close and it was such a treat to find these little olivella
disc beads on the inside so I ended up putting a few on the inside of a similar style basket
that I made for the Oakland
Museum and then basically just more looking
scrutinizing and this at the British
Museum. So I spent months and months searching for the native plants I would need for weaving
and eventually made this my first little basket completed in 1994 roughly 10 years after I
first saw that poster so it took a while to you know get all the moving parts together.
Anyway, it's made of Willow sedge, a black pattern of bull rush root, and black quail
top nut feathers. It is far from perfect but was significant because I had finally made
my first traditional basket and this was the first Ohlone basket to be made in approximately
150 years so it was significant like in a in kind of a deep you know sort of way for
me. Eventually I got really good at making our baskets and added a new one every year
or two in between raising a child working and life's general needs, so these are some
of these the fancy coiled baskets. This is the same basket in the foreground of the previous
slide for a different view. It's at the San Francisco Presidio and you might want to pop
into the Officer's Club Museum if you're at Chrissy field for a walk or whatever sometime,
it's in the Mesa room downstairs when you first enter. Upstairs is a feather dance Cape
feather headdress and an old style Ohlone necklace I also made so want to check it out
if you're nearby.
In 2009, 15 years after completing that first little basket, I found myself confronting
the exciting but scary challenge of making not one but two ceremonial baskets, patterned
with feathers and olivella shell beads, a type that hadn't been made in about 250 years.
The pattern on the outer surface is a combination of olivella disc beads, and chicken feathers
that I dyed red to imitate the Acorn woodpecker feathers that my ancestors used in the past.
And by the way this basket is on display over here so if you'd like to take a look. While
very fancy remember that this basket came from the land. I mean I realize that when
you look at it it's got so many you know so much bling on the outside that you could tend
to forget that it actually you know the structure of it is all made from three very humble plants.
So it came from simple sticks and roots that I had to cut and peel, I mean arm loads of
willow sticks in order to find enough of the same diameter, I had to dig for hours in the
ground to find and excavate the long runners that would become the fine weaving strands
you see when you look at the rim and inside of the basket. I also had to make all the
little shell beads and I tuck each feather carefully into the um stitches of the basket
as I wove it, so it's not you don't get the hot glue gun out you know after, it's got
to be well planned because if you make a mistake here and you find out after you've gone around
you know one or two rows or even a half row, you either have to leave the mistake in place
or you have to take it all out and go back and fix your error. That's a hard decision
to make
sometimes. About the same time I learned I had been selected for the creative work fund
grant, the Oakland Museum commissioned me to make a similar basket it took three years
to complete these two baskets working fairly full-time and which I made concurrently. There
were a number of technical details I had to figure out and reverse engineer including
the need to make more than 2,000 ollivella beads and integrate them into the stitches
of the baskets as I wove.
In Ohlone basketry there are two weaving techniques:
coiling and twining. This is a coiled basket-
round and round to go basically, wrapping and stitching wrapping and stitching, so you
poke a hole you push your slender little weaving strand through hopefully you know you can
manage to get it in there before the hole closes up because all the material's very
tightly packed so if you I think even in there you can see there are no holes just sitting
there waiting for a stitch to be pushed through you have to muscle your way through and I
have a crooked finger to prove I have a very crooked finger to prove how how much strength
you have to you know how much resistance there is when you're trying to push that all through.
At the British museum I was able to study this example of a basketry ear ornament taking
close-up photos that would help me make my own set a few years later. Note the coiled
basketry disc which was once covered with feathers now gone because of insect damage
which I assume were
moths. And if you notice the tube the white scrim shod piece um you can't see all of it
but it's a bird bone and it's been incised and then rubbed with you know something dark
it's basically scrimshaw, and that's attached I think you can see well, this you can in
this slide you can see you know all of the parts as I was in the process of making them
and um you can see the bird bones there which I incised with a very simple design because
it took me a while of practicing. I used a piece of a deer bone and I tried all kinds
of different you know tools different knives and this that and you know whatever I could
think of and uh to see what I could control and what tool would work well for doing the
incising, but once I did find what tool worked well for me, when it came time for putting
some some dark matter down into the grooves I ended up using I I ended up pulverizing
some burnt redwood that was in of a cultural site in Carmel Valley that was that burned
in oh I should have uh tried to remember this ... I'm not thinking of which fire it was
but anyway just a few you know years back, anyway the site had burned and um I ended
up pulverizing that, so it kind of had this a lot of little meanings and so it's that
pulverized charcoal from that cultural site from a burn from redwood you know in my cultural
area is what fills the little grooves.
Imagine them being worn while dancing or while entertaining special guests long ago. They
actually rest over the ear with the scrimshaw bird bone hanging behind the ear.
Now I included this because it's a great picture great photo it's the same basket that's here,
but if you were to look at this basket oh no I think no that was after I had to pull
the feathers out, so laws basically forbid us from harvesting plants we need to make
baskets or boats regalia or traditional foods. Laws forbid us from gathering feathers or
shells from beaches and our own ancestral homelands and before this particular basket
could travel to Germany and I think it was in 2019, I had to drive from Monterey to San
Francisco at the last minute to pull out these 32 little Redwing Blackbird feathers so that
the basket could pass through customs. And I had declared those to the person who was
doing all the administrative work for this art shippers and she when she looked it up
misread the lines of information, so when she got to the red wing blackbird she act
actually transposed something and saw a different the the law on on a different line for you
know referencing a different feather, and so she said no problem and I said really and
she said no problem we just need to declare it, but when it was about ready to go through
she found out that well she said I guess we're going to not be able to send this basket and
I said well I don't think that's really acceptable because it's already in their catalog, so
I said I'll just come to San Francisco and pluck them out.
So now on to twined
weaving. When we move from coiled baskets to Twining technique which often applies to
utilitarian work baskets such as this washing, seed roasting, winnowing, and gathering basket.
In this closeup you can see how the weaving material passes over and under the foundation
rods but what you can't see is they always work in pairs and what you can see if you
look carefully are seeds caught in the weave as well as a hair likely from the weaver,
and I think I know who wove it, that was caught in the weave as it was being made I've learned
from experience this happens frequently.
Anyway here I am making my first warSin.
And now on to the inspiration for a different basket. So years ago this stone mortar was
given to me and I was immediately excited by this heavy ring of tar or also known as
asphaltum, because to me this was clear evidence that my Rumsen people had a hopper basket,
which I'll soon explain. I vowed I would one day make a basket to sit on top of the mortar
again as one had done so many years before, held into place by this thick ring of tar.
Later during my work with our language I found the name for this basket "pechump tiprin"
which actually translates "stuck-on basket." The purpose of this bottomless basket is to
create a deep bowl from a shallow mortar depression
so that acorn fragments hit the walls and
fall back into the bowl when they're pounded. A few years later I kept my promise and made
my first pechump tiprin, and then I made two others: one for the de Saisset Museum on Santa
Clara University campus and the other for the Sanchez Adobe Interpretive Center in Pacifica.
The foundation rods are willow, the light colored weaving material is sedge rhizome,
and the dark pattern is bracken fern rhizome.
So here's the completed basket sitting on the mortar from Tucutnut so you can see how
it was used. In this case the mortar was my inspiration to figure out how to make this
bottomless basket since none had survived for me to use as a model. This hopper mortar
serves as an example of the connections we still have to the past and how cultural objects
can Inspire us and live again by actually being used by us. When trying to decide how
to make the pechump tiprin, or hopper basket, I decided to make it with the same weaving
techniques as our warSin or seed roasting basket. Here's a warSin in the process of
being woven, and I was hoping you would notice the diamond patterns they're made not with
a dark weaving material but just by slightly varying the actual stitches, which causes
the light to reflect differently off of the material, thereby allowing us to see the pattern.
Just so cool. Here's that same warSin in its finished form, now I've made several of these
of different sizes learning a little more about the dynamics of shaping the basket each
time. This one was commissioned by the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History.
At left in this side is another work basket I made called a shewin or carrying basket.
It's also made with subtle weaving patterns has special reinforcing willow rods incorporating
incorporated into the stitches on the exterior, so you can kind of see those kind of protruding
wrap sticks. These reinforcing rods give extra strength to a basket that needs to be sturdy
for the job it does. These are used by myself
and relatives and friends when we gather traditional
foods such as these manzanita berries. So here I was gathering manzanita berries with
cousins Violet, Linda, and Cindy, and it strikes me every now and then looking at these photos
because we were using them so casually people putting them on the ground and walking away
someone left one way down the trail and like wait a minute don't leave it down there. But
you know where once we didn't even know what our baskets look like now we can casually
use these baskets you know the way they were once used by our Ohlone ancestors so that's
a big switch. Traditional old style baskets don't just magically happen, they require
a lot of knowledge, skill, patience, and a lot of work. Sedge rhizomes must be excavated
from the earth, split, and peeled, cleaned, dried, then carefully prepared for the weaving
itself. In this drone shot you can see me digging sedge runners in a massive bed of
sedge growing on a sandy south bank of the Carmel River, probably the last of its kind
in the area, which is a concern. But just to give you an idea of the labor intensive
processes involved, yeah you know I kind of spelled them out here: you split the runners,
you peel the bark off, you have to let them dry for at least 6 months or so, then you
have to split them again, and scrape and clean everything before you can use it. And now,
I just kind of wanted to show another very important plant willow. Actually this particular
species of willow. So here I am cutting winter willow sticks with Mutsen Ohlone friend Vera
Powers, and when harvested in winter there are no leaves or bark to peel as a sap is
dropped into the ground and the bark adheres to the wood. These are most often used to
make open work twined work baskets.
Here I have an arm load of Sandbar Willow, salix exigua, the species needed to make our
baskets and only straight shoots will work, so it's not necessarily easy to find what
we need. Finding a good source of quality willows of the right species and within a
reasonable distance from home is a problem. Each of those sticks in my arm had to be stripped
of the bark, then dried for several months.
As you can see there's a tremendous amount of time and labor involved just to harvest
and process the materials before the also labor intensive weaving can ever begin. And,
I might add, I actually never have time to do any of this, I have to do it anyway. So
let me see where we are, kind of like to move away from baskets to just a few other little
personal cultural passions starting with making string or cordage from local native plants,
this one dogbane also known as Indian hemp. Dogbane string, many people don't realize
is a really important like California Indian cultural icon. In this photo you can see a
few ends of the dry stalks there above my right hand harvested in winter. Also some
extracted fiber up in the upper right hand corner and also there's a length of two ply
string in the process of being twisted. Anyway so at left of my hand is one example of how
cordage was used in the past in this case for tying two bird bone whistles together
and then you end up having, I'll show you in the next slide, this kind of double two-toned
whistle that's used in certain dances. And so speaking of dances brings me to another
current focus of mine, kind of my one of my most recent passions, and that is making dance
regalia. Something I've been doing for many years but basically more just personally,
but in recent months I started working with a small group of Rumsen women to start a dance
group, and so I've been helping them make regalia and making some pieces, regalia pieces,
for them because I was really pushing for us to be ready to dance together for the very
first time at a Rumsen reunion that we had I think it was just about 3 weeks ago in Monterey.
So we made it I had to pull quite a number of rabbits out of a hat, but I was really
struck as we were all coming out from backstage. This was at the JACL hall where Tim has created
a really beautiful Heritage Museum and I kind of turned around for a moment we were all
walking down these little stairs and there was no other place for us to dance except
the stage that's why we were on a stage but and I just couldn't believe it looking back
they were all coming down the stairs, and we have so much more still to do to complete
our regalia and for me to reconstruct some more of our dances, but to see the group of
ladies all dressed out was um really so striking and and beautiful to me.
So on the in the display over here on the
side, I brought one of these jay feather headdresses,
and the color is so striking but it all just depends on the light of the moment, because
I learned that blue color and and green in feathers comes not from pigmentation, but
is strictly structural, and so the blue color is not there unless there's light bouncing
off a certain way, and it's just this effect of the structure and the light interacting
that allows us to see this most intense, most beautiful blue color, which um one of our
littlest dancers was wearing. Anyway so I really invite you to take a look at it before
you leave this evening. Anyway so move along...So a very special regalia piece I'm preparing
to make is a band of red shafted flicker quills similar to the one shown here. Mine's going
to end end up being a little bit different because um you know those require a whole
lot of tail feathers which I don't have as many, but there are many variations of wing
feathers, tail feathers, etc etc and the really great thing is that they're actually so far
I'm aware of three flicker quill headbands that came from Ohlone territory. So since
we have so few cultural things that survived the the years, but in this case it so happens
that there are three that were purchased two in the East Bay and one in San Francisco so
I will use them to kind of be my inspiration and guides but I'm not going to be trying
to duplicate them or replicate them. And then in this drawing that I did kind of gives you
an idea of how it's worn.
As I get close to the end of what I'm going to share with you tonight I didn't want to
leave out the making of beautiful Tule canoes. Now I personally wouldn't actually want to
cross the bay in one, not me, but I've loved paddling on still water in lakes or lagoons,
marsh or protected harbor. It's really really wonderful to paddle and beautiful to see the
world around you from inside the boat just ask Sandy Lyden. Though I won't mention how
the Tule boat he was in rolled over and dumped him into the Carmel River
I won't mention [Laughter] That was a great day, well the one before when you didn't dip
in the water was better, but your your students enjoyed the the tip yeah. So here's a Tule
boat I made for the de Saisset Museum at Santa Clara University there's also one at Palo
Carona Regional Parks Discovery Center and Lower Carmel Valley and another on intermittent
display outdoors at the Monterey Bay Aquarium so if you ever want to see one in person,
those are three that are kind of in our area.
So in closing I'm delighted to be teaching Ohlone basketry to Violet Smith, also of Seaside
also Rumsen, who's a quick learner and is working on her first basket, so well I'm probably
going to say what you can already read, but at age 74 I've really been feeling concerned
because the people I've taught in the past you know unfortunately one passed away and
other people for various reasons you know did it for a little while one person said
well I discovered I don't have the patience, and other people you know various reasons,
work, children whatever whatever, distance did it for a while and didn't continue. So
you know Violet and I applied to this apprenticeship
program and we were selected for it, and we're
working together now for a few months. She's doing beautifully and I feel so much better
knowing that at least through this one person and hopefully others who all be working with
as well that it's going to carry on after I'm gone. So always alive is what that means
yes that's the idea it's the purpose for this work that Ohlone basketry and other cultural
practices will live on into the future. In some ways there's a parallel culture cultural
universe I kind of think of it that's going on, and it seems like the average person isn't
really aware that it exists, but with simple roots and shoots as just one example, and
knowledge gleaned from our ancestors we can keep some of the beauty of the past alive
for the benefit of us all not only for now but hopefully into the future as well. And
that's all for now shuururu which means thank you and blessings.
Okay thank you Linda that was beautiful thank you for sharing that with us tonight. As Ariel
gets the next presentation ready I'm going to introduce Tim, and I just want to start
with, I've had the fortune of working with Tim over the years and also my colleague Robert
Schwemmer who's the West Coast Maritime Heritage Cultural Coordinator. He couldn't be here
tonight he's in Southern California, but he sent me some words I just want to share with
you Tim and the group: "I've known and worked with Tim Thomas for decades. He's a walking
encyclopedia of all things related to Monterey's rich history and I'm proud to call him my
friend. We have worked together sharing research on Maritime exhibits at the former Maritime
Museum of Monterey. The most exciting collaborative
experience working with Tim was when he joined
the science team aboard the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute's research vessel the Wester
Flyer during Noah's first archaeological survey of the dirigible ship USS Macon lost off Point
Sur in 1935. (I was lucky to be on that ship too) Us seeing it for the first time through
the ROV's eyes. So congratulations Tim for receiving this award it's well deserved. Your
friend, Bob Schwemmer. So Tim's gonna speak tonight about the early collection of white
abalone by the young Japanese American abalone diver Roy Hattori and the unresolved history
of its scientific name.
Thank you, thank you all. This is really an honor for me to be here tonight and I have
to say it's always a tough act to follow Linda, and so it's always difficult for me but here
we are. Yes I'd like to point out we are from the other side of the bay greetings from Monterey
I love this particular postcard from the 1930's, just says a lot to me but we're going to,
hope I can do this correct which button do I push I got the right one, so but first how
I got here. So I've been researching history Monterey Bay the fisheries in particular of
Monterey Bay for about 35 years or so and, I started here. So I know you guys can all
deal with this you're all adults in the room- Ed Ricketts was not the only Marine Biologist
on Cannery Row, nor was even the most important marine biologist on Cannery Row. These guys
were, right here. These are the scientists from the, and biologists from the Cal from
the California Department of Fish and Game in 1929. The woman standing here that is Francis
Clark. Francis Clark was a woman way ahead of her time. She was the first person within
Fish and Game to receive a PhD which she actually got in 1925, and so they weren't sure what
to do her at that time they said well uh let's make her the librarian, where actually took
a series of books that sat on a man's desk and built one of the premier fisheries libraries
in the world it's actually now here in the Monterey/ Santa Cruz area. Then there's W.L.
Scofield next to her, and Scofield was one of three brothers who all worked for California
Department of Fish and Game, were all biologists. The older brother, N.B. Scofield, actually
was head of the Marine Division. Richard Croker in the middle, M.J. Linder, and then the guy
on the end is a guy named J.B. Phillips, and when I first started doing this research I
used a lot of the reports the Fish and Game folks would write, I had were writing about
the Fisheries of Monterey. Fish and Game had a different life in those days their whole
function in life really was to sort of support the fishermen, and Julie Phillips went to
work for Fish and Game right out the college in 1929. In fact, I had a copy of the letter
that offered the job it said that "the cannery is opening soon, you need to come to Monterey,"
and they opened their offices initially in 1919 at Hopkins Marine Station so could be
close to the canneries. That's why they came here so they could monitor that sardine fishery
here in Monterey. They would actually go into the canneries every every day and they would
meet the fisherman and they would keep what they called interview cards and they would
ask the fisherman where they caught their fish, how much they were catching, then they
would take samples of these sardines back to their office at Hopkins in their lab there
where they would weigh them, measure, them sex, and then, this is the best part, they
put them back in buckets and brought them back to the canneries and gave them back so
they wouldn't lose any catch right there. So Julie Phillips went to work there in 1929
and he actually spent his entire career in Monterey and the office at Hopkins Marine
Station. In fact Fish and Game of course grew over the years in the Monterey area but they
kept that office open just for Julie until he retired about 1972. And when he retired
he packed up everything that was in that office and took it home and put it in his garage.
And he passed away and then I got in touch with his son Don Phillips and and Don said,
"yeah we're going through all this stuff at the house and we're not sure what it all is
could you come over and take a look at it?" and I went over there and there's all these
boxes of stuff and they said all we know about
Dad was that Dad worked for the State of California
had something to do with fish that's all they knew. But there was all these papers, notes,
all of these handwritten notes, all of everything in uh that he had done all that period of
time working at Fish and Game. And then there was a box, a file box, of photographs, about
500 photographs and their negatives and on the back of every single photograph was the
who, what, where, why, and how. I mean it was an amazing thing, right? And there were
things in these pictures that we had never seen before, things we'd only heard about,
and so I wanted to show you a photograph of one of the back of those images but I didn't
have a chance to get to that today unfortunately, but I can tell you that now lives at the Monterey
Library, and you all have a chance to go see it right there. So and by the way many of
the pictures you're going to see tonight were taken by Julie Phillips. So, "What's up Doc?"
Of course you can see Ed Ricketts on the side here and then that's my friend Julie Phillips
on the other one. Now this was taken in the 1930s at a time when they're catching a lot
of Humboldt squid in the Monterey Bay. Those are not the same two Humboldt squid uh that
was taken where J.B. Phillips was taken that was taken at Hopkins Marine Station, this
of course was Ed's lab, but I've been there's been a debate about Doc Ricketts the debate
being when was he really called Doc Ricketts and those who say well it was John Steinbeck
called him Doc Ricketts before that no one ever called him Doc Ricketts before that.
Well I found out that's really actually not correct because what I found and I was talked
to a lot of folks who used to work on Cannery Row and it turns out every scientist on Cannery
Row was referred to as "Doc." Like I know Julie Phillips who spent a lot time on Cannery
Row and he didn't have PhD but I I talked to some guy who worked for the Del Mary County
once he said said, "did you know Julie Phillips from Fish and Game" he said, "oh you mean
Doc Phillips? oh yeah Doc Phillips." So everybody was called "doc" right there. He didn't like
being called doc either as Ed Ricketts didn't. But Julie was famous this this particularly
famous for rock fishes this is a very, those folks who study rock fishes this is still
considered one of the best publications about California rock fishes that exist today this
was done in 1957. Actually within the collection of stuff we have, we have all of Julie's notes
for this particular report that went out, we have all those notes. We also have an amended
addition of this that he actually did as well. They also even named a rockfish after Julie
Phillips there
But first let me get to the story. But I need a little history first. This abalone, and
I going to say this right up front, abalone, and I've been researching the abalone fishery
now in Monterey Bay for close to 20 years, and I believe the abalone fishery in California
in Monterey is probably the most important
fishery in all California. It may not be economically,
but it definitely is historically, and it definitely is culturally. And one thing Linda
didn't mention in her talk was that the first abalone divers in Monterey were Linda's ancestors,
the Rumsen people. They were diving in abalone. Monterey was the abalone capital of the world,
and we know that because of burials that come out of the ground in recent years, and you
really cannot build a house along the Monterey waterfront without running across a Rumsen
burial or two. The males have what's known as surfer's ear, which that little bony growth
over to the ear from spending a lot of time in the cold water like the Monterey Bay, right?
Which makes a lot of sense. When you see an abalone the size of a hubcap, you're going
to dive down there and get it, right? So and abalone was very important: they ate, it they
used the shells as you see to decorate baskets, to make jewelry, and they traded it to other
California Indians things they could not get through a Monterey like obsidian which is
a volcanic rock. And perhaps some of you have seen that old Kevin Costner movie called Dancing
with Wolves? Anybody remember that movie? yeah yeah yeah That is about Indians in South
Dakota. If you watch that film closely, and it comes on cable TV all the time, if you
watch it closely you'll notice there's a lot of abalone in the clothing and the regalia
that they're wearing. Well as far as I know there is no abalone in South Dakota, it's
got to get there some way it's going on those trade routes. A lot it, most of it actually,
starts right here in or in Monterey. So oh I'm backing up so I'm sorry .. Again a little
history I won't spend a lot of time on this otherwise you will never get done here tonight
but but Japanese abalone divers arrived in Monterey around 1895/ 1896. Actually a guy
by the name Otosaburo Noda who got a job working for the then land arm of the Southern Pacific
Railroad of the Pacific Improvement Company which just this gigantic conglomerate and
they just purchased about 8,000 Acres of the Monterey Peninsula because they had this kind
of quirky idea they could turn Monterey into a tourist paradise right who thinks such a
thing? So Noda was hired as kind of a labor contractor and he was bringing other Japanese
workers to clear land, and he was supplying to these workers he was supplying food and
water and wood for their fires. He was working on a tree one day near the Monterey Wharf,
he looked down into the harbor and he just saw all this abalone down there. In fact,
so much abalone he actually described it in a letter as being a carpet of abalone, and
nobody doing anything with it. And the reason nobody in Monterey was doing anything with
it because nobody knew. I mean what are the heck are you supposed to do with it? You know
unless you're preparing abalone properly it is kind of like eating a rubber boot. The
Japanese who had been dealing with abalone for centuries they knew exactly what to do
with it so Nodasan writes back to government of Japan said "Hey! They got all this abalone
here that nobody wants" the government of Japan sent a guy by named Gennosuke Kodani,
who was in the abalone business in the Chiba Prefecture in Japan. He comes over goes "oh
this is great! Not only is there a lot of abalone, these abalone are big." He sent back
to Japan for abalone divers. Those first divers that came were known as ama. There were three
of them that arrived here in the fall of 1897. We know who they were we, both Sandy and I,
we have seen their passports, and they began to dive for abalone in Monterey Bay. If you
know anything about ama diving, a traditional just little white cotton outfit, a pair of
goggles which actually had pig bladders on the end they would squeeze to help release
the pressure. By the turn of the 20th century they moved into the helmet gear primarily
because it was just much more proficient than than on the divers, so with the helmet gear
they're bringing in helmet divers and of course as you can see in this photograph they were
the wool underwear. There actually was a dive company which still exists dive company in
Tokyo that was producing this dive underwear strictly for the divers in Monterey, right.
So they would put that on, they put on a heavy canvas suit, about 65 pounds of the lead weight
to the front and back that led to the shoes, bolt
on the helmet of course has a hose attached
to it and go into the Monterey Bay. In the early days there was hand pumped air down
to the diver. He's going down 40, 50 feet sometimes
in the Monterey Bay, but the deeper they went
the harder it was to pump. Then the 1920s they put air compressors on the boat and and now
they're pushing the air down with a motor so
now that diver is going 40, 50, 60, 80, even up
to 100 feet into the Monterey Bay, but at that
level you can't stay down there very long
and you and you can't see anything so they're on their hands and knees crawling around and
they
have to work their way up very slowly to this 30 foot level and be down there all day collecting
abalone. So initially the Japanese are drawing all that abalone and they're shipping it back
to Japan, they're also shipping it to China, and they're also shipping it to Hawai'i and
Australia
where there was a large Japanese Chinese community that lived there that would buy it. And then
in 1907 a German restaurant tour by the Pop Ernest opened a small restaurant on Alvarado
Street and he would serve oysters in his restaurant.
Oysters were a very popular thing at that
time, and he would get his oysters not from Monterey Bay but from San Francisco, they'd come
by train, and if you know about trains, trains have tendency to break down, there'll be a cow
on the track or something will happen, and
of course oysters, like any shellfish, any seafood,
won't stay fresh very long. So often times
he would ride to the train station and already to pick
up his order of oysters and they would be spoiled.
So he's goes looking something new he could serve in
his restaurant, and he sees all this abalone leaving
the Monterey and says "yeah abalone, kind of like
giant oysters!" He brought them into his restaurant
in the spring of 1908, experimented with it,
and find that famous recipe where you slice the foot
because after eating eating abalone is the
foot, it's just a big marine snail, and then he would pound it you don't just pound it
there's a certain technique to pounding it,
and then he run it through egg wash, cracker crumbs,
and cover it quickly olive oil and soon people came
from all over to eat fresh abalone steaks and Pop's restaurant.
They'd sing songs and write poetry like, "some folks boast the quail on toast because they
think it's tony, but I'm content to owe my rent and live on abalone." George Sterling wrote
that in his guest books in 1913. Abalone is introduced to the world in 1915 during the
Panama Pacific International Exposition and soon the
whole world wanted this product. Hotels, restaurants,
all wanted this new sensation: abalone. Because
of Pop's recipe the Japanese abalone industry took off
Just to give you an idea of how large it was: in 1916, 1916, they brought in 600,000 pounds
of red abalone in Monterey. 1920, there were nine full-time Japanese abalone companies operating off
the Monterey wharf. In 1929, the California abalone industry
is bringing in close to a million dollars
in revenue, 75% of that in Monterey Bay. Prior World War II, 80% of the businesses on the
Monterey Wharf were Japanese owned - fish markets abalone processors - so big, big, business which
leads me to this gentleman right here. This
is my old friend, and Sandy's old friend, Roy Hattori
Roy is very important for a lot of reasons. But Roy, he's a handsome young man, Roy is
Roy was the last of Japanese abalone divers, but more importantly Roy was the only diver
that was born here. He was nisei, second generation.
All the divers were born from Japan came to
Japan and returned to Japan. They were all coming working on contract. Roy he was born here, just
a couple hundred
yards up from where the Monterey Bay Aquarium is today in 1919. And so this picture was
taken, he was about 18 when this picture was taken, and I asked him how he learned how to
do this. He told me he was a young man he just
graduated from Monterey High School, his father was in
the abalone business. During the depression,
had a lot of debts to pay, he thought "hey this would be a good
way to make some money." But he had no experience in this business. He had friends who were in
it, so he borrowed some equipment, takes one little
boat in the middle of the Monterey Harbor and
dresses up in this little underwear here.
In fact Roy told me his mother knit him this underwear
right here. Put on the clothes, put on the big heavy
canvas suit, attached the 65 lbs of the lead
waist to his front and back, tried lead to his shoes, bolted on the helmet then he just tossed
him off the side of the boat. Then you start running down there, that's how he learned to
be an abalone diver. Luckily the older divers took him under their wing and kind of showed him
what to do. So here's the typical this is the typical gear that they would use. Again, all
this gear came from Japan. When they first started diving in Monterey at the turn of the 20th
century they did try American equipment and they didn't like it. It was too heavy and they
said it was rough. Roy told me the Japanese gear felt like putting on silk. And so you can
see the suit and the weights, abalone basket over there, the helmet, the lifelines, and the
abalone pry you see right there. So I knew Roy for about 20 years and I would I interviewed
him a number of times. In fact the first time I interviewed Roy, I should bring this up, it
the very first time I interviewed Roy in 19 I think it was 1992 actually, Linda was with
me that day that I interviewed Roy that day. But I spent a lot of time with Roy over
those years. I'd go and visit him at his house and a few few months before he passed
away he actually called me up and he said Tim I want you to I want you to take me around
Monterey to all these different places so I can talk about my abalone diving days. So
actually Sandy is with me for this and we took him to Hopkins Marine Station, and
talked to the the faculty at Hopkins and
the students there. And we went to the Monterey Bay
Aquarium and talked to the volunteers there and over at Point Lobos, and he really enjoy doing
that. So this is Roy getting ready to go diving. And here that's his brother on
the right and his cousin on the left
there. And here he is going down that ladder to go into the into the water. These pictures
by the way were taken by a guy named Rey Rupple and Ray Rupple was a good friend of Roy and
they took these photographs in 1939 on speculation for an article for Life Magazine. Life Magazine
was very interested in doing this story of
of this abalone industry because it was kind of unique.
And so they took a whole series of images they sent them to Life Magazine and they sat
on it for a couple years and then the war broke out with Japan and they never used them.
So here's Roy, handsome guy, going down into going down the ladder into the bay there. There
you go. And that's his brother and cousin, into the water. I love this photograph
you can see so they would in the 30s they're going on these three-day abalone cruises.
So you have the dive boat, and then there's a mother boat, you stay at night you stay on
the big big mother boat. And this is of course the dive boat here, and and so you see the
crew on the boat here. The guy in the on the on at the stern working the skulling ore that's
technology that came from Japan. So with the skull you have to use a motor, and you would
just track the bubbles of the diver so you knew where he was going out, or wherever he was
under the water right there. You can see they put an engine on the bow here so they can
move it place to place. Often times they'd move it from place to place and they'll just pull the
diver up so he's just not off, so he's just off the
floor of the seafloor and then they were just
moving while he's underwater. You can see there's a cover over the engine there if you
look closely you'll notice there's a tea kettle and a pair of shoes. And so I asked Roy
about that and he told me "yeah we always had a tea kettle so I could get hot tea when I
got out of the water, and I could put those shoes on, my shoes would be warm when I put them
on my feet" because he'd be so cold he'd literally be shaking for like 30 minutes that's how
cold that water was he'd come out of that water. So again this is the mother boat coming in
after three days. The box you see on the back these are called live boxes. This is again
technology came from Japan. That's how they kept the abalone fresh for those three-day
abalone cruises. They're made out of redwood, they're made by the Siino Brothers at the Monterey
Boat Works, and they would just pile the abalone on top of each other inside those redwood
boxes and kept them under in the water while they're
out they out fishing during the day and then
they brought them back in to Monterey. So at this time this picture is taken in 1939 there were
at least three different abalone processing plants on the wharf at that time. Here they are unloading
the boats that go out. Each boat would come in with about 200 dozen large red abalone.
Abalone season would fluctuate from from season to season sometimes it would be long like
up to nine months. Sometimes it would be shorter. But you can see the abs come in, those are
big red abs there, and into the
boxes. And then they would pull them into the cannery. This is inside one of those processing
plants, in fact this is the processing plant if you
know the Monterey Wharf this is where the Fisherman's
Grotto restaurant is today. And they could see all the ladies, these are all Japanese workers
in these canneries here and the ladies pulling
the abalone out of the shell. And then if you look here
and then if you look at the guy holding the hose right there that's Roy Hattori right
there. I showed him that picture he said "oh" Roy said
"that's me!" I said "what do you mean I thought
you were a diver?" Well Roy's mother actually
had her own cannery on the wharf, so Roy would dive
for the family but when he needed money for
his own personal use, when he wanted to go on dates
and things, he worked at another cannery processing
that one and that's him.
So of course again they pounded this is the process that Pop Ernest came up with and
can of lyme there can see all. Roy told me that in his mother's cannery she'd bring in these
big old Sicilian guys to pound the tough
steak. And of course it was going to the restaurants,
hotels, all across, up and down Northern California,
really by Pop Ernest, the guy that came up that whole process right there. So in 1939 here's
our friend Roy, this was taken about 1939 he was would have been 19 years old and he was diving
just south of Point Conception in September of 1939, he was diving about 60 feet of water
and diving through red abalone, and it wasn't uncommon
for these dive companies to go down to
Southern California they were going down there quite often, and so he was diving and
he come across this abalone that looked unusual to him. He knew it was different it wasn't
a red abalone, it was just by itself. He picked it up put in his abalone basket, sent
it back to the surface, and when he got back to the surface he looked at it "man this is
odd looking," and he showed around to everybody on the boat they didn't know what it was. He
asked some of the other dive crews, they didn't recognize it either. They were actually down
there for about two weeks and so he spent those two weeks looking for more of these
unusual looking abalone. He actually found three more of them at that time and they sent them
back to Monterey. When he got back to Monterey he took them to his friend a guy named Andrew
Sorensen. Andrew Sorensen was lived in Pacific Grove and he was a noted mollusk expert at
that time and and Sorensen and Roy had...would dive
for him they would collect things for him. And Sorensen
looked at it and didn't recognize it and said I'm not sure what this is, and so they in
turn took it, there's the white abalone, that's the abalone that he found right there, that's not
exact one he found that's there. They took
it to Hopkins Marine Station where he showed it to Harold
Heath, who was a zoologist of Hopkins at that time. He didn't know what it was either. They
showed to all the other biologists and the scientists
at Hopkins they didn't know what it was for sure either
and so Sorensen sent it to the Smithsonian to his friend Dr Paul Bartsch, who was then the
curator for mollusks and I think he was the director
of the of the Natural History Department there
at that time. And and so people have been talking about Roy. Roy talked to a lot of different
historians and other writers writing about
abalone and always talked about that white abalone.
He was very proud of that white abalone that he found it and and but he never got credit
for it. And he always talked about it and and but we never had any proof about it no one
ever you know we just he just told us and so I had this idea last January, I had this
idea that well, you know maybe the Smithsonian still
has that correspondence. So I wrote an email
to the curator at the Smithsonian and about this
and it took about six months and several emails from
me to various different curators some of them not even in Washington DC, that on Memorial
Day of this year all these letters appeared in my email box that were written between
Andrew Sorensen and Paul Bartsch. So this is the first
letter that Sorensen sent in 1939 and you can
see what it says right there it says, "They were found slightly south of Point Conception,
California by a commercial abalone diver friend
of mine in 10 fathoms depth." Now he didn't, unfortunately
he didn't mention Roy's name in that particular, but it's handwritten which makes it really
cool actually, and Bartsch actually should have at that point asked who that diver was but
he didn't. And so there's Dr Bartsch right there there he is handsome gentleman he is right
there. So he wrote this letter back because
he had told him Sorensen told him that we think, both
Roy and I think that this is a new species he said so he says you have for..."it is
more than likely that this will prove, as you surmise, a new species. If this be the case,
I shall take pleasure by naming it for
you." So here it is Haliotis sorenseni right there. This this is the actual shell that Roy
first collected and was the one sent to the Smithsonian, so now in their collection
there it is right
there. And then in 1940 this was produced as publication uh where now is this new species
of abalone written by Bartsch right there and it's all says all new species and a real big
deal he actually mentions in this paper he does mention quotes Sorensen's initial letter that
it was collected by a commercial diver off the Point Conception there. But in that same
report here out of this so during that two week dive in 1939 when there Roy also brought up
this abalone. This is actually a subspecies of the red abalone. It's a little bit smaller ...
it's a little bit flatter and so he did name this one after Roy. But Roy never talked
about this, it's a sub species you know, it's not a new species it's a it's a sub species.
It's kind of like a consolation prize kind of thing you know. When I was a kid I used to
come home from school and we'd watch game shows and at the end of the game show
if you didn't win you get like a consolation, a going
away prize usually like a a case of Turtle
Wax right so that's Roy's case of Turtle Wax right they that's what he got, they named it after
him right there. But this got the attention of another diver who dove for Sorensen who was
jealous that they he didn't get an abalone shell named after him. So there's a letter that Sorensen
wrote back to Bartsch about this and he says right down there that I let's see "feels quite jealous
of Diver Roy Hattori who had one Haliotis named after
him by you. Hattori also brought up the original
large ones that you named H. sorenseni." there it is in black and white right there telling
you that Roy Hattori was the one that brought those white abalone, and so the guy that first
recognized this is a new species there it is right there in black and white. So as you know
there is a lot about white abalone today. People want to save the white abalone. White abalone
is I believe on the endangered species list
the first mollusk ever even named on the endangered species
list. It began to be heavily fished in the 1960s and was and I actually blame Jacques Cousteau
for all this because he is a guy invented
the aqualung in 1948 and everybody could go down and
get abalone but there is a big effort to save white abalone up in Bodega Bay and also
in Southern California, Santa Monica. the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History which
has an aquarium is also involved in this project but they're putting in an exhibit about white
abalone, and I work with them a little bit, and what's great about that is they are in
their exhibit are acknowledging the fact that
was Roy Hattori that was the one who discovered that
white abalone out there. so...But through
the years Roy had his had his they didn't acknowledge
a lot this is there's young Roy right there and then you notice that you already recognize
the drawing painting on the side there that is of course Ray Troll. And Ray Troll in early
2000 when NOAA took over the big building in Pacific Grove for the Fisheries building
he was commissioned to do a mural around that building and I was then working at the Maritime
Museum so he came into the Maritime Museum and I worked with him to get photographs for
that mural and at that time I had an exhibit about abalone and so you'll notice the guy
and the Roy that's right there and that's also Roy facing the diver right there. Now,
they're trying to save this building right because there's a whole thing about the building
and they're going to tear the building down and I actually this this past Sunday I was
on a walk coast with the coast people were trying to save this building so hopefully
they can do that. So I'm not proposing that they change the name I understand it's a big
deal right you have to I why would be such a big deal but don't ... I'm not proposing
that but what I am proposing is they just make an addition, right? And me, and the truth
is what does it really matter, right? All these principles, or they're all gone now. 85 years
ago, and scientists have told me even if you change the name they wouldn't do anything
about it, no one would use that, but you know that's irrelevant, it doesn't matter you know.
The truth, I mean reality, is that that history is history, science is science, and the truth
is the
truth. So here's my old friend Roy. This is about six months before he died. I took that
photograph at his house. So I have one last thing I hope you can bear with me but I just added
this yesterday because I was really moved by this, alright. So there this ties to my title
of my talk right? So Western Flyer, so I wasn't really involved in any of this but I know
people who are involved in this project, have some good friends who are actually on the
board of directors of this and and for some reason another they invited me to go to this
party last Friday over in Moss Landing, where I got to go on the boat and see all that cool
stuff. It was really a neat thing to see was just I was it was just beautiful. So I was
sitting on this wonderful deck, drinking this beer from Other Brother Brewery and I was
eating this pizza that had strawberries on it, it actually was pretty good, and it just
like epiphany, hit me out looking at this boat. Oh wow, the Western Flyer. That boat was built
in 1937 by the Western Boat Company for one reason and one reason only, and that was to
fish sardines. That was its sole purpose in life was to fish sardines. It came to Monterey in 1938
this sardine 38-39 season was really good sardine season he came at the height of the season
when they're really good and then in the 1939- 40 season which was part was the best starting
season in all they caught over 600,000 tons of sardines in that that season in Monterey. And
of course this 1940 was the year that Steinbeck hired this boat to take him and Ricketts down
to Baja for that famous collecting trip but also they have they happened to leave on that
same weekend that the fisherman flew this huge party at Monterey because of the great
sardine catch that they had right. "Fishermen Will Celebrate Good Season with Festival [on] Sunday."
and says "Townspeople are invited to a party
at waterfront. Boat parade, games, barbecue, dancing"
I love that part "bring knife and
fork." Then of course all these wild things they all great things skip races, boat parade,
water wagon contest, I'm not sure what that
was, pie-eating contest, walking on the greasy pole,
motorcycle racing, street dancing on Alvarado Street. What a fun time that was. That was the
same weekend those guys all left for Mexico right? Of course it also was the beginning
of the end of the Monterey sardine fisheries. So this
is the Western Explorer. This is the sister
boat to the Western Flyer built by the Western Boat Company. They built a number of these
boats. This was captained by Frank Monaka,
Japanese Fisherman. In fact Frank was the first Japanese fisherman in
all California to have one of these boats. He was only 18 years old at that time. He actually
had two of these, had the Western Explorer and he also had a boat called the Western
Navy. Look how low that guy's sitting in the water right there you got 100 tons of sardines
on that boat. So at one time there over a hundred of these boats in Monterey Bay
a hundred of them. By the early 1960s they were all gone ... all gone. And then
on Saturday she arrived. There was just, I mean I actually had tears in my eyes I watched
that come see another one as Monterey one hadn't been
in Monterey Bay like that for 75 years, and now she's
a boat they're going to outfit to do science and take kids out the boat and teach them all
about the Monterey Bay so that to me is a wonderful
thing and I know I bored you guys enough so thank
you very much.
So as was mentioned earlier they wrote a lot of books and they're good books so in advance
of this week, I went to my public library and I got Linda's books, I got Tim's books and
I read them all and I'm just going to pull out one. This one is fantastic this is The
Abalone King of Monterey, talking about Pop Ernest and how abalone came to be in Monterey. Fantastic!
Thank you. And Linda's an editor of this book she got indigenous peoples to write their
own stories it's fabulous and it's unique in that way, so. And scientists too,
archeologists, linguists, so it's a nice blending. It's fabulous. So thank you for doing that.
We're gonna take questions we have some online maybe, and maybe some in the room so
anyone in the room you have a question for Tim or Linda anyone? Yes, Jane. For Linda, how
in the world do you make out of the olive shell make those beads and I'll repeat the
question so the question was how does Linda make the olivella beads on the basket? Maybe
Linda come get I'm thinking fast how to make it a quick answer. How, how would they have
done it you know in the past? Yes. Well, I can tell you how I did it and then kind of compare
so I just broke them and like with a a rock which would be a hammerstone, so that part
could be equivalent to the past. And then I found you know pieces that randomly broke
that would work in terms of their size and their curvature. Also, but there are many
pitfalls and little glitches because there's this our structural elements on the interior
side of you know the shell because it's it's a snail and so there are compartments and
structural, you know, elements, so those have to be tossed. And I also learned through
lots of loss and I kept, I mean it kind of blows my mind to think how I all the records
that I kept because I kept track of everything basically that I did and the the rate of
of loss not only like as after I finally found a piece that was suitable for potentially
being a bead then it needed to be drilled, and that's
when I learned over time how olivella shell
is very prone to fracturing along its I think its growth I'm I'm I don't know Olivella
biplicata from a science perspective only from my personal you know experiences so I don't
know what terminology to properly use, but anyway, so lots and lots you know you do
a lot of work, and then you try to drill and it's a and half you know over the edge
anyway so that's what I did and once I I finally learned don't put any more work
into it than necessary before you drill the hole um so then after I drilled it and it
didn't break then I would grind down the edges but supposedly in the past, all of
those pieces would have been stacked up. What I do know is if you'll forgive me for a
moment go from olivella shell to clamshell, which are much thicker and much larger.
Those, which I've made before, you do break up pieces and then you drill them and they
don't fracture because they're so thick and sturdy, and then you stack them all up and
you put something, like in modern times you can put a piece of heavy gauge wire for example,
or in the past you could put I don't know a piece of a plant you know, wire grass or
you know certain juncus species would be strong enough, and then you roll and you grind
and you upbraid those by rubbing them on a flat piece of sandstone for example. I tried
to do that with olivella shells and it didn't work. Didn't work for me, but archaeologistd
told me in the past that it appears that um olivella shells were ground like that
but the problem is the concave, you know, shape of the olivella, and the fact that the
shells, because they're very tiny species, then the shell is proportionately thin,
and when it breaks it breaks in with really sharp pointy edges. So when I tried to roll
and grind them that way, those sharp edges just caught on for example the the slab of
sandstone, and instead of sitting there and grinding off they would just continue
to rotate and I got nowhere. But I had one surprise, I was going through a collection
of artifacts that had come out of the ground in or I should say at Filoli which is
gosh somebody could help me near yeah near Redwood City I believe Woodside yes, and I
was helping to photograph these artifacts before they were about to be reburied, and
I could not believe my eyes when we came upon a little olivella shell that had a rectangular
piece cut out of it, and it had been scored for all four sides you know yeah all four
sides and that piece I mean was perfectly this perfect little rectangle was missing
from an otherwise whole olivella shell and probably Ray Schwader who's here in the
audience could um give us a much better lesson about them and you know some aspects
of the past if you wanted to know more you can probably talk to her but I was told,
because of the concave shape of the shell, when I ground them individually then I was
able to grind them basically perpendicular to that edge, and therefore I was able to create
a smooth edge. But if you try to grind them all basically you would end up with a whole
bunch of cups like this of pieces and you're trying to grind those you know all together
you do not end up with smooth edges but Gary Buscini I believe it was told me that
based upon the nature of the edge grinding that they it appears that they or that
was evidence that they had been, you know shaped stacked I don't know if that agrees with
your experience or not but or observation but I don't see how those would be very
attractive or very beautiful like end products because when I tried to do it that way they
just wouldn't grind very well anyway. Thank you. Too long of an answer.
But I think there's some online questions or any other questions in the room at this
moment. Well I have one, how did the baskets get to Europe? Question is how do the baskets
get to Europe?
well Well there were, as you already know, I mean
it was early European visitors to the area who ended up taking them back. And it's
impossible to know at this time how, you know, what the situation was I've heard people some
people say, based upon zero documentation, oh well they came and they stole your baskets,
you know, and I doubt that that was actually the case, but it's I I suspect that in
some cases a priest probably, you know, I don't know this is only me guessing in this case,
but because there were few so-called you know like European "European style civilized"
outposts here at that time so European visitors then of course wanted to go to places
where people like them were there who spoke their language and you know there were their
their people so they were coming to Monterey, San Francisco, I assume if you know San
Diego, but uh considering the places that that you know were easy to get to by by ships in
the in that era. There were just a limited number of places that people tended to visit
and Monterey was one of those, San Francisco another, probably Santa Barbara as well.
Anyway so just at that time people were collecting items that were kind of exotic.
In in terms of what people in Europe were unaccustomed to seeing and so is kind of the
equivalent of us today buying you know souvenirs of places where we've been, and there were
few means of entertainment back in those times. Not like today where we have you know
TV and internet and all kinds of things that take our attention, but in in those days people
took back these things that were exciting for people to see from an exotic distant location.
Took them home and had these curiosity cabinets, and and it's those collections of things
that ended up being the the beginnings of museum collections, like in Germany for
example, but back in the days when all of these things were being collected they were different
little nations that eventually came together as you know different countries I mean as
more consolidated larger countries now. I know for a fact that Ferdinand Deppe, who in 1830
whatever 33 ish was in Monterey, he was actually purchasing things from native peoples in places
that he visited, because there's are written letters of people saying why are why is he
asking so much for why does he want such a such a large price for this at a museum
back in Germany what is today Germany, and and his cousin said "well it's because he
paid a high price for these" some of these items you know feather blankets, these baskets
might have taken a year or more to make so he needed to pay, you know compensate the person
a fair price for for the amount of work that went into it. So because of that little bit
of documentation I know that in his case he definitely did not come and steal things. He
in fact paid very fair
prices. Well I just want to share you all have gotten
several shoutouts, both presenters, from our online audience there's 70 people watching
from home tonight, um a few less during the Q&A admittedly, so specifically I did want
to share one person asked to share a shout out from ... to the both of you they're
thinking of you and sending you a nice all right well they're sending you lots of support.
But another question that had come up kind of follow up to uh the discussion we
just had about why these baskets ended up in Europe, is there are there efforts right
now or in the works to bring some of those baskets back to some of the places that they're
that they were originated from?
I can't say a lot very you know very super specific, but I know that, I believe that there
have been some efforts for repatriating certain cultural materials from particular
museums, I think in Europe, but unfortunately it's been a long time ago that I read something
about this and I don't remember the particulars. What I can say is it would be a complicated
situation to suggest doing that at this point, because who would get it? Where would it go?
and I would personally think that just bringing them closer to home perhaps bringing
them even on a long-term loan to a museum close to home would be a a great thing
to do because if it went to particular people, we don't have any really organized,
large, kind of tribal organizations and so who who would be responsible, or who would
have ownership of them and the responsibility for them? But museums are not bad places
at all, especially now, the efforts over the past 30, 40 years even I have seen the
difference in the desire and the I don't know, stated mission of museums to actually
share collections with the cultural communities that they're associated with and often the
relationship is quite reciprocal. I know that at times when I visited museums to look at
our baskets, I went into the visit thinking that I was the one gaining this great opportunity
but I ended up being quite surprised when I was the one telling them, oh well this is
you know I could tell them I could recognize and I could tell them every single material
that that basket was made out of. I could recognize so many things that an average person
would not. Their catalog card might identify the the basket as being made of plant material
like duh, but I could tell them the precise species. I can recognize for the most part
what what fiber a particular handmade string was made from if it's from California. So
the benefit works towards both parties, and a lot can be done if I think if I really
like the idea of trying to have local museums see if if we could bring those baskets close
to home, or we can visit them and learn from them. Alright anyone else? Last chance. Well
I want to thank both Tim and Linda tonight, congratulations, and before everyone leaves,
please check out the basketry, the artwork, the
books on the on the shelf there. They're beautiful.
So thank you all for coming. Another year [Applause]