Dragonfly Gala on August 13, 2016

A Chemehuevi Song: Dragonfly Lecture November 16

The Oasis of Mara

The new book, A Chemehuevi Song: The Resilience of a Southern Paiute Tribe, brings together a chorus of Native American voices, both past and present, to narrate the story of tireless efforts to gain tribal recognition and autonomy. 

Please join Clifford E. Trafzer, distinguished professor of history at UC Riverside, also the Rupert Costo Chair in American History, as he shares the story of the power of perseverance in a Dragonfly Lecture at 6 p.m. November 16, 2015, at 127 N. San Gorgonio Ave., Banning. 

Your $5 will help the nonprofit Dorothy Ramon Learning Center save and share Southern California's Native American cultures, history, languages, and traditional arts. Information: 951.849.7736.

A Laughing Lizard

At our Serrano language class on Monday, we also talked briefly about Teparxwen-yi', the San Diego horned lizard, more popularly known as a horny toad or horned toad. 

(It actually is a lizard. The fine folks at the California Herps web site offer details here.)

Here is one hunting for good food in our canyon.

© Pat Murkland Photo

Ever wonder how it got to look this way?

The Chemehuevi people know. They call this lizard Makatsatsí, according to Carobeth Laird’s masterpiece on Chemehuevi mythology, Mirror and Pattern (Malki Press 1984).

The Chemehuevi say Makatsatsí once was round, but Coyote is to blame for the way he looks now. And Cicada, too. You see, Coyote tricked Cicada.
Cicada became so angry at Coyote, he caused the wind to rise and blow very hard. Coyote and just about everyone and everything else in the village swept away in the wind, except Cicada and his cousin, Makatsatsí.
While Cicada stood and watched his great wind blow Coyote and everyone and everything in the village far away, Horned Lizard saved himself by squatting down and clinging to the Earth for dear life. He lived, but got extremely flattened by the wind. His name is related to language that means being flat, according to Laird.
Laird reports that the Chemehuevi people also saw the Makatsatsí as “a laugher, one who is easily moved to mirth.” She says: “The horned toad used not to have any horns, and he was laughing so much that his cousin (Cicada) … was afraid he would get in trouble by it, and tied flint all around his head. One time they were all together and one of the party swallowed the horned toad, who when he got way down, just turned his head from side to side, and the swallower was forced to throw him up.” (p. 141)

Following the Trail of Truth, 100 years later

DETAILS:

WHAT: Dragonfly Lecture, "Tell Them Willie Boy Was (Still) Here."

WHO: Clifford E. Trafzer, UC Riverside Costo Chair and UCR history professor.

CO-SPONSORS: Dorothy Ramon Learning Center, 

UCR Costo Chair and UCR Center for California Native Nations.

WHEN & WHERE: 6 p.m. April 20 at the Learning Center, 17 W. Hays, Banning, CA.

Your Donations at the door will benefit the Learning Center, which saves and shares Southern California's American Indian cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts.

Willie Boy, 100 years later

In what became the West’s last famous manhunt, a man named Willie Boy shot and killed another man 100 years ago at Gilman Ranch in Banning. Willie Boy then ran off with the dead man’s young daughter. A posse chased him for more than a dozen days over 600 miles of desert, finally reporting that Willie Boy killed the girl and then killed himself.

People have been arguing about what really happened ever since. As the saga of Willie Boy reaches its 100th anniversary this October, the controversy doesn’t appear to be letting up. Clifford E. Trafzer, a UC Riverside history professor, supports what many Indian people believe: He says Willie Boy escaped and lived for many years after.

Trafzer will share his research, based on oral and archival histories, in his Dragonfly Lecture, “Tell Them Willie Boy Was (Still) Here.” 

What's in the history books

Trafzer contradicts the tales famously told by Harry Lawton in the 1960 book Willie Boy, and then made more famous in the 1969 Robert Redford film, Tell Them Willie Boy is Here, and revived in 1994 by James Sandos and Larry Burgess (The Hunt for Willie Boy).

According to the legend, William Mike, a Chemehuevi Indian shaman, or religious leader, wouldn’t let Willie Boy, a Chemehuevi or Southern Paiute, marry his daughter. Willie Boy then killed Mike during the apricot harvest at Gilman Ranch in Banning, and took off with the daughter, Carlota. The October 1909 posse chase made national headlines, hyping a possible Indian uprising and warning of assassination dangers to President William Taft, who at the time was visiting Inland Southern California, many miles away from the posse chase.

During the famous chase, Willie Boy supposedly killed Carlota because she was slowing down his flight. Under the intense media spotlight, the posse reported that he then killed himself to avoid capture and said that posse members later burned his body. A plaque commemorates that site on Ruby Mountain.

“Tell them we’re all out of souvenirs,” Deputy Sheriff Cooper (Robert Redford) says in the movie when people say burning the body ruins the chance for people to see the now-dead outlaw.

What really happened?

Trafzer said his research revealed that the posse accidentally killed Carlota, mistaking her for Willie Boy, and that Willie Boy then set a trap for the posse, shooting one and watching the rest flee him. Many Indians have said for years that Willie Boy escaped and died many years later, of tuberculosis in Nevada. Trafzer agrees.

The case illustrates how the power of oral narrative often is disregarded as part of the historical record, according to Trafzer. As UCR’s Costo Chair and a UCR history professor, he emphasizes how oral narratives hold the history of Southern California Indian nations. He invites people to share their knowledge as he continues his research in what continues to be a controversial chapter in national history.

For more information about the Dragonfly Lecture, call (951) 849-4676. Remember, your donations at the door will support Dorothy Ramon Learning Center’s nonprofit work of saving and sharing Southern California’s Native American cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts.