You could feel it the moment over one hundred people poured into the San Lorenzo Library for our Acorn Processing Workshop on November 15. Fifty kids arrived on charter buses. Families crowded around the tables. People who had never cracked an acorn in their lives were suddenly shoulder to shoulder, fully invested, asking questions, grinding, sorting, and trying everything for themselves.
Last year our best attended events averaged about twelve people. So watching that level of interest unfold in real time was a moment. It was controlled chaos, but it was the best kind. The kind that tells you the work you are doing is needed, and that the community is ready for more.
We are especially grateful to our Alameda County Library partners and to the participants who stepped up to help manage the tidal wave of kids. Without that teamwork, the workshop would have looked very different. Instead, it became our largest and most successful event to date.
The 2025 Harvest: A Tough Year for Oaks
This was a low yield year for oak trees. Wildlife was competing hard for the few acorns that were out there, and most of the time we found ourselves coming in right after the animals had already done the rounds. Every harvest this season required patience, attention, and fast communication.
That is why our partners made all the difference. Their careful observations, timely updates, and willingness to keep checking trees meant we harvested what we did. It may not have been a huge year, but it was enough. And it reminded us that community monitoring is just as important as community processing.
We also want to acknowledge our newest partners for stepping up with generosity and collaboration: John Muir Land Trust, Alameda County Library, Hidden Villa, and Copal Calli. And none of this happens without the APC Farm2Market and the Alameda Recreation and Park Department. They have been with us from the start.
Community Acorns Wanted
Even with the harvest winding down, there is still room for community participation. If you have acorns to share, we can turn them into acorn flour for our educational programs and culinary sessions.
We are looking for:
Ripe, brown acorns
Whole, shells on
No holes or cracks
No mold
No caps
If you think you have a good batch, send a photo to acorns@nativehistoryproject.org along with a good pick up or drop off time. We respond quickly.
Building the Acorn Leaching Machine
If you received our fundraising letter, you already know: we’re facing the existential problems of colonization by sciencing the **** out of our TEK application for acorn leaching by making a “mechanical river”. A closed loop, self-contained acorn leaching system that functions like the river we would traditionally use to leach acorns. It is a practical, hands-on way to protect Indigenous foodways, support large-scale workshops, and teach people the full cycle of acorn processing.
The finished Acorn Leaching Machine will be shown at schools and libraries to teach kids about what it means to use science + imagination to solve the problems we face.
And yes, you can literally leave your name on this project. People who donate seventy-five dollars or more are eligible to have their name engraved on the side of the machine. It is one of the first of its kind in the region, and we want the people who helped make it possible to be recognized.
Newsletter subscribers and volunteers will get advance notice for all future events, including our upcoming adults-only acorn processing session.
Looking Ahead
The excitement around acorns is not slowing down. In 2026 we are expanding even more. We are bringing the Acorn Processing Workshop and the ACORNS! Culinary Series back to Alameda, and we are also taking the show on the road to other parts of the Bay Area. The interest, the turnout, and the energy we have seen this year make it clear that this work matters to people. So we are scaling up responsibly to meet that demand.
A Community Effort
Everything we do is powered by community support. People volunteer. People donate tools. People hand us acorns from their own backyards. People show up with their kids. People learn. People teach each other. That is what keeps this project alive.
This year proved that Indigenous foodways can ignite genuine public interest and participation. And the best part is that we are only getting started.
If you want to help, there is a place for you. If you want to learn, there is space for you. If you want to support the work, there are three real ways to do that.
Volunteer: Help facilitate events, guide participants, or offer expertise.
In-kind support: Tools, equipment, and services help us run programs year round.
Donate: Support Indigenous foodways, education, and our GIS lab through our fiscal sponsor, the Hack Foundation.
And if all you want to do is follow along and watch the growth unfold, that is fine too.
To stay informed and get advance notice for everything we do, join our newsletter.
There are a number of things I want to say about this article:
First, this is a culmination of 5+ years of research and investigation. And it was only because of the Official Statement by the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area [included in full at the end of this article] that I was finally able to put together some missing pieces about Corrina Gould’s relationship to Muwekma–specifically, her descent and her belonging to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area. During the course of researching this matter, I interviewed Tribal Attorneys, as well as members of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, and representatives from several local organizations who freely volunteered their reasons for no longer working with Corrina Gould.
Second, despite several comments by Deja Gould on public posts, neither Deja Gould, nor her mother, Corrina Gould have directly answered any of the questions presented during the course of our investigation. Sogorea Te Land Trust has only provided legally required documentation related with their tax filing and reporting duties and responsibilities as a charitable organization.
Third, I used ChatGPT to help me write this article. Specifically because I needed help keeping track of the sections, its tone, and to make sure that I created something complete and ready for publication. That said, the facts presented in this article are not AI hallucinations. This article was carefully constructed and painstakingly reviewed, over and over again, to ensure the veracity and completeness of the information presented here. My sources are open and available for anyone who wants to verify them.
Fourth, I was not paid to write this article. Doing the right thing, reporting the truth, and telling the historical background of Bay Area Native American history is the mission of this project. It’s what we do. And we do it without asking for compensation. This is an independent organization, and we are beholden to no one.
Fifth, I will not respond to personal attacks. I will not waste my time proving to anyone who I am. I do not care what you think. If your argument does not lie within the context of the material presented here, it is irrelevant to the message of this article. And your desperation to escape the truth and ignore the facts–laid bare here–is your choice.
Finally, this article was updated in November 2025 to bring it into closer alignment with the Official Statement of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area on Corrina Gould, the Confederated Villages of Lisjan, and Sogorea Te Land Trust. As of this update, neither Corrina Gould, nor Deja Gould, nor Sogorea Te Land Trust has provided any substantive response that corrects, clarifies, or refutes the documented facts presented here or in the Tribal statement.
1. Introduction
For years, Corrina Gould has positioned herself as a tribal leader, a rematriation visionary, and a voice for Ohlone land return. She has founded organizations, signed land agreements, created a land tax, received millions in funding, and claimed to speak on behalf of Ohlone people. But her story is built on fiction.
Corrina Gould is not the Chairwoman of a tribe. She is the head of a nonprofit corporation. The so-called “Confederated Villages of Lisjan” did not exist prior to 2018. It has no documented history, no enrollment records, no government, and no collective identity beyond a name she gave it. The Sogorea Te Land Trust is not an Ohlone organization. It is a nonprofit corporation led by a single unenrolled individual–someone who only discovered her genealogy because the real Ohlone tribe shared it with her.
That tribe is the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area: the only tribal government with documented continuity, legal standing, and ancestral responsibility for this land. Muwekma are the living successors of the historic, federally recognized Verona Band of Alameda County. They descend from the Indigenous people forced into Misión San José de Guadalupe, Santa Clara de Thámien, and San Francisco de Asís, and today, Muwekma has over 600 enrolled members. They have fought for their sovereignty, defended their sacred sites, and preserved their genealogy and governance through every wave of erasure: missions, courts, colonization, and nonprofits.
And yet, Muwekma is being erased again; this time, not by settlers, but by activists claiming their identity, collecting land and donations under their name, and silencing them with the language of “solidarity.”
This isn’t just confusion. This is colonization, rebranded and crowd-funded. It is settler violence in a progressive disguise. It is a lie that has been funded by foundations, platformed by institutions, and repeated by people too afraid–or too lazy–to ask basic questions: Who governs this tribe? Who are its members? Where is the money going? Who was consulted? What elections have been held?
This is a pattern of identity fraud, land misappropriation, and community displacement, and it has gone on for too long. The time for “raising questions” is over. The answers are here. And this is the record.
2. The Myth of the Confederated Villages of Lisjan
The “Confederated Villages of Lisjan” (CVL) did not exist prior to 2018. It has no historical precedent, no documentation in early ethnographic records, no mention in tribal enrollment rosters, no record in legal proceedings, and no lineage-based governance structure. It is not a tribe. It is a name invented by Corrina Gould–retroactively applied to give the appearance of a tribal coalition that never existed.
The word “Lisjan” itself is poorly understood and inconsistently used. Gould cites a 1920s interview with her ancestor, José Guzmán, who described himself as “Lisjanes”–but this was simply a reference to the place he was from: the Nisenan name for the Pleasanton area. He did not say he was from a “Lisjan Tribe.” He did not describe a confederation of villages. He was a Muwekma ancestor who spoke Spanish—maybe as a third language, after Nisenan and Chochenyo–he did not speak English, and was likely describing location, not identity. And yet, Gould has used this single, mistranslated phrase to build an entire tribal identity.
Gould publicly presents herself not just as a tribal member, but as a Tribal Chairwoman–a title that holds formal and legal weight in actual tribal governments. But her organization has no tribal enrollment. No constitutional structure. No elections. No council. No ratifying documents. There is no list of what “villages” make up the supposed confederacy. There are no lineages publicly claimed. No other representatives from these villages ever appear at events or claim descent. It is a title without a people. A nonprofit corporation posing as a nation.
In reality, Gould descends from the very same lineages as enrolled members of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area. On December 13, 2005, she requested her genealogy from then Muwekma Chairwoman Rosemary Cambra, and the Tribe’s ethnohistorian, Alan Leventhal, prepared a detailed report that traced her ancestry back to specific pre conquest Ohlone villages. It was only through Muwekma’s documentation and research that she learned she descends from Muwekma ancestors. Instead of enrolling or standing with the Tribe, she took that information and built her own identity-based platform, weaponizing documentation that was shared with her in good faith.
Her family is not excluded from Muwekma. In fact, her relatives–including her aunt and uncle, and their extended families–have been enrolled Muwekma members since 1995. Gould made a choice not to enroll. And then, she made another choice: to leverage Muwekma’s genealogy, history, and sacred sites to build her own nonprofit brand.
She presents herself as a Tribal Chairwoman–but she is the chair of a corporation. And she uses that corporation to appear as if she governs a sovereign tribal nation, when in fact, she governs nothing but a grant-seeking nonprofit made up of herself, her daughter, and a cohort of non-Native allies and unaffiliated supporters.
In its Official Statement, the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe identifies the so-called Confederated Villages of Lisjan as pure political fiction designed to enrich Gould, and describes the group as a collection of activists, many of them non Native and unrelated to one another, who share no common tribal enrollment or traditional governance.
The result is a cheap knock-off of a tribal government, built on the illusion of collective identity and the erasure of the very people whose legacy she claims to protect. Her statements and symbolism are packaged for public consumption. But there is no tribal infrastructure behind it. No cultural authority. No community accountability. It is a performance built on selective ancestry, strategic branding, and the quiet theft of another tribe’s history.
3. Funded Fabrication and Institutional Complicity
Since its creation, the Confederated Villages of Lisjan and its sister organization, Sogorea Te Land Trust, have received millions of dollars in grants, donations, and land transfers–funding that was intended to support Indigenous land return, cultural revitalization, and tribal sovereignty.
But that funding is not going to a tribe. It’s going to a nonprofit corporation with no elections, no enrollment, no federal or state recognition, and no documented governance. The public has been led to believe that Sogorea Te Land Trust is an Ohlone-led effort to rematriate ancestral lands. But in reality, the land is not being returned to a tribe… It’s being handed to an individual–who has no interest in helping her real tribe–and her nonprofit corporation.
The most egregious example is the West Berkeley Shellmound. In 2023, the City of Berkeley announced that it would transfer the historic site to Sogorea Te Land Trust. In the meeting minutes, the city described the action as “returning the land to the Ohlone people.” But this was a lie. Sogorea Te Land Trust is not an Ohlone tribe or tribally governed entity. The land was not returned to Muwekma–the only federally documented tribe connected to that site. Instead, it was handed to a nonprofit that claims Indigenous identity without legal or cultural accountability.
This supposed “return” was made possible by more than twenty million dollars in grant funding to Sogorea Te Land Trust fromRegan Pritzker’s Kataly Foundation–which the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe explicitly identifies in its Official Statement as a taking of Muwekma land rather than a return of land to the rightful tribal government.
This confusion is not accidental. Gould has intentionally blurred the line between nonprofit and tribe. She invokes language like “rematriation,” “sovereignty,” and “traditional territory,” while never disclosing that her organization has no formal recognition, no election process, no ratified tribal rolls, and no council oversight. Funders and institutions allow it because it’s easier than doing the work of real consultation.
Organizations that have partnered with CVL or STLT include:
These institutions have played a role in fabricating legitimacy. They’ve repeated claims without verification. They’ve entered into land agreements and awarded grants without consulting the federally documented tribal government whose sovereignty they’ve bypassed.
This is not accidental. This is the institutional funding of a fiction.
And every time a university, foundation, or nonprofit puts Sogorea Te Land Trust on a panel, signs an MOU, or writes a check, they’re not standing with Ohlone people. They’re standing with a narrative built on erasure–one that excludes the very tribe whose homeland they claim to “rematriate.”
4. Weaponizing Rhetoric to Avoid Accountability
Corrina Gould frequently accuses her critics–including enrolled Muwekma members–of “perpetuating colonial violence.” She uses the language of decolonization to shield herself from scrutiny and shut down legitimate questions about her identity, governance, and funding. But this is not decolonial work–it is the strategic misuse of anti-colonial rhetoric to avoid accountability.
This tactic has proven effective, especially among non-Native supporters who are unfamiliar with the difference between actual tribal sovereignty and self-appointed identity. In Gould’s framing, any critique becomes “lateral violence,” and any push for clarity is “divisive.” As a result, even basic questions–Who are your enrolled members? When do you hold elections? What is your governance structure?–are dismissed as hostile.
The irony is unavoidable: Gould accuses others of colonial harm while collaborating with the very institutions that enforced settler violence–churches, universities, real estate developers, and city governments. She denounces the legacy of the Catholic mission system while operating out of a church. She claims to speak for Ohlone people while silencing Muwekma, the tribe she descends from.
The harm here is not theoretical. Every time Gould uses progressive language to shut down real tribal voices, she reinforces the structures of colonization. She replaces truth with optics, community with control, and shared identity with personal branding.
This isn’t what decolonization looks like. It’s what erasure looks like–draped in the language of justice, funded by people too uncomfortable to ask questions, and defended by institutions more interested in performance than accountability.
5. A Reckoning Rooted in Research
This project didn’t begin with opposition. It began in good faith.
In 2020, I supported Corrina Gould. The City of Alameda was considering renaming Jackson Park to Chochenyo Park, a gesture I backed without hesitation. Gould was present at those discussions. At the time, her narrative seemed compelling. Her cause appeared righteous. Like many people, I wanted to help uplift a story that claimed to center Indigenous land and sovereignty.
So I began researching, intending to support her work. I looked for historical records, linguistic references, maps–anything that could substantiate and elevate her cause. But what I found instead was something Gould never expected anyone to look for: the truth.
And that truth pointed, again and again, not to a “Confederated Villages of Lisjan,” but to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area–the living successors of the Verona Band of Alameda County, recognized by the federal government in 1906 and unlawfully removed from recognition in 1927. Every credible source I found–mission records, ethnographic interviews, enrollment documents, BIA files–told the same story: this is Muwekma land, and Muwekma never left.
It was Muwekma who preserved the genealogy. Muwekma who fought for recognition. Muwekma who kept ceremony alive and language breathing. It was Muwekma who gave Corrina Gould the documents she now uses to claim Indigenous identity–and it is Muwekma she now displaces.
People are quick to give Corrina Gould credit–for symbolic gestures, shellmound walks, and public speaking. Some even claim she “saved the West Berkeley Shellmound.” She didn’t. The Shellmound was already destroyed. It’s a parking lot. Meanwhile, former Muwekma Chairwoman Rosemary Cambra helped save an actual Ohlone cemetery from destruction during the construction of the 680 freeway in the 1960s. That cemetery was later returned in 1971 to Andrew Galvan via the Ohlone Indian Tribe Inc., through a historic and unprecedented decision by the Catholic Church. “It’s the only piece of Californian mission property returned by the Catholic Church to a group of Indians, that I’m aware of,” said Galvan, curator of Mission Dolores in San Francisco.
That wasn’t an isolated act. In 1967, Phil Galvan [“Mr. Ohlone”] successfully advocated for the naming of Ohlone College in Fremont–ensuring that a major institution would carry the name of his people and their land. And in 1985, Rosemary Cambra again took direct action–striking an archaeologist with a shovel to stop the desecration of her ancestors’ graves by developers attempting to build a hotel in downtown San José.
These are real, measurable accomplishments–land protected, history recognized, sovereignty advanced–achieved not through branding or ceremony, but through resistance, strategy, and leadership.
Photo courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay AreaPhoto courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay AreaPhoto courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay AreaPhoto courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay AreaPhoto courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay AreaPhoto courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area
In 2024, Muwekma embarked on the Trail of Truth, a 90-day cross-country journey from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., to demand federal recognition and justice for unrecognized tribes. Along the way, they were joined by members of over 30 other tribes, fostering national intertribal relations. Upon arrival in D.C., they faced violent responses from law enforcement, including arrests and physical confrontations, as they attempted to bring their message to the nation’s leaders. Despite these challenges, Muwekma’s commitment to sovereignty and recognition remained unwavering.
Meanwhile, Corrina Gould–while formerly associated with service delivery at the American Indian Child Resource Center–has used her platform through Indigenous People Organized for Change and especially through Sogorea Te Land Trust to build what is, at its core, a personal fundraising machine, not a tribal government. And she built it at the expense of real Muwekma–and in the Chochenyo context, Muwekma means “the people” [“la gente“.] She has rebranded the people as herself, and turned their collective legacy into her private gain.
Her base of support is not grounded in local tribal governance. It comes largely from non-Native institutions, funders, and Native individuals with no ancestral ties to this land. Meanwhile, the real Ohlone Tribe is pushed aside in favor of symbolic leadership that offers visibility, but not accountability.
Once faced with the facts, I had to admit that I was wrong. I had been led by a compelling story–but the truth was stronger. So I did what solidarity demands: I apologized, publicly withdrew my support for the Confederated Villages of Lisjan, and committed to telling the truth.
Because protecting Indigenous sovereignty sometimes means telling hard truths–and refusing to participate in feel-good illusions.
6. The Harm Is Real (And Measurable)
This isn’t just a difference in opinion. It isn’t a clash of personalities. And it certainly isn’t a harmless misunderstanding.
When institutions platform Corrina Gould as a tribal leader, or treat the Confederated Villages of Lisjan as a legitimate tribal government, they are doing more than making a mistake–they are actively undermining the sovereignty of the real Ohlone Tribe. They are diverting resources, land, funding, and political capital away from Muwekma, and into the hands of a private organization with no legal standing, no elections, and no tribal citizenry.
This harm isn’t abstract. It’s measurable.
Millions of dollars in philanthropic and public funding intended for Indigenous land return and cultural revitalization have gone to a nonprofit corporation with no recognized tribal status.
Shuumi Land Tax–individuals and institutions are encouraged to believe they are contributing directly to “the Ohlone people,” yet the money flows to Sogorea Te Land Trust rather than to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, which further entrenches a fictional framework and diverts resources away from the only tribal government tied to this land.
Public institutions, including cities and universities, have entered into consultation relationships with Gould and her affiliates, bypassing Muwekma entirely–despite Muwekma’s documented federal recognition and direct ancestral connection to the land in question.
Land acknowledgments, educational materials, and grant applications are being written and approved using a fictional framework, misleading the public and distorting the historical record.
Nonprofits and state agencies increasingly treat Sogorea Te Land Trust as the default Ohlone contact, creating a monopoly of voice that drowns out the actual tribe’s legal claims and cultural continuity.
These are not harmless errors. They are a form of structural erasure–the exact kind that has plagued Native nations for generations. When land meant for Indigenous people is given to a nonprofit posing as a tribe, that is not reparation. That is dispossession in progressive packaging.
This is particularly dangerous because the harm is disguised as justice. The very people who claim to be “decolonizing” are recoding colonization into a new language of rematriation, visibility, and inclusion–but behind the optics, the effect is the same: the real tribe is left out. The real tribe is defunded. The real tribe is made invisible.
And let’s be clear: the people being erased are not theoretical. Muwekma has over 600 enrolled members. They are the living successors of the Verona Band. They have filed lawsuits, preserved records, won recognition, buried their dead, held their ceremonies, and never left their land.
But when outsiders accept Gould’s narrative at face value–when they hand over land and money without due diligence–they don’t just cause confusion. They help erase those 600+ people from the public record and from the future of their own homeland.
This harm is worsened by the fact that many of Gould’s supporters are not Ohlone, not from this territory, and in many cases, not even Native. Her occupation of Sogorea Te (Glen Cove Park in Vallejo) was carried out over the objections of local Wintu and Patwin tribal leaders, who viewed her presence as invasive and inappropriate–and who were already in the middle of negotiations with the city. Once again, her support came not from the tribes whose land she claimed to defend, but from outsiders–many of whom lacked the cultural or historical context to recognize the damage being done.
This isn’t pan-Indigenous solidarity. This is outsider-enabled erasure masquerading as justice.
And if you’ve ever promoted Corrina Gould as a tribal leader… If you’ve ever funded Sogorea Te Land Trust believing it was an Ohlone-run tribal entity… If you’ve ever written a land acknowledgment, curriculum, or policy that names CVL without verifying its legitimacy…
Then you’ve been part of this harm.
You didn’t just uplift the wrong narrative. You helped erase a federally documented tribe. You helped redirect land, funding, and power away from 600 living descendants of the Verona Band–and handed it to a nonprofit that exists because Muwekma gave one woman access to her genealogy.
This isn’t theoretical. This is real. Real people. Real land. Real erasure.
You didn’t decolonize anything. You just changed the branding.
7. This Is Muwekma Land
Photo courtesy of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Let’s be clear: this is the unceded ancestral homeland of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area.
The East Bay–including the very places where Corrina Gould operates, where cities write “rematriation” into land agreements, and where nonprofit funders congratulate themselves on “land return”–sits squarely within the ethnohistoric territory of the Chochenyo- and Thámien-speaking Ohlone tribal groups and intermarried Muwekma Ohlone and Bay Miwok ancestors. These were not abstract “villages.” They were governed communities with kinship ties, linguistic identity, and ceremonial responsibilities. Their descendants are now enrolled in the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe.
These people were forced into Misión San José de Guadalupe, Misión Santa Clara de Thámien, and Misión San Francisco de Asís. Their names and records exist in the mission rolls, in the ethnographic interviews, in the early court filings, and in the federal Indian rolls. Their presence on this land was never erased–only ignored.
Muwekma didn’t vanish. Muwekma was excluded–deliberately and illegally. And they never stopped fighting to be seen.
They are not a nonprofit. They are not a brand. They are not “one of many Ohlone groups.” They are the documented, federally acknowledged, and unlawfully derecognized successors of the Verona Band of Alameda County–and the only Ohlone tribal government with a continuous ancestral, cultural, and political presence in this region.
They are the tribe that:
Has maintained ceremonial stewardship of sacred sites and burials.
Has documented every ancestral line with forensic-level precision.
Has filed for federal restoration and fought institutional exclusion for over a century.
Has survived the missions, the ranchos, the Gold Rush, the boarding schools, and the bureaucracies–and is still here.
To pretend that this land is “returned” by handing it to a nonprofit corporation with no governing authority, no intertribal legitimacy, and no community accountability is not just inaccurate–it is a continuation of colonization.
It is the institutional funding and support of settler colonial violence–the same erasure, dispossession, and genocide that removed tribes from their land in the first place, now rebranded as “rematriation” for white comfort.
The land hasn’t been returned until it’s returned to the people it was taken from.
This is not “Lisjan territory.” This is not “rematriated space.” This is Muwekma land.
8. To Stand With Ohlone People Is to Stand With Muwekma
By now, the facts are clear:
The Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area is the only tribal government with documented continuity, legal standing, and ancestral responsibility for this land.
Their aboriginal homeland includes what is now known as San Francisco, San Mateo, most of Santa Clara, Alameda, and Contra Costa Counties, as well as portions of Napa, Santa Cruz, Solano, and San Joaquin Counties.
The present-day Muwekma Ohlone Tribe consists of the descendants of the Indigenous people who were forced into Misión San José de Guadalupe, Santa Clara de Thámien, and San Francisco de Asís.
Cities like Oakland, Berkeley, Emeryville, Albany, El Cerrito, Richmond, Fremont, Hayward, Niles, and Pleasanton sit squarely within this territory.
Still, some people will ask, “Why are you criticizing other Indigenous-led groups?”
Here’s the answer:
“Representation isn’t just about who shows up — it’s about how they show up. When groups claim Indigenous identity without tribal recognition, without elections, and without consulting other Native peoples, it’s not real representation. Holding people accountable protects Indigenous identity — it doesn’t attack it.”
Others will say, “Aren’t you worried this undermines solidarity?”
Not if you understand what real solidarity is:
“Solidarity built on misinformation is a weak foundation. Real solidarity requires honesty — even when it’s uncomfortable. Protecting Indigenous sovereignty sometimes means telling hard truths, not participating in feel-good illusions.”
And if you’re asking, “Well, what should I do instead?”
Start here: “Support federally recognized and state-recognized tribes, or groups with real historic documentation and transparent leadership. Always ask: Who benefits? Who was consulted? Where is the money going? Good intentions matter — but real relationships and accountability matter more.”
Let’s stay focused on the facts. It’s not about personal feelings — it’s about who has the rightful voice, and who’s building legitimacy at the expense of Indigenous communities.
If you’ve platformed Corrina Gould or the Confederated Villages of Lisjan without doing your homework, then yes–you’ve been misled. Now that you know Sogorea Te Land Trust is not an Ohlone tribe or organization, it’s on you to stop giving them money and land. Because at this point, you’re not helping–you’re enabling the lie. You’re disrespecting the real Ohlone Tribe and their 600+ enrolled members, and you’re disrespecting their ancestors’ living legacy.
Non-Native people created this problem, and then doubled down and made it worse. So it’s on them to fix it–by demanding accountability. Find out where your money is going. Ask who’s being left out. Demand that Sogorea Te Land Trust include the rightful Ohlone tribe of the East Bay: the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area.
If non-Native people are really about all this land defender and water protector, rematriation, land back rhetoric they love to post about– Then they’ll fight just as hard for a real tribe As they fight for a fucking parking lot.
“Indigenous sovereignty isn’t a brand. It’s a responsibility to the ancestors and a duty to future generations. I’m here to protect that — without apology.”
An Ethnohistory of Santa Clara Valley and Adjacent Regions: Historic Ties of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe and Tribal Stewardship Over the Tupiun Táareštak Site (CA-SCL-894) Monica V. Arellano, Alan Leventhal, Rosemary Cambra, Shelia Guzman Schmidt, Gloria Arellano Gomez (2014) PDF Link
Public Statement on Corina Gould, the Confederated Villages of Lisjan, and Sogorea Te Land Trust Received directly from the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area (May 1, 2025)
Ohlone/Costanoan Indians of the San Francisco Peninsula and Their Neighbors, Yesterday and Today (2009) Randall Milliken, Laurence H. Shoup, Beverly R. Ortiz – for the National Park Service PDF Link
A Time of Little Choice: The Disintegration of Tribal Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area 1769–1810 (1995) Randall Milliken – Ballena Press Anthropological Papers No. 43 Publisher Link
J.P. Harrington Chochenyo Field Notes and Vocabulary (1921) Smithsonian Institution – National Anthropological Archives, Collection of John Peabody Harrington
Ancient and Modern Genomics of the Ohlone Indigenous Population of California (2022) Severson, Ramstetter, Kennett, et al. – Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) PDF Link
By Gabriel Duncan, Researcher, Alameda Native History Project
Ozone is increasingly discussed as a way to manage stored acorns intended for food. It is already permitted in the United States as an antimicrobial agent for certain food uses when applied under good manufacturing practice. Because acorns are rich in unsaturated fats, the question is not only whether ozone reduces microbes, but whether it also changes the underlying lipids in ways that matter for quality and compliance.
When ozone reacts with unsaturated fatty acids, it follows a defined chemical pathway. It can form primary oxidation products (lipid hydroperoxides, measured as peroxide value), secondary oxidation products (aldehydes and ketones), and cyclic peroxides called ozonides. Studies on ozonated vegetable oils and high fat foods show that these reactions can be significant and persistent, and that ozonated lipids are chemically modified compared to the original oils.
Food science uses objective indices to evaluate oxidative quality. Peroxide value is a marker of primary oxidation. Aldehyde related tests, such as p-anisidine value, indicate secondary oxidation. Many commercial and compendial standards treat materials with values above defined limits, often around 10 to 20 milliequivalents of active oxygen per kilogram for refined oils, as oxidatively deteriorated and out of specification. These tools can be applied to ozone treated acorns to see whether their lipid quality remains within accepted ranges.
Regulatory principles are also relevant. Ozone is allowed as a processing aid when its use does not result in unsafe residues or unfit food. Food that is decomposed or that contains unsafe added substances can be considered adulterated. Ingredients that do not meet applicable quality criteria are not used as standard raw materials in foods represented as wholesome.
For these reasons, ozone treated acorns proposed for food use should be evaluated through established analytical tests, rather than assumed equivalent to traditionally processed acorns in the absence of data.
This is the kind of careful, evidence based work we do at Alameda Native History Project. We research, we verify, and we translate complex science into clear information our communities can use. This supports the revival of Indigenous foodways and shows a real, measurable contribution to STEM rooted in Native leadership and priorities. If you value this work, please consider supporting it with a donation.
Thank you for all of your support. For coming to our events, playing with the maps on our website, volunteering for the Acorn Harvest, and for checking out our printed maps and other merch.
I am writing to you now because I want you to know that your support is appreciated, and that it has had an impact on our mission, to educate the community about local Native history through maps, advocacy, and experiential learning opportunities. Your support is helping to reopen Indigenous foodways, a tangible benefit made possible by your participation and generosity.
The journey over the past year has been exciting, humbling, and rewarding. We have made so much progress! And one of the most exciting places we’ve made progress is in the way we leach acorns at scale.
Meeting the Challenge
We faced the existential challenges presented by pollution, climate change, loss of native wildlands and animals, and a lack of fresh, free flowing water. If the traditional way of leaching acorns is using a basket in a river or stream: how can we do that when all of our water has been polluted, and diverted into culverts? The answer was to build our own river.
Proof of Concept
The first Acorn Leaching Machine was cobbled together with plastic never-used trash cans fitted with PVC piping. It connected a DIY water filtration system with hand packed filter cartridges, an elaborate acorn tray setup, and a well pump. I hand-sewed the muslin acorn sacks. The first machine ran too hot, and wasn’t terribly food safe. But it was a proof of concept; a successful first generation.
From Prototype to Food-Safe Design
The second machine, the most current design, features some very significant upgrades.
Stainless steel, weld-less design
Food grade, with as little plastic as possible
Completely new cooling system
Upgraded to full-scale, food-safe, whole-house filtration system (multi-stage)
Housed on a mobile platform for presentations at schools and libraries
A Tangible Tribal Benefit
When complete, the flour produced by this system will go on offer to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area (and to the wider Indigenous community) as a tangible tribal benefit to the first people of this place. For free. It will feed ceremonies, meals, and gatherings, and it will travel to classrooms, libraries, and community spaces as a mobile teaching tool. Together, we are restoring a foodway that has not existed in over three centuries, and showing that food is medicine; traditional food is medicine.
Now, we are poised to leach acorns at scale. To produce consistent, safe, traditional food. Without compromise. Your impact will be more tangible than you could ever imagine.
The Final Push
Every contribution, every hour volunteered, and every conversation shared has led to this moment. Reopening Indigenous foodways isn’t symbolic–it’s real work with tangible results. The Acorn Leaching Machine is more than equipment; it is a living example of innovation and restoration working together. It shows what can happen when we adapt ancestral knowledge to meet the challenges created by colonization and environmental change.
We’ve already come this far with community effort, a partial grant from the Alameda Public Art Commission, and your continued support. Now, we’re preparing to complete the machine, to upgrade the last of its fittings and mount it securely to the moving platform that will carry it into classrooms, libraries, and public spaces across the region.
This is the final push. Every donation, no matter the size, brings us closer to completion.
Make Your Impact Visible
For gifts of $75 or more, your name will be etched directly onto the stainless steel Acorn Leaching Machine, a visible acknowledgment of the community who helped make this restoration possible. Each name will stand for someone who chose to take action and help reopen Indigenous foodways in a tangible way.
Your continued support is helping to decolonize our diet, rebuild the relationship between people and the land, and remind our communities that food is medicine, and traditional food is medicine. This is what it means to turn gratitude into action.
With gratitude,
Gabriel Duncan Founder, Alameda Native History Project
In one of the most famous scenes from the 1982 movie Poltergeist, a suburban home begins to collapse into chaos. A mother, played by JoBeth Williams, slips into a half-finished swimming pool as a storm rages above her. The water churns with mud, lightning flashes, and dozens of corpses rise to the surface. Coffins burst through the ground. Skeletons float around her, brushing against her arms as she screams for help.
It looks like pure Hollywood horror. But what most people don’t know is that those weren’t fake skeletons. They were real human remains.
When Poltergeist was filmed, the production used actual human skeletons for the pool scene because they were cheaper and more realistic than plastic props at the time. The special effects team bought them from a company that supplied anatomical specimens to universities.
In the early 1980s, high-quality plastic skeletons weren’t common, and real ones cost less. It was a practical but deeply questionable choice. When the story came out, it added to the film’s reputation for being cursed. Crew members, including the special effects artist Craig Reardon, later confirmed in interviews and court depositions that the skeletons were genuine.
That detail has become Hollywood legend, a bit of trivia traded at Halloween parties.
But when I say “Alameda was made with real skeletons, too,” it isn’t a punchline… It’s history.
Alameda Times Star Tuesday, April 23, 1901
ROAD PAVED WITH BONES
Grewsome Covering On Bay Island Thoroughfare.
Skeletons of Indians From the Old Mound Found to Make Perfect Paving
The road from the Bay Farm Island bridge south toward the island is being paved with human bones. The city, under whose supervision the work is being done, had no intention of putting such grewsome covering on the road when the improvement was undertaken. it was understood that the earth to make the fill with was to be taken from the old mound in the Sather tract. it was supposed that a few Indians had been buried there in the long, long ago, but was never imagined that when the mound was levelled to build the Bay Farm Island road that human bones would be found there as thick as the sands of the sea.
The horror was never hidden. It was printed in black and white. Alameda’s own newspapers documented the use of Native graves as paving material and no one stopped it.
Shellmounds were cemeteries built by Ohlone people. They were not ancient ruins of some vanished people; they were active burial grounds and ceremonial places within living memory when the United States was declaring independence.
In 1776, Ohlone communities were still here, speaking their language, tending their lands, and burying their dead. They were later forced into missions and labor camps designed to destroy their way of life, and Ohlone Peoples’ ties to their language, beliefs, and cultural practices.
By the time Americans arrived in California, settlers pretended the people were gone.
Newspapers and government officials asked “Where are all the Indians?” while state militias and vigilantes carried out massacres. California’s first governor, Peter Burnett, openly declared that a war of extermination would be waged until the Native race was gone.
Within that system of genocide, settlers desecrated Ohlone cemeteries.
They dug into cemeteries and smashed human bones–not shells, but skulls, ribs, and limbs–into fragments. Those remains were shoveled into carts and mixed with lime to make concrete for sidewalks, roads, and foundations.
Bone dust and ash were spread across fields and gardens, used as fill to raise ground and fertilize crops.
The people who did this didn’t move the bodies with care or ceremony. They desecrated graves and used human remains as raw material for construction. They built the city of Alameda out of Ohlone cemeteries.
Some of the remains were sold to museums and universities, including UC Berkeley, where they were tagged and stored as “specimens.” [There are still thousands of stolen, unclaimed ancestors languishing in UC Berkeley’s crypt.]
Others were discarded, dumped, or paved over. This was not accidental archaeology. It was desecration committed in the shadow of a government that had already declared open war on Native people. By any moral or legal measure, it was a violation of human rights and human dignity.
Alameda once had several shellmounds. But only one of them was known until the Alameda Native History Project did the research and work that institutions like the Alameda Museum were too afraid or disinterested to do, and discovered there were at least 4 shellmounds in Alameda.
The bodies of Ohlone people were razed and pulverized to build the City of Alameda.
Developers leveled shellmounds (Ohlone cemeteries) to grade the city. Local newspapers reported on these uses as they were happening. Ohlone human remains and funerary items were used in landfill across the island, including Bay Farm Road, which was literally paved with bones.
These burial grounds are still being disturbed. Human remains are still unearthed during construction, and the City of Alameda knows exactly where these cemeteries are.
The city knows what was done to the bodies of Ohlone people and still refuses to acknowledge it.
There are no protections, no memorials, and no apologies.
The Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area, direct descendants of the Ohlone people whose cemeteries were destroyed, continue to fight for recognition, repatriation, and truth about what lies beneath the city.
So when I say “Alameda was made with real skeletons,” it’s not metaphor or exaggeration. The city’s foundations were literally built with the bodies of Ohlone ancestors, disturbed, ground up, and reused without consent. That is not heritage. It is desecration, theft, and ongoing violence. It is a crime against memory, and against humanity.
This city cannot call itself progressive while it buries the truth. Alameda must acknowledge the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area, apologize for the desecration of Ohlone cemeteries, and take immediate steps to protect the remaining burial grounds.
Every sidewalk, every home foundation, every patch of landfill poured on top of those graves is a reminder that justice has not yet been done.
It is time for residents, allies, and institutions to advocate for justice for the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area and demand accountability from the city that built itself on their ancestors’ bones.
Until there is public acknowledgment, apology, and action, Alameda remains complicit in the California Genocide.
Ohlone people buried their loved ones in mounds long before any of us ever came here.
They’re called shellmounds.
The “Ancient Indian Burial Mounds” of Ohlone people–ancestors of the present-day Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area.
They were built long before any of this was here.
Long before some old dead white dudes squatted on what was then a peninsula. Before it got dredged into an Island and eventually called “Alameda.”
Long before this place was called la Bolsa de Encinal to Mexicans, land grant parcels on the extension of former Mission Lands that stretched north from San Jose de Guadalupe, to the Carquinez Strait.
Long before Ohlone were called Costanoan, when Portola came through in who-cares-when. Before the missions were founded in 1776[–which is the same time a meddlesome group of colonists declared their independence from England on the East Coast of this continent.]
Even longer before: when this area was just a valley with a little river in it…..
THIS PLACE HAS BEEN OHLONE TERRITORY SINCE TIME IMMEMORIAL
10,000+ years of habitation meant those shellmounds were real, and big.
There were thousands of shellmounds all over the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of the biggest recorded shellmounds were in Emeryville.
At least 4 shellmounds were right here, in Alameda.
And while many may not exist above ground.
Ohlone Ancestors still lie in wait below.
To be discovered during foundation upgrades, trenching, and in-ground pool installations.
The Shellmounds of Alameda
I grew up in a pre-victorian house on Court Street, about a block away from my grandparent’s house, which was firmly on the edge of the Mound Street Shellmound, around Santa Clara and Mound Street.
Being an Indian kid, adopted out of his tribe from birth, raised on an island that’s just as well known for its racism as it is the former naval air station, things were tough. And, I’ll be honest, I only ever wanted to go home.
So, maybe it was my spirit calling that influenced what I saw as a child. Because my white adopted parents’ money paid for all the psychological and physical testing that proved I wasn’t suffering from some psychosis or more serious condition. [Laying down in a dark room with electrodes attached to my head was an interesting experience.]
I never really got a lot of peace in that house when I was alone. From an early age, I learned not to go too far into the basement by myself. Not necessarily because it was dangerous; but because other things lived there.
The House on Court Street
The Bad Dream Light
Before my sister came to live with us, (she’s adopted, too; and came home in 1989,) I slept in the room which would become hers.
It was a small, narrow room, with popcorn ceiling, and walls; with access to the attic through a panel in the ceiling of the closet.
Next to the was an old “ancient” light fixture which had probably been there since the house was electrified. [It was also moved from the corner of Benton & Santa Clara to the place on the 1300 block of Court Street where this all occurs.]
My dad remembers that I called that the “Bad Dream Light”. He doesn’t remember why specifically. But, he told me, when it came time to pick which room I would sleep in once my sister arrived, I picked the room at the front of the house–not the one with the light.
This is only a footnote about myself that was told to me. And it shrouds the next story in even more mystery because it makes me wonder if it came from the attic.
Ruby In the Attic
My earliest memory of something being a little off seems somewhat inconsequential. It’s more of a passing note.
But, at some point, I remember finding some jewelry in my mom’s jewelry box and somehow knowing that it was the kind of jewelry that Ruby used to wear.
I never met someone named Ruby; and I have no idea how I could know that. But I remember telling my dad that Ruby was the woman who lived in the attic.
Of course, nobody could live in the attic; it was just a crawl space.
This whole thing was forgotten until many years later, into my adulthood, when I remembered this, and asked my Dad who Ruby was. [In fact, I asked both my parents, and my birth mother.]
It turns out: Ruby is the name of my father’s great aunt.
The Procession in the Hallway
I don’t like talking about this. Because, out of all my experiences, this is the one that legitimately makes me seem crazy. Despite the confidence of having had a total psychological and physical work up, and knowing this wasn’t the product of some kind of illness: it’s still something that bothers me to this day.
Have you ever had a light shined in your eyes that you could see even after you closed them? Like a silvery, shadowy afterimage burned into your retinas? Some people call them “eidetic images”, mental images with unusual vividness–an exceptional ability that only children between 6 and 12 are able to possess.
Now, imagine you’re a 6 year old who can’t sleep; so you went into the living room, and are watching late-night/early-morning television on the big recliner in front of the T.V.
At some point, you become aware of something moving out of the corner of your eye. So you look. And what you see is the outline, a silvery shadowy outline of a person. And it’s walking down the hallway.
You watch, as it walks down the hallway, behind the living room wall…. And then appears in the other living room entryway, at the same pace, in the same manner. Just minding its own business.
It can’t be real. Because it looks just like the afterimage of a bright light shined in your face. And you know no one’s there, because it’s too late, it’s night time, and there’s no one there.
But it is.
Except, it’s not minding its business. It has noticed you. So it’s stopped, and turned to face you directly, staring back. With no face, no details, just this weird shadowy figure.
You will the thing to go away, to leave you alone. But it does not disappear when you close your eyes and open them again. It turns back and walks down the hall on its own time.
In the beginning it was just one figure watching me from the hallway. Then it was two or three.
If I kept my eyes on the TV and pretended like I didn’t notice them, they would keep going, only occasionally stopping to look at me.
It terrified me to see them. But my room was also terrifying on its own, too. Sometimes the bed would move, vibrate, or I would … feel like there was something waiting to pour forth from my closet the whole time.
But it wasn’t as simple as just ignoring them.
They never came into the living room. Never approached me. Never made a sound.
But there were so many that the hallway seemed crowded.
Something changed that made it stop. I can’t remember what.
But it’s worth noting that from the time I was born and lived in that house, the neighboring block, the former site of Lincoln School, had been razed and was being developed into the south-west inspired houses that sit there now. [From 1986 to 1991 at least.]
Considering how many burials are still being unearthed in 2025: Who knows how many burials were hiding just below the surface of the former high school grounds.
Is it possible that I saw Ohlone ancestors wandering through my house, searching for their way back home? Or were they the figment of an overactive imagination?
The Basement Double
Because the house had been moved from its original lot at Benton Street and Santa Clara Avenue, it never had a real foundation. At some point, my dad had paid for a foundation to be built underneath the half that held our bedrooms, but the rest of the “foundation” was a collection of 4×4 posts sitting on piles of bricks.
This meant the “basement”–the ground floor of the house–was mostly dirt, covered by plywood.
The basement was always spooky. Not because it was dark, or dangerous. But because I could tell something else lived there. And that I was an interloper. It’s a feeling that never left me, no matter how well let, or how cozy it ever became.
When it was still mostly unfinished, the two most recognizable rooms were the laundry room, and the workshop. Early on, my dad spent a lot of time in both. Mostly doing laundry, and sometimes tinkering in the workshop. If he couldn’t be found upstairs, he was downstairs doing either.
To get to the “basement”, you would go out a side door in the back of the house, and walk down a staircase that wrapped around to the exterior door–which was padlocked shut when no one was in there.
Usually, I could be left to my own devices. I would entertain myself or play games, read books. But at this point in the day, I got bored and went looking for my dad.
I checked the bedrooms, the kitchen, and the bathroom. No one was around. So, I figured he was probably downstairs.
When I poked my head out of the side door, I saw the back of him turn the corner at the bottom landing.
I shouted, “Dad!”
And jumped down the stars a landing at a time. Reaching the bottom and turning just in time to see him disappear into the basement.
At this point I’m thinking he’s playing a game. So I rushed into the basement calling out for him.
But the basement was dark. There was no sign my dad was down there. The washing machine wasn’t running. There were no lights on anywhere, not in the workshop. Not in the garage.
I realized very quickly that I was alone.
That, maybe, this was a trap.
And with these realizations, things started to feel like they were closing in on me. I felt exposed. Viscerally. Almost … in danger.
Even though I knew I should probably run, I felt frozen.
It wasn’t until I heard the toilet flush upstairs that I was able to gather my wits, and zoom out the door.
I caught my dad just as he was coming out of the bathroom door.
Not wanting to let on about the terrifying experience I just escaped, I cried, “Oh, there you are!”
The Vertebra
I found a bone in the dirt in this little room in the back of the basement. The room itself was squared off by walls, and it had a large step of poured concrete, much like a bulk-head–but very much unlike every other part of the basement. This looked like the most built up part of the whole house to be honest. Even though it lacked real walls, and a real floor.
I was messing around in the dirt in the back there, because it was so powdery and light. It was just dust, I liked running my hands through it because of its smooth, silky texture.
And that’s when I found it.
A bone, pale, pitted, but whole. With no obvious cuts or missing pieces: I could tell it was a vertebra. [Because reference books were my only friends.]
When I showed my mom, she told me it was a dog.
Or a cow, when I pushed back. But I knew.
I kept that bone for years. The last time I saw it was in my room, on my bookshelf. But I can’t tell you where it is today. It’s probably somewhere in storage, waiting to be re-discovered.
Living on a Haunted Island
My house wasn’t the only place where I experienced things. Most of Alameda is haunted by its own past. The Shellmounds of Alameda had long been used as overspread, the bones of Muwekma ancestors used for fertilizing rose bushes … and paving Bay Farm Road.
But even its more contemporary history echoed in the abandoned halls of buildings long forgotten.
My personal history of exploring the abandoned buildings on the former Alameda naval air station as a teenager is extensive.
And some of the most heart-pounding experiences I have ever shared with my friends have taken place in buildings that no longer even stand today.
This is not to introduce a story so far away from home as it is to introduce the fact that I have had experiences which have been shared and witnessed with other people.
The Swaying Woman in the Closet
At some point during my teenage years, I had removed the door from my closet. My childhood fears of what lurked inside had been abandoned.
In that version of my bedroom layout, my bed was positioned directly across from the closet.
One night, a friend was sleeping over. The lights were off. We were getting ready to go to sleep. I was just starting to relax when I noticed some movement out of the corner of my eye.
In the doorway of the closet, there was the outline or shadow of a woman with long hair.
She was standing there. Her feet were planted. But she was swaying side to side–moving left to right unnaturally fast. Ping-ponging in place between the door jambs.
No human could move that way. And no one else was in the room besides us. This woman wasn’t really there. Even though I could see her, and feel her angry, unsettled energy.
I saw it. But, I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to scare my friend.
After a moment, they asked, “Do you see that?”
Which meant they saw it too.
I just replied, “Go to sleep,”
And pulled the blanket over their head.
Rosa in the Den
Rosa was a rescue dog from Guatemala. A collie type dog with calico colors and spots.
At this point, I was in my 20’s. The house had been renovated almost a decade ago, so there was a den in the basement now, with a real locking door to the rest of the still-unfinished basement.
My sister’s dog had recently passed. He was a miniature Dachshund who succumbed to old age. This happened not long after.
Rosa and I would sit downstairs on the couch in the den and watch TV together. (She had actually started watching it with me, commenting in her own way on what was happening on the screen. Which was … almost more fun to watch than TV.)
Tonight was no different.
Except, Rosa suddenly cued up on something.
She started, and looked at the recliner across from us. Then she seemed to watch something go from the recliner to the floor. And continued to track something as it went under the coffee table directly in front of us.
Then she let out a whimper. And covered her eyes with her paws.
I couldn’t ask her what she saw. But it seemed like it was small, almost like another animal. I still wonder about it to this day.
The Bureau Shadow
Sometimes it was hard to tell if I was just imagining things. If something was really there. Or if I were somehow picking up on the echoes of the past.
Upstairs, on the main floor, the renovations to the house saw an addition of a bathroom in my parents’ room, as well as the removal of the walls separating the living room from the hallway and the dining room. We now had an open floor plan, and stairs leading down into the den from the dining room.
Other changes had been made. For instance, the front door now had a frosted glass oval window in the center, and another window frame on top. This allowed the porch light to illuminate the whole space with a gentle glow.
I could basically walk in a diagonal line from my room to the bathroom. I guess that’s not really a big deal now that I think of it. But I wonder why I didn’t just take that route one night when I saw a shadow in the hallway.
It wasn’t one of the things I used to see walking through the hall when I was younger. This was different.
In the hallway, along the wall between my sister’s bedroom door–the narrow bedroom between my parents’ and mine … was a bureau of draws, about waist height, with a mirror mounted lengthwise on top.
It was long, sturdy. And it used to belong to my mom’s parents. My grandmother used it, and it used to have a picture of me and her wedged in the frame. But that was long ago.
Now it was in the hallway. And it held linen and place settings for the dining room table.
But there was something else there tonight.
A shadow of a person. Standing in front of the bureau, its hands flat on the table top, gazing into the mirror.
I could have walked around it, like I said. I probably should have. But, for some reason, I didn’t. I thought, like all of the other strange things, it would just disappear as soon as I came too close to it.
I was wrong.
It only became more solid the closer I got.
Until I was standing next to it.
Realizing that it was blocking the light.
And that I could sense its presence like you can sense someone standing next to you.
I didn’t walk through it. I didn’t touch it. In fact, I moved around it, and said, “Excuse me”, as I passed.
Then I went into my room. Locked the door. And didn’t leave for the rest of the night.
The Grandparents’ House on the Shellmound
My dad’s parents lived three blocks away from us. At about Santa Clara Avenue, and Mound Street. Well within the bounds of the shellmound on Mound Street.
I never felt alone in that house. And I never really felt at ease. It always seemed like I was just one corner away from seeing something I was really prepared for. Whatever that thing would be. I felt it lurking in the walls, behind every door, and inside every cabinet.
The place vibrated with a strong, unsettling feeling. Even outside, I felt like everything inside was watching me through the windows. Was waiting for me behind the trees. Even in the open space of the backyard, the detached shed–which was actually a nice, newer, single room building–had that vibe to it.
Something not necessarily foreboding, but just not entirely welcoming or at-ease.
I was the most scared of the dorm room on the third floor my dad and his three brothers (my uncles) shared growing up. But the basement–real basement–with my grandpa’s den and the cellar were a very close second. However, I felt like I could stay there for a little longer without feeling too creeped out.
Up on the third floor, I became paranoid that things were happening on the floors below me, just out of sight. But down in the den, I didn’t want to turn my back on anything.
My fear of the house was so strong that I never wanted to stay the night. Ever. And I don’t think I ever stayed more than one night at any time.
The last time I slept there, I slept in the living room on the couch because I didn’t want to go any deeper into the house.
My dad’s cousin said he and my uncles used to dig up arrowheads in the cellar. I never ventured onto the dirt over there. Even after both my grandparents had passed, it was my job to pack up the house. My partner at the time was there, working with me.
Our workflow was to pick up stuff, wrap it in packing paper, then put it in a box, label the box, seal it up, and transfer it to storage.
One of the first things I did was teach myself how to use the security system, and assign myself and all my family members separate pins for the alarm. It seemed important because I wanted to make sure the house was secure since no one was living inside it anymore. It was a basic system that chimed and announced when a door or window was opened.
So my partner and I had managed to make really good progress on packing everything up, and had managed to work our way down to the den.
At some point, we ran out of some packing supplies. My partner stayed working in the den as I locked the door and left to get more.
When I came back, he was visibly shaken. And he wanted to know if I had come back earlier.
When I asked him why, he told me that he heard someone come into the house, and walk all the way to the back room, where my grandparents used to sit and watch TV all the time.
No one else was in the house. The alarm would have announced an open door. But there was no record of any event other than my return.
Maybe I never saw anything in the house because I never wanted to. Because I was scared enough just being there that I didn’t need to.
I still dream about both my childhood house, and my grandparents’ house. They’re usually nightmares about growing up on the burial mound.
It wasn’t until I started doing local research that I learned about the other shellmounds in Alameda.
I know I’m not the only one who’s had these experiences.
Hopefully this gives other people the courage to reach out and share theirs.
A Living Model for Indigenous-Led Environmental and Cultural Restoration
The ACORNS! Project Arc is an Indigenous-led initiative of the Alameda Native History Project that restores the living relationship between people, oaks, and the land that sustains them. It was created to provide tangible tribal benefit by rebuilding systems of reciprocity where cultural revitalization and environmental repair move forward together.
The project transforms Indigenous ecological knowledge into collective action, bringing together community members, educators, and tribal partners in a continuous cycle of gathering, building, and sharing. Every part of the Arc, from granary construction and willow harvests to acorn processing and community meals, creates measurable benefit for Indigenous people while offering the broader public a respectful way to take part in restoration guided by Native leadership.
Reconnecting People and Land
ACORNS! grew from the Alameda Native History Project’s broader effort to document Indigenous history and revive living foodways in the San Francisco Bay Area. What began as community-based educational events evolved into a working model of Indigenous stewardship.
The project’s foundation is reciprocity: the idea that cultural and ecological restoration must return real value to Indigenous people, not just symbolic recognition. Through every stage, participants learn how care for the land, material use, and community participation can be expressions of sovereignty and responsibility.
Acorns gathered during the harvest season are processed into flour that is freely given to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area and other Indigenous communities. Any proceeds from small public sales are reinvested to sustain future harvests, workshops, and educational events. The result is a complete feedback loop of generosity, accountability, and tangible tribal benefit.
The Project Arc in Practice
Granary Builds
Each granary build is both an engineering project and a cultural act. Using willow, tule, and other natural materials, participants construct traditional storage structures that blend Indigenous architecture with principles of geometry, physics, and sustainable design. The work begins with a willow harvest, where people learn to identify, gather, and prepare branches in ways that honor ecological cycles. These builds restore traditional technologies while serving as public symbols of cultural continuity and environmental care.
Acorn Harvest
The harvest reconnects participants with the landscape through observation and respect. Before gathering begins, community build days are held to create wooden Acorn Tenders and custom storage buckets designed for minimal ecological impact. Participants learn to recognize oak species, monitor ripeness, and collect acorns responsibly while avoiding damage to trees or habitats. The practice combines traditional ecological knowledge with modern environmental science, teaching gratitude, restraint, and stewardship through hands-on experience.
Processing and Sharing
After the harvest, participants gather to crack, sort, and process acorns into flour. This stage preserves not only food but also relationship. The ACORNS! Project Arc developed a custom acorn leaching machine that mimics natural water flow while meeting food safety standards, addressing the loss of clean freshwater systems caused by pollution and urbanization. The finished flour is nutrient-rich and long-lasting, distributed freely to tribal communities and shared through workshops that teach participants how to process acorns safely at home.
Culinary Series
The final phase turns restored foodways into shared experience. Through the ACORNS! Culinary Series, participants cook with acorn flour, learning to prepare traditional dishes such as acorn mush alongside modern recipes that blend Indigenous ingredients with contemporary methods. These events highlight that food is both ceremony and science, where chemistry, ecology, and culture meet. By eating together, participants complete the full circle of care and reciprocity that defines the Arc.
Addressing Barriers to Indigenous Food Sovereignty
Access to land for gathering, harvesting, and cultural use remains one of the greatest barriers faced by Indigenous communities. Many ancestral areas have been privatized or restricted by land-use policies that criminalize traditional sustenance practices. Indigenous people are often required to obtain costly permits or face harassment for gathering on public lands that historically belonged to their nations.
Environmental degradation further compounds these challenges. Streams once used for acorn leaching are now diverted or contaminated, making traditional food preparation unsafe. Bureaucratic barriers such as liability policies and conservation restrictions often exclude tribes, particularly those without federal recognition, from using public land for cultural purposes.
The ACORNS! Project Arc demonstrates a path forward within these constraints. By forming partnerships with agencies and land trusts, maintaining transparency, and emphasizing Indigenous-led collaboration, the project shows that policy goals can be met through cooperation rather than control. Each event functions as both cultural restoration and environmental education, reclaiming access while modeling responsible land stewardship.
Legal and Policy Foundations
ACORNS! is rooted in existing state, federal, and international frameworks that affirm Indigenous rights to land, resources, and cultural practice. California’s Public Resources Code §§5097.9–5097.994, known as the Native American Historic Resource Protection Act, prohibits disturbance of Native cultural sites and recognizes the importance of traditional gathering areas. Senate Bill 18 and Assembly Bill 52 require consultation with tribes in land-use planning, while recent legislation such as AB 389 strengthens the repatriation of Native heritage and human remains.
At the international level, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples affirms the right of Indigenous peoples to maintain and strengthen their spiritual and material relationships with lands and resources. Articles 25, 26, and 31 specifically recognize the rights to stewardship, ownership, and transmission of traditional knowledge. The ACORNS! Project Arc brings those rights to life through direct action. Every harvest, granary build, and meal is an exercise of cultural sovereignty and self-determination.
Restoring Balance Through Practice
The project’s outcomes reflect a model of applied policy and measurable benefit. Each year, ACORNS! hosts multiple community events, engages hundreds of participants, and produces acorn flour that is shared freely with Indigenous communities. The work integrates oak restoration, pollinator habitat planting, and soil monitoring, connecting food sovereignty with environmental health.
Beyond numbers, ACORNS! fosters healing. Participants describe a sense of reconnection and grounding through the act of gathering and sharing food. Traditional foodways strengthen identity and promote wellness, echoing public health findings that Indigenous diets rooted in local ecosystems improve physical and emotional well-being.
By turning rights and consultation frameworks into living systems of care, ACORNS! transforms policy language into practice. It demonstrates that Indigenous leadership is not symbolic; it is essential to the survival of ecosystems and cultures alike.
A Living Model for the Future
The ACORNS! Project Arc is more than a program. It is a working model for how Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities can coexist in mutual respect, restoring both land and relationship. Through its cycle of harvest, building, education, and nourishment, it provides a blueprint for action that fulfills the promises of environmental justice, cultural survival, and reciprocity.
The project continues to grow, expanding partnerships and refining methods that unite ecological science with Indigenous knowledge. In doing so, it reaffirms a simple but profound truth: sustainability begins with respect, and restoration begins with relationship.
This is big. For the first time ever, the entire San Francisco Bay Area shoreline has been reconstructed and shared as a public, interactive, open-access map.
Historic Shoreline of the San Francisco Bay Area shows what the Bay once looked like, its original coastlines and wetlands before 1900, in a way no one has seen before. This is not just another overlay on top of modern maps. It is a full digital reconstruction that lets you see exactly where the old Bay met the land, and how much we have changed it.
This project was handmade by myself, Gabriel Duncan, Paiute, Two-Spirit, and member of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation, as part of the Alameda Native History Project GIS Lab. It was built using open data, open-source software, and a lot of patience. I stitched together historic shoreline datasets from NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey (NGS), the same data used to update nautical charts and define the nation’s territorial boundaries, to bring the Bay’s past back into focus.
Each section of shoreline was aligned, corrected, and merged into a single, continuous dataset covering the entire Bay. I colored the wetland areas by hand, guided by original survey markings, to give a sense of the marshes and tidal zones that once surrounded the Bay.
Like all historical maps, there are limitations. The data comes from surveys done more than a century ago using methods that predate modern GIS and satellite imagery. Small distortions and projection differences are expected. But that is part of what makes it powerful. This map connects us to a moment in time when the Bay was still alive in ways most people have never seen.
This work represents Native innovation in STEM and the continuation of Indigenous relationships with land, water, and technology. It stands as proof that Indigenous people are not just caretakers of the past but builders of the future, mapping, coding, and visualizing our histories through the tools of today.
The dataset itself is reserved for Indigenous researchers and organizations.
This map joins the Bay Area Shellmounds Map, the Historic Alameda Ecology Map, and other original GIS projects in our Indigenous mapping initiative. Together they form a living record of place, memory, and truth, created by Native hands for everyone to see.
The Alameda Native History Project and the San Lorenzo Library co-hosted Acorn Granary Workshop 2.0 on Saturday, bringing together families, students, and community members to rebuild the Acorn Granary in the library’s outdoor viewing area. The event was part of an ongoing collaboration between the Alameda Native History Project and the Alameda County Library System to reconnect the public with Indigenous knowledge and land-based traditions.
From 12:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m., more than 20 participants, including about 10 children, worked together to weave willow poles, lash frames, and construct the granary. The effort followed the unexpected removal of the original structure earlier this month by Alameda County General Services Agency.
“For us, this was not about loss,” said Gabriel Duncan, founder of the Alameda Native History Project. “In traditional practice, granaries were never permanent. They might be damaged by weather, animals, or time. Rebuilding is part of the cycle and a living reminder of community resilience.”
The project would not have been possible without the support of the John Muir Land Trust, which hosted a willow harvest on October 12 at Family Harvest Farm in Pittsburg. Volunteers gathered and prepared the willow branches used in the new granary, linking the harvest directly to the hands-on reconstruction at San Lorenzo Library.
Granaries have long been integral to Indigenous food systems in California, used to store acorns safely through the winter and maintain a sustainable food supply. Rebuilding and teaching these practices supports the Alameda Native History Project’s mission to reopen Indigenous foodways across the East Bay through workshops, acorn harvests, and cultural education programs.
“Building and rebuilding together deepens our relationship with the land and with one another,” Duncan said. “It is how we remember, how we teach, and how we continue to care for the foods that sustain us.”
The new granary now stands at the San Lorenzo Library as a community-built symbol of renewal, cultural continuity, and partnership.
For the first time in 300 years, acorns will be harvested at scale in the Bay Area. This is not a reenactment. This is real work, feeding real people, and restoring a food system stolen by colonization.
If you have been waiting for a way to do something that matters, this is it.
A Historic Challenge
You know you want to do more than watch from the sidelines. You know you should be part of this. The Acorn Harvest is your chance to show up and help bring back Indigenous foodways.
This is not about sending money and hoping it lands in the right place. This is about using your own hands to gather food that sustained Native people for millennia and will again.
Why It Matters
Every acorn you help collect is a tangible benefit to tribal communities. Every bucket strengthens sovereignty, food security, and cultural survival. The harvest is more than ceremony. It is sustenance, reciprocity, and history in motion.
And it only happens if people like you step up.
Do Not Miss This
Harvest meetings start next week. Only people who are signed up will get the details. If you are not on the list, you will not be part of this season’s work.
