Salad Bowl of the World · Episode 2 of 14 · 19 min
The First Ten Thousand Years
For eight to ten thousand years before written records, the Rumsen, Esselen, and Salinan peoples lived on the Salinas plain, the sloughs at its mouth, and the ranges beside it. They gathered acorns and seed, built tule boats, burned grassland, and traded across the mountains. Spanish missions broke their communities, and an anthropologist declared the Esselen extinct in 1899, yet the descendants remain, and in 2020 the Esselen regained land.
Who's who
- Gaspar de PortoláGovernor who led the 1769 land expedition across the valley
- Juan Crespí+1 more episodeFranciscan diarist who wrote the first descriptions of the river and plain
- Miguel Costansó+1 more episodeEngineer and cartographer of the Portolá expedition
- Junípero Serra+2 more episodesFounded Mission San Carlos Borromeo at Monterey in 1770
- Alfred L. Kroeber+1 more episodeAnthropologist who declared the Esselen extinct in 1899
- Isabel Meadows+1 more episodeLast fluent speaker of Rumsen and Esselen, recorded by J. P. Harrington
- Gary S. BreschiniArchaeologist whose radiocarbon work frames the local record
- Tom Little Bear Nason+3 more episodesChairman of the Esselen Tribe of Monterey County
Where it happens
- Elkhorn Slough, CaliforniaEstuary with archaeological sites about 8,000 years old
- Moss Landing, California+3 more episodesBest-dated archaeological locality in the region
- Santa Lucia Range, California+1 more episodeHomeland of the Esselen
- Carmel River, CaliforniaSite where Mission San Carlos moved in 1771
- Monterey, California+2 more episodesWhere the mission and presidio were founded in 1770
Timeline
- c. 8,300 years agoEarliest dated components appear at the Moss Landing sites on Elkhorn Slough.
- December 1602Sebastián Vizcaíno anchors at Monterey; the Rumsen are the first Costanoan people the Spanish record.
- September 1769Portolá's expedition follows the Salinas River toward the sea.
- June 3, 1770The presidio and Mission San Carlos Borromeo are founded at Monterey.
- 1899An anthropologist declares the Esselen extinct.
- 2020The Esselen Tribe of Monterey County takes title to 1,199 acres of its homeland.
Still debated
The popular figure of ten thousand years outruns the dated evidence, which reaches back about eight thousand years. Pre-contact population estimates vary widely by scholar, and the Chalon homeland and the group met by Portolá in the riverbed remain uncertain.
Connected episodes in other series
The GardenersFire Returns to My Backyard · Episode 3Also features Isabel Meadows, Juan Crespí
How Indigenous People Resisted the Spanish Missions — Pueblo Revolt to SerraMissionaries: From Alaska to Patagonia · Episode 3Also features Junípero Serra
A Thousand Small NationsThe Smallest Nations · Episode 1Also features Alfred L. Kroeber