August 29, 1911
On this day the “Stone Age” met “modern America,” according to reporters. Ishi, the last survivor of his tribe emerged from the northern California hills.
It happened near Oroville, Butte County, and it created a sensation. At the time he was believed to be the last survivor of the Yana speaking people. The southern Yana known as Yahi were never a large or powerful population. It was estimated there were never more than 3,0000. That number dropped dramatically after gold was discovered and thousands of miners crowded into the tribe’s homeland.
A simple hunter-gatherer society, it was the first to see the food supply dwindle as mining operations caused fish kills and wild game was over-harvested by settlers. In addition, in 1865 a series of massacres further decimated their numbers.
Without firearms, the Yana people were basically defenseless against assaults by white settlers. Between 1870 and Ishi’s emergence in 1911, the few dozen surviving members of the southern Yahi, lived in complete concealment in the Mill Creak area. Ishi was believed to have spent at least three years in total isolation after the death of the only other survivor, a single male.
Starving and in poor health, he became the cause celeb of two anthropologists from the University of California Berkeley. Alfred Kroeber (left), considered by many to be the “father of cultural anthropology” and Thomas Waterman, a young researcher particularly gifted in linguistics, identified him as Yahi.
It was Waterman (right) who named him Ishi, the word for “man” in his language since Yahi tradition demanded that one’s name cannot be spoken by the individual but requires an introduction from another. There were no others, Ishi said, so he was nameless. His age was estimated to be 48 or 49 years old.
For the next five years, Ishi lived a sheltered existence under the guardianship of the two scientists at the UC Museum of Anthropology in San Francisco, now the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology He worked as a research assistant to Waterman and drew thousands of visitors to the museum demonstrating arrow making, fire starting, woodworking and other traditional skills.
Ishi beside example of tribe’s bark shelters
During that time, however. Ishi was hospitalized numerous times. With no immunity to the maladies of civilization, he had a particular susceptibility to respiratory infections.
In 1915 Ishi was diagnosed with tuberculosis, then basically untreatable. He died March 26, 1916.
Waterman, ever respectful of Native American traditions, tried to prevent an autopsy but was unsuccessful. In addition, Ishi’s brain was removed and sent to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., violating the cultural dictum of intact burials.
Ishi was cremated according to Yahi custom, however, and his remains placed in the columbium at Mount Olive Cemetery. But his story didn’t end there.
The National Museum of the American Indian Act of 1989 mandated that the Smithsonian and other museums inventory, document and repatriate the remains of any indigenous people if requested to do so. In addition, later research at UC Berkeley based on Ishi’s arrowhead techniques suggested that he may have been culturally, if not factually related to the Nomlaki or Wintu tribes of northern California.
A number of federally recognized tribes as members of the Butte County Native American Cultural Committee petitioned to have Ishi’s brain repatriated for proper burial in 999. After conducting several months of research the Smithsonian determined that the Redding Rancheria and Pit River tribe were Ishi’s closest relations and designated them recipients of his remains.
1868 woodcut illustration of Pit River tribe
In 2000, 89 years after being forced into the Anglo-American world, Ishi was returned to his native roots.
Despite their deep friendship, in later years it was revealed that, in fact, it was Kroeber who removed Ishi’s brain and had it shipped to the Smithsonian. While Kroeber’s attitude toward indigenous tribes may not bear close scrutiny under today’s scientific standards, his work was critical in the cultural preservation the West’s native people. Continuing to travel and lecture following his retirement in 1946, he died of heart failure October 5, 1960 in Paris at age 85.
The California Museum, 1020 O St, Sacramento, houses the story of more than 100 California Native American groups through artifacts including Ishi’s fur hat, original art, oral histories and videos. In all, a dozen exhibits run the gamut from the prehistoric Chipped Stone Bear to the interactive “Health Happens Here,” an examination of healthcare in California Communities, the California Hall of Fame and the massive Constitution Wall.
Open 10 to 5, Tuesday through Saturday, noon to 5, Sunday. Closed Mondays as well as New Years, Christmas, Thanksgiving and Fourth of July. The museum is also closed for a number of private events throughout the year and visitors are advised to inquire about the schedule.
Admission is $9 for adults, $7.50 for seniors and students with ID, $6.50 for youth 6 to 17 and children 5 and under are free. For more information go to californiamusuem.org, email museuminfo@californiamuseum.org, call (916) 653-7524 or write California Museum, 1020 O St, Sacramento CA 95814.
© Text Only – 2018 – Headin’ West LLC – All photos – public domain or fair use.