A Short History of Sonoma

1. The Village of Huchi

6 Chapter One The Village of Huchi T he front page of the June 30, 1923, issue of the Sonoma IndexTribune featured an eye-catching boldface headline: “Mission Centennial Starts Today.” The paper was filled to capacity with articles about the many activities planned for the five-day event, commemorating the establishment of Mission San Francisco Solano by the government of Mexico in 1823. There was a Spanish Ball, a mission play (complete with special lighting effects), brass bands, a rodeo, and music by Capelli’s Musical Chicken Pickers. The celebration culminated on “the glorious Fourth,” with more brass bands, a speech by Congressman Clarence F. Lea, another rodeo, and a grand ball. Sonomans were proud of their history, which to them began with the mission’s founding a hundred years earlier. And although “Indians” made an appearance in the mission play, no one knew much about the area’s original inhabitants, or the centuries of tradition practiced in their valley before the first Europeans arrived. before 1769, the year when the first mission was established in San Diego, more than 300,000 Indians lived in what is now California, and they represented as many as a hundred unique cultures. Each of these groups, called tribes or “non-political ethnic nationalities,” shared some cultural characteristics, and there were also similarities in language, but they were not unified at all. t h e v i l l a g e o f h u c h i 7 These peoples grouped themselves into villages, or “tribelets,” made up of families who lived and worked together to find food, observe important rituals, and travel to different locales during specific seasons of the year, sometimes called the “annual round.” These family groups could include as few as fifty individuals or as many as five hundred. Sonoma had been an important border area between a number of Indian groups for centuries: the Patwin, who ranged over three hundred square miles around the present-day city; the Miwok, from the Coast Range, Marin County, and just-adjacent portions of Sonoma County; the Pomo, from the area of the Russian River Valley and the adjacent coastline; and the Wappo, from north of Glen Ellen and up to Clear Lake. Sonoma Creek was the water source for a number of local villages , the most important of which were Huchi and Wugilwa. Although they were similar with respect to living conditions and diet, the different Indian groups who lived near the Sonoma Valley had their own cultural characteristics. The Patwin, called Tulukal in the nearby Napa Valley, had a rich oral tradition of legends and stories, and believed their spiritual leaders had great healing powers. They had main and “satellite” villages, which were usually located along waterways, and they were sometimes called the “river people.” Their boats were made of river reeds called tule, and they used the great variety of plant materials on local waterways to make their baskets. The Miwok lived over a vast area in northern California, from the Sierras to the coast. Those who lived in and near Sonoma were the Coast Miwok, or Tchokoyem. Each geographic group made baskets unique to its locale, and its designs were often similar to those of peoples of nearby groups such as the Patwin and the Pomo. Clothing, ceremonies, and language were also unique to each group. The Miwok who lived near the ocean had sophisticated systems for harvesting fish and other seafood. Pomo Indians were not a large organized tribe, as many of the other peoples were. Even with shared culture and similar language, the different groups governed themselves in unique ways. In contrast to neighboring tribes, they had a sophisticated trading system with the Russians at Fort Ross after it was established in 1812. Their basketry designs are considered among the most sophisticated in California. 8 a s h o r t h i s t o r y o f s o n o m a The Wappo called themselves Miyakmah; the Wappo designation came from the Spanish word guapo, meaning handsome. The Miyakmah ancestral lands were in the Napa Valley north and west to the Alexander Valley on the Russian River. According to surviving accounts, the Wappo were both good-looking and rather fierce, and they also had a tradition of basket making. Their dances shared similarities with those of the Pomo. In the area around the Sonoma Valley and outlying...