[News] Nov. 20, 1969 - 78 Indians of All Tribes landed on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay and occupied the island

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/alcatraz-occupation/


  Nov. 20, 1969: Alcatraz Occupation

This Day in History- November 20, 1969

Alcatraz Occupation

Indian occupiers moments after their removal from Alcatraz Island on 
June 11, 1971. Left: Oohosis, Cree from Canada. Right: Peggy Lee 
Ellenwood, Sioux from Wolf Point, Montana. Source: © Ilka Hartmann

On Nov. 20, 1969, a dramatic and unprecedented event took place in 
California that focused attention on American Indian grievances as 
nothing else had. It burst through the invisibility of previous local 
indigenous protests and declared to the entire world that the Indians 
still lived and would fight for their rights.

On that day, before dawn, 78 Indians landed on Alcatraz Island in San 
Francisco Bay and occupied the island. They called themselves “Indians 
of All Tribes” and issued a proclamation, “We Hold the Rock.”

In it they offered to buy Alcatraz in glass beads and red cloth, the 
price paid Indians for Manhattan Island over three hundred years earlier.

The occupiers organized themselves immediately, electing a council and 
giving everyone a job. Everyone on the island voted on all major 
decisions. Within three weeks of the occupation, a school was set up. 
Older adults taught traditional native arts and crafts such as bead and 
leather work, woodcarving, costume decoration, sculpture, dance and music.

Although federal marshals eventually removed the protesters, and their 
demands—including title to the island and the construction of a Native 
American university—were never granted, scholars view the two-year 
protest as a springboard for modern-day Indian activism. [Description by 
Bernice Yeung from Alcatraz Is Not an Island website (defunct).]


      Proclamation

<http://ilkahartmann.squarespace.com/indian-america/the-occupation-of-alcatraz-19691971/>

Photo by Ilka Hartmann. Click for more photos of Alcatraz occupation by 
Hartmann.

We feel that this so-called Alcatraz Island is more than suitable for an 
Indian reservation, as determined by the white man’s own standards. By 
this, we mean that this place resembles most Indian reservations in that:

 1. It is isolated from modern facilities, and without adequate means of
    transportation.
 2. It has no fresh running water.
 3. It has inadequate sanitation facilities.
 4. There are no oil or mineral rights.
 5. There is no industry and so unemployment is very great.
 6. There are no health-care facilities.
 7. The soil is rocky and non-productive, and the land does not support
    game.
 8. There are no educational facilities.
 9. The population has always exceeded the land base.
10. The population has always been held as prisoners and kept dependent
    upon others.

Further, it would be fitting and symbolic that ships from all over the 
world, entering the Golden Gate, would first see Indian land, and thus 
be reminded of the true history of this nation. This tiny island would 
be a symbol of the great lands once ruled by free and noble 
Indians.—/Indians of All Nations, The Alcatraz Proclamation to the Great 
White Father and His People/


      Related Resources

  * Contrary Warrior: The Life and Times Of Adam Fortunate Eagle
    <http://www.lillimar.com/Contrary-Warrior.html>
  * National Park Service: Alcatraz Island
    <http://www.nps.gov/alca/index.htm>
  * Photos by Ilka Hartmman
    <http://www.ilkahartmann.com/jbrave/phototext.nsf/images/7CF697C44CA3E2AC88256C6D00019953>
  * “We Hold the Rock
    <https://soundcloud.com/user660132316/we-hold-the-rock>” by Joe
    DeFilippo, a Baltimore songwriter and retired social studies
    teacher. Performed by the R. J. Phillips Band.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 https://freedomarchives.org/
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