All weekend, American History tv is featuring chico, california. Cspan cities tour staff recently visited sites showcasing his history. General john bidwell founded the city of in 1860. A town of 92,000 residents is home to california state university. Learn more on American History tv all weekend. Were standing at a place that holds profound significant for the Indigenous People here in this part of what we now call butte county. These people regard this very place as the particular location where in their cosmology the creator had humans emerge into the world. It is also alumni glenn. With the discovery of gold not too far south of here, and the inability to keep that discovery spread. The news quickly and the ratio of settlers to native people began to radically shift. Prior to the gold rush, there would have been somewhere on the order of maybe under 5000 settlers in all of california. Have55, that would skyrocketed to above 50,000 settlers. Were fraught. Ons at everyvery group moment, but there was a profound sense of racism towards native peoples. The general epithet used was digger indians. In other words, they were regarded as sub human. Because they did not have the kind of technological accoutrements that European American settlers considered standard. Its not because they were not clever enough to figure it out. Because those things were irrelevant to their daily lives. They were able to, on the coast, you know, when the tide went out here in this part of North Central valley, the mass crops of acorns provided very important calorie rich food source for them. Wild game, deer, small animals, insects were a staple of the regular diet. And, course, fish. There were abundant salmon runs and steelhead. In some cases, two different runs of the same species up the rivers. So, there was no need, really, to have complicated technology. The critical issue became access to subsistence resources, because, with is a huge influx thenttlers, miners, and merchants who were essentially mining the miners, selling them the equipment that they thought they needed, game the game to be began to be scarce. Rivers werre diverted and in soe cases completely upended. As food sources began to disappear for native people in traditional subsistence regime, they naturally look towards stock. One of the Main Industries here in this part of california as well as elsewhere, in fact, was the hide trade. The idea was to raise a lot of cattle to sell the skins and meat. Cattle were Critical Resources for the settlers but also viewed as food source food sources. Hungry native folks would have may be poached a cow here and there. And slowly, over the course of several months to a year and a 1852,between 1850 and these kinds of depredations began to rankle deeper and deeper in the white Settler Community and began to be punished more and more systematically, and ultimately, the rational for outright murder if not genocide of indigenous groups was held to be kind of like this, were going to teach you a lesson. Here in butte county, the attitude was these people cant be trusted. We need to exterminate them for their own good. This is rhetoric that existed at the time. One effort to try and minimize these kinds of assault was to move california indians to reservations, what were called rancheria. The idea was to move local people 100 miles west of here on the other side of what is now the Mendocino National forest in round valley. People andly 470 various other tribelets in the area were essentially corralled just west of chico. Then marched over the course of two weeks in midseptember 1863, a0 miles to their new home, reservation out over the mountains in the coast range. Forced relocation of 1863 is remembered as the nome cult walk. It was the name of the reservation that was essentially created in round valley. This series of forced relocations is kind of a not very well known aspect of American History in general, and california history in particular, because, as one might imagine, its not a pleasant chapter. Its a very brutal and violent series of events that took place between approximately 1850 and 1 875, and resulted in a radically reduce population of Indigenous People in california, not zeroed out by any means, but definitely throughally reduced sheer, outright genocidal methods. It was about 18 years ago that in roundm both valley decided to organize a memorial walk. They decided that in september they would retrace the steps their ancestors were forced to take. And so, ever since then, for the last 18 years or so, every september, folks gather in chico and take a week to walk 100 miles. A very meaningful, profound ceremony. Its regarded as a spiritually to not justort commemorate the fact that their ancestors survived this arduous journey and they the descendents are here now today, but also to think deeply about why this happened and to try and instill values of sort of Mutual Respect and tolerance. S staffcities tour recently traveled to chico. Learn more about other stuff on our tour at cspan. Org cities tour. You are watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan 3. This weekend on American History tv, on cspan 3. At 6 45 p. M. Eastern, james haley, the author of captive paradise, talks about the life of the last queen of the kingdom of hawaii. She had secretly been working on a new constitution that would restore her powers. And in fact, from this procession, she went back to the palace and announced her new constitution, and that was the beginning of the overthrow. At 9 00, historian on the effectiveness and legacies of 20thcentury president s. How weak the american presidency was in the late 19th century and how powerful an office it was when Theodore Roosevelt surrenders power in order to shoot eastern, at 4 00 p. M. The 1961 encyclopaedia britannica film, the ordeal of woodrow wilson. Even though they had agreed to mr. Wilsons 14 points committees delegates were determined not to let idealism stand in their way. Conflicted with their own purposes and desires. For a complete schedule, go to www. Cspan. Org