The Lisjan people have lived in the territory of Huchiun since the beginning of time.
For thousands of years, hundreds of generations, the Lisjan people have lived on the land that is now known as the East Bay in the San Francisco Bay Area. They did not own the land, they belonged to it. Generation after generation, Lisjan People cultivated reciprocal relationships with the plants and animals we shared this place with and developed beautiful and powerful cultural practices that kept the world in balance.
The colonization of this land began with the reign of terror inflicted by Spanish soldiers and missionaries who sought to convert all Indigenous people into Catholic subjects of Spain and steal their land. The Missions were plantations, built by slave labor and sustained through brutal physical violence and extractive land practices. The Spanish brought deadly diseases, invasive species and Christian ideology based on human dominion of the natural world with devastating consequences for the Lisjan people and all living beings they shared the land with.
The Lisjan are made up of the seven nations that were directly enslaved at Mission San Jose in Fremont, CA and Mission Dolores in San Francisco, CA: Chochenyo (Ohlone), Karkin (Ohlone), Bay Miwok, Plains Miwok, Delta Yokut and Napian (Patwin). Their territory includes 5 Bay Area counties; Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano, Napa and San Joaquin, and they are directly tied to the “Indian Town” census of the 1920’s and the Verona Band.
History of the Land and Lisjan People
“There were about 80,000 California Indians forced into the California missions from 1769 to 1834.
Of those people, 78% died.”
Jonathon Cordero Ph.D.
Ramaytush Ohlone/Chumash
The California Mission System
Ohlone dancers at Mission Dolores. Louis Choris 1816
The cemetery at Mission San Jose in Fremont. 1906
The Spanish Missions of Alta California, California Missions Foundation
Throughout the nearly 100 years of the Mission Era, there were countless Indigenous armed revolts, widespread “fugitism” or escapes, uprisings, and continual resistance.
The legacy of the missions is still active hundreds of year later. The missions are still standing and fourth graders through out the state still build mini replicas of them every year.
At the same time, California Native People who experienced missionization and have survived three waves of colonization and genocide, are also still here, engaging in cultural regeneration, language revitalization, sacred sites protection, land return work, and sharing the true histories of the land we are on.
“Life for Indigenous women in the Missions was incredibly difficult. They were removed from their families, had their children taken, were forced to labor, and faced illness, violence and abuse.”
Corrina Gould, Lisjan Nation
Indigenous Resistance
“No Sainthood For Serra,” protest atMission Dolores. Photo:Joe Rivano Barros, 2015
A Junipero Serra statue at Mission San Rafael. Photo: Inés Ixierda, Indigenous Peoples Day 2020
A Junipero Serra statue being toppled at Golden Gate Park Photo: Viktemea, Juneteenth 2020
Resistance to the Missions and their legacy also continues. There were Indigenous protests from Los Angeles to San Francisco when Mission founder Junipero Serra was canonized in 2015 and at least six Serra statues were toppled or dissapeared through out California in the social uprisings of 2020.
As the glorification and myths of the missions have been challenged by Native people, curriculums are being updated and projects like Iweš-‘iweš kečkeyma: One hundred women, uplift Native voices and perspectives, contributing to growing awareness of these histories and their connection to our lives today.
