Cheryl Seidner, Tribal Chair of the Wiyot Tribe, has been leading the effort to reclaim Eureka’s Indian Island as tribal land.
Seidner says the site is important to her tribe because almost all of their ancestors were massacred there in 1860 right as their land was taken away.
Today, the Wiyot tribe of northern California has close to 400 members and they’re asserting that the return of this land is crucial to preserving their heritage.
Seidner raised funds to purchase 1.5 acres of Indian Island while working with the mayor of Eureka to reclaim 60 additional acres of the island. Recently, the city council of Eureka voted unanimously to return this territory to the Wiyot Tribe.
Now Seidner hopes to restore the site to the state it was in 135 years ago. Efforts are under way to clean up the island (which was home to a failed mill and a yacht club that burned down) and build a hall where traditional dance ceremonies can be held and future generations of Wiyot can come to learn about their heritage.
- The homepage of the Wiyot Tribe
- Native Languages of the Americas: Wiyot (Weott)
- Site of sacred ceremony returned to Wiyot Tribe, Indianz.com
- In 1860 six murderers nearly wiped out the Wiyot Indian tribe, San Francisco Chronicle
- “Extermination is no longer a question of time–the time has arrived, the work has commenced, and let the first man that says treaty or peace be regarded as a traitor.” The Yreka Herald, 1853. From CaliforniaHistory.net