Chumash Indians

In 1911 a mysterious man emerged from the wilderness of Northern California. No one knew who he was or could understand his language and he was immediately put in a jail. A couple of anthropologists befriended him, and he told them the story of his life. As the last surviving Yahi, Ishi was able to provide invaluable insights into his culture, ensuring that his tribe would not be forgotten. To learn more about California Native American tribes, use the direct links on The Times's Launch Point Web site at http://www.

Stretching beside the road to San Marcos Pass, the property known as Camp 4 is rolling, oak-studded and vast. On that much, the land's owners, the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians, and their neighbors in the Santa Ynez Valley agree. But now that the tribe is pushing to annex the 1,400 bucolic acres it purchased last year, both sides are as ready to slug it out as the boxers who occasionally do battle in the Chumash Casino's Samala Showroom. If Camp 4 is made part of the reservation, it won't be subject to local land-use rules — a sore point in a county where almost every large development triggers intense scrutiny and epic public debate.

A generation ago, the ancient Chumash tongue of Samala was all but dead, its songs and sagas buried in a university basement beneath mountains of yellowing research notes. But now Samala is the talk of the reservation. Thanks largely to a non-American Indian graduate student who was working for pocket money 40 years ago, the tribe has unveiled the first major Samala dictionary, a key moment in the language's rebirth. At a lavish event in the Chumash casino's concert hall Friday night, most of the tribe's 150 enrolled members lined up for copies of the long-awaited 608-page book.

Everyone thought the tall, strange white man was some kind of genius. But to teenage Ernestine De Soto he was a giant pain in the neck, a nosy, "Ichabod Crane-like" character who drew her mother's attention from its rightful place -- on her. John Peabody Harrington studied De Soto's Chumash family for nearly 50 years, pumping her great-grandmother, her grandmother and her mother for the tiniest details of their lives. Everything fascinated him: the Chumash names of places mostly forgotten, of fish no longer caught -- even, to the family's puzzlement, of private parts never discussed in polite company.

A group of Chumash Indians meeting Sunday night voted to recommend that a proposed new wilderness area in north Ventura County be named the Chumash Wilderness Area. Patrick Tumamait, who organized the meeting, attended by about 40 people, said he prefers the name Chumash over other suggestions because it would increase the tribe's visibility.

Like creatures of the ark, Saddlerock Ranch's animals are here in pairs: llamas, emus, macaws, peacocks, camels and zebras. But these California immigrants are commonplace compared to the pictographs tucked amid the ranch's towering rock formations and grapevine-studded hills. Archeologists say the drawings were made by Chumash Indians, the original settlers of the area, to depict a pivotal event in California history: Their encounter with Spanish explorers more than 200 years ago.

The chairman of the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians had a tone of pride in his voice last week as he strode through his new super-sized Chumash Casino, rapidly rising amid the pastures and rolling hills of the serene Santa Ynez Valley. "I think it looks pretty good myself," Vincent Armenta said. "A couple of people may never stop criticizing this. But the vast majority realizes that this is going to be a classy place that just adds to the beauty around here."

Everyone thought the tall, strange white man was some kind of genius. But to teenage Ernestine De Soto he was a giant pain in the neck, a nosy, "Ichabod Crane-like" character who drew her mother's attention from its rightful place -- on her. John Peabody Harrington studied De Soto's Chumash family for nearly 50 years, pumping her great-grandmother, her grandmother and her mother for the tiniest details of their lives. Everything fascinated him: the Chumash names of places mostly forgotten, of fish no longer caught -- even, to the family's puzzlement, of private parts never discussed in polite company.

Very quietly, during the dog days of summer, this seaside town has been working around the clock to help clean up one of the most troublesome oil spills ever to mar California's coast. "I'll tell you, it will blow your mind to understand what we've been doing in the last few weeks," said William Gengler, spokesman for the Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response in the California Department of Fish and Game. Unocal Oil spilled 150 barrels of oil on the evening of Aug.

Santa Barbara County wants a piece of the Chumash Casino jackpot. With the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians hoping to renegotiate their casino operating agreement with the state, Santa Barbara County officials on Tuesday drafted a letter to Gov. Gray Davis asking for tribal funds.

A generation ago, the ancient Chumash tongue of Samala was all but dead, its songs and sagas buried in a university basement beneath mountains of yellowing research notes. But now Samala is the talk of the reservation. Thanks largely to a non-American Indian graduate student who was working for pocket money 40 years ago, the tribe has unveiled the first major Samala dictionary, a key moment in the language's rebirth. At a lavish event in the Chumash casino's concert hall Friday night, most of the tribe's 150 enrolled members lined up for copies of the long-awaited 608-page book.

Over the years, a couple of dozen descendants of the Chumash Indians have complied with the odd requests of their old friend John Johnson, a leading scholar of the tribe's culture and head of the anthropology department at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. After all, what harm could come from parting with a few of their hairs or letting him swab the inside of their cheeks for a saliva sample?

Federal prosecutors are suing two accountants for allegedly running a fraudulent scheme that has enabled nearly three dozen Chumash Indians in Santa Barbara County to claim bogus tax deductions on millions of dollars in casino gambling profits. The accountants -- Kenneth Sorenson of Buellton and Stephen Drake of Arizona -- received more than $2 million in fees from members of the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians who participated in the alleged scam, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.

With first light bleeding into the sky, a Chumash village was reborn Wednesday on a wind-swept plateau overlooking the ocean in Malibu. There, tribal leaders and supporters gathered for a sunrise ceremony to kick off the creation of a demonstration village and interpretive center that will take root over the next year on an 8,000-year-old Chumash site along Pacific Coast Highway near Nicholas Canyon County Beach.

Amid rancorous debate over tribal development rights, Chumash Indians and former actor Fess Parker have abandoned plans to build a resort hotel and luxury homes on 745 acres of rolling ranchland here. The project -- the first of its kind proposed by a California tribe -- collapsed after Chumash leaders and Parker failed to agree on key details, including the size of the hotel and the value of the land.

In a newly published paper, two scholars have revived the controversial and long-dead theory that Polynesian sailors visited the California coast centuries before the first European explorers planted their flags here. It might still be too soon, however, to swap out the Eureka on the state seal with an Aloha.

The casino-rich Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians has indicated that it will give $1.1 million in grants to local communities. Santa Barbara County is pushing to spend the money on more sheriff's patrols, road improvements and a new bus to offset traffic problems around the tribal gambling resort. Other governments and organizations besides the county can ask for the money.

Leaders of the Santa Ynez band of Chumash Indians broke ground for a $157-million expansion of its casino to add a 105-room hotel, convention hall and health center. Tribal leaders addressed complaints about the project by scaling it back from five stories to four and building fewer rooms. For months, the project has been opposed by many community members concerned about traffic control at the casino entrance on California 246 and the lack of water and sewer capability.

State and federal authorities will investigate fresh concerns about casino regulation by the Chumash Indians after learning that the chairman of the tribe's gaming commission is a convicted felon. Gilbert Cash pleaded no contest in November to a felony charge of beating and choking his estranged wife. He was sentenced to 60 days in county jail and five years' probation.

Andy Rose says he had no idea that lambasting the Chumash Indians over the management of their casino could cost him his job. In a column in the Santa Barbara News-Press, Rose chastised tribal chairman Vincent Armenta for directing a blackjack dealer to provide free chips for Armenta's then-18-year-old son and other patrons. "Kind of takes the sport out of it, doesn't it?" Rose wrote in his Jan. 14, 2003, column.