May 22, 1939: 85 years ago, May 22 1939, the last fluent speaker of the Rumsen Ohlone [...]
85 years ago, May 22 1939, the last fluent speaker of the Rumsen Ohlone language, Isabel Meadows, died at the age of 92. One of eight prominent Ohlone languages, the Rumsen language had been spoken, likely for thousands of years, between what’s now the Pajaro River and Big Sur
Isabel Meadows was born to an English whaler and a Rumsen Ohlone mother, Maria Loretta Onesimo. Her great-grandmother, Lupecina Francesa Unegte, had been baptized and grew up at the Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo where the infamous priest Junipero Serra is buried
Late in her life, Meadows lived in D.C. and worked with Smithsonian anthropologists to document Ohlone culture and language in Monterey and Carmel. She pushed to include stories documenting crimes against the Ohlone, such as the rape of Vicenta Gutierrez by a Franciscan priest
Today, the Ohlone Costanoan Rumsen Carmel Tribe is working to reclaim the language, running a Rumsen language revitalization project and offering language classes to all tribal members:
@faerieblushie gotta double check some things but it looks January 23. also a really important story
