The Karuk Lands Management Historical Timeline
Authors’ Statement & Background, July 2010
“We are Fix-the-World People.”
– Ron Reed, Karuk tribal member
“Unless you look honestly at the past, you don’t draw on the strength that has brought us so far, that
strength that will help us create a more joyful, enlightened, and loving future.”
– Carol Moseley Braun, the first African American woman to be elected to the United
States Senate and to run for president1
Who was involved in making the Timeline?
The Karuk Lands Management Historical Timeline was created over a nine month period in 2009-2010
by a team of UC Berkeley students, with support from the Karuk Department of Natural Resources.
Members of the Karuk-UC Berkeley Collaborative, co-founded by Ron Reed, Jennifer Sowerwine, and
Tom Carlson, were project advisors. Bill Tripp, Frank Lake, Kathy McCovey provided essential feedback.
Will Harling, Peter Brucker, and others shared important resources. Timeline co-authors are Sibyl Diver,
Lisa Liu, Naomi Canchela, Rafael Silberblatt, Sara Rose Tannenbaum, and Ron Reed. We have received
permission from the Karuk Tribal Council to share this timeline with others.
How was the Timeline created?
The Timeline concept was developed through previous work with the Karuk-UC Berkeley Collaborative
and through a UC Berkeley class on citizen participation. In August 2009, Collaborative members invited
several Berkeley students to visit the Klamath. Many community members voiced a need to document
the barriers and opportunities to community participation in land management on Karuk traditional
territory. That fall, a group of students studying citizen participation formed a research team to address
this topic. We began analyzing the literature, and decided on a timeline format to present our findings.
Our experience presenting the first draft to Karuk natural resource managers fundamentally shifted the
project. We learned from Karuk tribal managers about cultural resource management and their
perspectives on historical events. Based on the community feedback, we doubled the number of
documents analyzed and revised our data. We also wanted to better connect our project to the place
and community values about the land, so we organized the Klamath Art Contest for students from the
mid-Klamath region and incorporated student art into the design.
1
From Grandmothers Counsel the World by Carol Schaefer (2006), p100.
Why did we make the Timeline?
The Timeline is intended to be an educational resource for learning about the history of lands
management on Karuk Aboriginal Territory. Our goal was to produce a carefully referenced account of
key events affecting Karuk lands, which includes the perspective of Karuk natural resource managers
and their allies. Through the Timeline, we hope to demonstrate that there is a long history behind the
social and environmental challenges that the Karuk Tribe is facing today. We believe it is with
acknowledging, discussing, and understanding history that we move forward.
We understand that there are multiple perspectives on historical events occurring within the midKlamath and within Indian Country. We acknowledge and respect these different viewpoints, and do
not intend for the timeline to be used as a single source of information. Rather, we hope that the
Timeline may help to provide a useful framework supporting open discussions on lands management
issues that include the Karuk perspective, as well as inspiring additional research and inquiry.
What does the Timeline tell us?
The Timeline presents data from about 100 different sources, and focuses on federal and state policies,
regional and local lands management, and environmental condition and human health conditions that
are relevant to the Karuk Tribe and its traditional territory. Important themes that have emerged
include the following: fire; fish and wildlife; forest and plants; land claims; racial violence and
discrimination; traditional foods and tribal health; tribal self-determination; water quality, dams and
floods. Timeline entries present short summaries of this data, and we have marked each entry with
symbols reflecting relevant themes.
Reading Timeline entries, one can begin to learn about the complex history of land use management in
the mid-Klamath from 1850 to present. The Timeline documents abrupt changes in Karuk lands
management that took place following European-American settlement of Karuk Aboriginal Territory,
when the Karuk Tribe’s traditional lands management systems and the tribe itself were displaced.
Changes in human management systems have affected Klamath Basin ecosystem functions with impacts
on plants, wildlife, and the human community. More recently, public concern over environmental
degradation and Native American rights has sparked new directions for environmental policy and tribal
self-determination.
The artwork in the timeline represents local student responses to one of three questions: 1) What does
the Klamath river and forest mean to you? 2) How do you and your family take care of the river and the
forest? And 3) What do you think the Klamath will look like in 100 years? Student artwork shows the
river is many things: a place of solitude and inspiration; a place where families and friends gather to
have fun; a place to catch your dinner if the fish are biting; a place that supports a swirl of vibrant plant
and animal life, rocks, water, and people; a place that needs cleaning up; and place that is changing over
time. In this way, the images begin to convey how important the Klamath is to the next generation, and
why the community’s involvement in establishing new policies to restore the Klamath is needed.
What’s next?
The Timeline is currently on display at the People’s Center in Happy Camp, and additional displays are
being planned by the Karuk Tribe in Orleans and at the Clarke Museum in Eureka. We are also posting
smaller versions of the Timeline on the internet, including printable versions.
The Timeline is copyrighted by the authors and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non
Commercial-Share Alike License. This means that others can download, redistribute, or build on this
work non-commercially, as long as they credit the original Timeline authors.
Thanks to everyone who has made this exhibit possible, and we hope that you enjoy the Timeline!