OAKLEY, Calif. (July 19, 2024) – The Delta Protection Commission created a new advisory committee on Thursday to recommend policies, processes, and governance as the Commission implements the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area Management Plan.
In addition to advising the Commission, Committee members act as ambassadors to the diverse partners and communities in the NHA.
The committee is chaired by the Delta Protection Commission Executive Director or their designee, and has two members of the Delta Protection Commission and 12 members of the public. There will also be non-voting ex officio members representing the Legislature and public agencies.
Interested members of the public may apply to serve on this committee through 5:30 p.m. Aug. 16. The Delta Protection Commission is expected to make the appointments Sept. 19.
Committee members are expected to attend six bimonthly in-person meetings per year, which are held in the NHA at rotating locations. Four seats will expire in September 2025, four in September 2026, and four in September 2027. The expiration date for individual seats will be chosen randomly at the first NHA Advisory Committee meeting.
Tricia Canton (Photo courtesy of Delta Sculling Center)
Water defines the Delta, and access to water defines people’s connection to the Delta.
For both Dr. Pat Tirone and Tricia Marie Canton, there was no access in the beginning. Their early time as Stockton residents was completely disconnected from the water that flows through the city.
“I lived here for three years and didn’t know the Delta was here,” said Tirone, a physical therapist and graduate of the 2024 Delta Leadership Program.
When she first stumbled onto a city park with water access, she saw not the water and boat ramp that were hidden from view, but a private boat club, and it was unclear whether she even had the right to access the water.
Then she came across a rowing club that was raising money at a shopping center one day. That’s when she learned the public does have access to the water, and that there were ways to enjoy it without buying a power or sail boat or joining an exclusive yacht club.
That launched her into something that would become not just a personal passion, but a professional one: sculling.
Canton’s path was different. Born and raised in Stockton, she discovered her love of water only when she moved to Southern California to attend UC Irvine, becoming an avid beachgoer.
Then in 2014, at the age of 28, she had a ruptured brain aneurysm and three strokes that nearly killed her, leaving the entire left side of her body paralyzed. Her family was told she would probably never walk, talk or even breathe on her own again, and they moved her back to Stockton to take care of her.
This is where both Canton’s and Tirone’s stories would meet.
Pat Tirone
As part of Tirone’s rehab work, she spent much of her time taking her clients into nature, often at Berkeley’s Bay Outreach and Recreation Program, which had an entire barn full of adaptive recreational equipment. But as soon as her clients were discharged from rehab, their access to those opportunities ended.
“My husband listened to me complain that there was nothing like that in our community and finally told me to put up or shut up,” Tirone said. So together they started the Delta Sculling Center in Stockton in 2013, buying boats, renting storage space for them, and acquiring gear needed to adapt to rowers’ various needs.
“Rowers joined us as volunteers, and all a sudden we had a whole program,” she said.
Canton learned about Delta Sculling Center in 2022.
Being immunocompromised, she had been confined to her home since the beginning of the Covid pandemic, and her rehab stopped during that time. As the pandemic was receding, her doctor told her about a program that teaches people with disabilities to row, and that’s when she contacted “Coach Pat.”
The Sculling Center had a way to compensate for poor grip in her left hand: a Velcro connection to the oar, and a handle that would release if the boat turned over so the connected oar wouldn’t drag her down. The Center also had gear that would help her climb into the boat. And of course, volunteers who would row with her.
She used her arms more in her first session than she had the entire time since the aneurysm, and rowing has increased her endurance and strength. Just last week, she set a new personal record: 7 km on a day when her goal was 5.
But it’s about more than that. “On land I have to worry about gravity, other people, and the terrain – if it’s slippery, if there’s an incline, if there’s gravel, if there’s sand,” she said. “On the water, I’m just free.”
Beyond that, nature is endlessly delightful, a chance to encounter ducklings growing from one outing to the next, sea lions swimming near the boat, herons threatening to “drop bombs,” or the rush of dozens of blackbirds lifting from a powerline all at once.
And then there are the local landmarks, like the miniature Statue of Liberty at the confluence of the San Joaquin and Calaveras rivers. Canton rowed there recently with Tirone’s husband Bob, and they spontaneously sang God Bless America.
Experiences like these are what Pat Tirone cherishes about her time on Delta waters as well. “The other day, I was out rowing by myself and the sound of all the birds at 6 in the morning was just overwhelmingly beautiful,” she said. “I just turned the recorder on my phone on, laid it down on the deck of my boat and captured their beautiful music. In the middle of Stockton! What a gift.”
All people need to be able to connect with this gift – the water that is the lifeblood of the Delta – is access.
Learn more about:
The Delta Sculling Center. The center is a non-profit whose mission is to provide inclusive rowing opportunities to people of all abilities. Tagline: “Where EveryBODY Sculls,” and “EveryBODY” includes adults of all ages, military veterans with disabilities, and middle and high school aged youth, especially those who come from under-resourced parts of the region.
The Delta Aquatic Center. The Delta Sculling Center has been instrumental in the development of the Delta Aquatic Center of Stockton project, a new facility in Stockton that would increase access to the water for the community. A $2.5 million grant from the Delta Conservancy is funding planning for the project.
DELTA PROTECTION COMMISSION
Diane Burgis, Chair (Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors)
2101 Stone Blvd., Suite 200, West Sacramento, CA 95691
(916) 375-4800 | delta.ca.gov
June 14, 2024
The Honorable John Garamendi
United States House of Representatives
2004 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Subject: Support for H.R. 7719, Abandoned and Derelict Vessel Removal Act of 2024
Dear Congressman Garamendi:
I write to express the Delta Protection Commission’s strong support for this legislation. The Commission has long advocated for removal of abandoned and derelict vessels (ADVs) from Delta waterways, and remediation of the environmental damage ADVs cause to the rivers and sloughs that are vital to irrigating farmland, supporting recreational and commercial fisheries, and providing enjoyment in all kinds of water recreation. ADVs pose real and significant threats to public safety and property from navigation hazards, and damage to docks, marinas, and levees.
The Delta Protection Commission is a California state agency charged with protecting and enhancing the unique values of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, a resource of state and national importance that, largely owing to your tireless efforts, was recognized by Congress as California’s first and so far only National Heritage Area in 2019. The Commission provides a “forum for Delta residents to engage in decisions regarding actions to recognize and enhance the unique cultural, recreational, and agricultural resources of the Delta” [Public Resources Code (PRC) § 29703.5(a)]. As such it includes representatives from city and county governments in each of the five main Delta counties, Delta reclamation districts, four state agencies and one non-voting, ex-officio member each from the Senate and Assembly.
As a primary function, the Commission maintains and oversees implementation of a comprehensive long-term Land Use and Resource Management Plan (LURMP) that includes goals and policies aimed at protecting, maintaining, enhancing, and restoring the overall quality of the Delta environment. Public Resources Code applicable to ADVs requires that the LURMP policies must “preserve and protect open-space and outdoor recreational opportunities,” “preserve and protect opportunities for controlled public access and use of public lands and waterways consistent with protection of natural resources and private property interests,” and “preserve, protect and maintain navigation” [PRC§29760 (b)(9-11)].
The Commission has worked with local law enforcement marine patrol units, the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG), the State Parks’ Division of Boating and Waterways (Boating and Waterways), State Lands Commission, Recreational Boaters of California, CalRecycle, the Bay Conservation and Development Commission, and other stakeholders to promote and facilitate abandoned vessel removal. The Commission’s collaborative project with the Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response to identify and map ADVs within the Delta in 2019 led to state legislation that provides limited funding for removal of commercial ADVs by the State Lands Commission. Additional funding by Boating and Waterways supports removal of recreational vehicles. The USCG can only remove hazards to navigation. Thus it typically falls to local law enforcement marine units with limited resources to remove non-commercial ADVs in their counties. However, the scope of all these efforts is significantly constrained, largely due to funding, and limitations on where and how federal agencies such as the USCG and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) could assist.
The Abandoned and Derelict Vessel Removal Act, H.R. 7719, would bring much needed cohesion to this patchwork management by providing additional funding and organization. Significantly, the bill would authorize the Corps to remove any abandoned vehicles regardless whether they impede navigation, and to create and maintain a national inventory of ADVs. Such an inventory could help identify more regional-based solutions and coordination in areas such as the Delta where there is overlapping jurisdiction among responsible agencies.
Thank you for your commitment to finding solutions to this complex public safety issue of concern to Delta farmers, residents, and business owners, and the many visitors who come to the Delta.
Sincerely,
Bruce Blodgett
Executive Director
CC: The Honorable Laphonza Butler, U.S. Senator
The Honorable Alex Padilla, U.S. Senator
The Honorable Mark DeSaulnier, U.S. Representative
The Honorable Josh Harder, U.S. Representative
The Honorable Doris Matsui, U.S. Representative
The Honorable Mike Thompson, U.S. Representative
When Azorean Portuguese arrived in the California Delta during the Gold Rush, they brought with them a Medieval tradition that has proved resilient in a sea of constant change: the Holy Ghost Festa.
“My dad always talked about ‘the footsteps, the footsteps, the footsteps,'” said Jim Souza, one of the organizers of the Freeport/Clarksburg Festa. The oldest in the Delta, it was founded in 1893, and has been held at the same hall since 1905.
“He was referring to the fact there was a lot of history there.”
The particulars of this tradition have changed, but its core tenet remains the same: feeding people, for free, as an act of generosity and sharing.
Festas began the 1400s in mainland Portugal, inspired by the lore of Queen Isabel, who took food from her own table to feed the poor during a famine. But their roots trace back even further to a radical utopian ideology promulgated by an Italian monk born in 1132. (Story continues below photos.)
When the Portuguese settled in the Azores in the mid-1400s, they took the tradition of Festa with them, and it thrived there, even as it mostly died off on the mainland. Azoreans comprise the bulk of Portuguese who immigrated to California in the 1800s, and the tradition followed them here.
For Souza, Festa has always been part of his life. “I was born into it,” he said. “My parents were involved in it. That’s where they made their first connection!”
As a kid, Festa meant getting a new pair of jeans and cowboy boots and maybe a hat that he’d wear to the dance. “And obviously you’d see all your cousins and Portuguese friends and whoever else came along,” he said.
Festa also involves the crowning of a young queen, in honor of Queen Isabel. Professor Diniz Borges, the founding director of the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute at Fresno State, said the queen is a feature that arose in California.
“There were no queens in the Festas in the Azores. We don’t know where or why it started, but they’ve become part of the tradition in California,” he said. And now some Azorean Festas have begun adopting the tradition.
The Queens Court in television news coverage of the 2024 Freeport/Clarksburg Festa – click to watch video.
An even newer evolution is the growing presence of non-Portuguese at Festas. “More and more they attract a lot of outsiders,” Borges said. “I’m happy to say we now have queens who are not of Portuguese backgrounds, and people playing in marching bands who are of different ethnicities as well.”
But there is one constant that dates back to Medieval origins: “They are religious in nature, but the church doesn’t control them,” Borges said. “There is a Mass, there is a coronation, but the whole idea of the serving of food free of charge to everybody, the idea behind the celebration, whether it’s music or parades or whatnot, is it’s all done by a committee of men and women.”
Souza became the youngest president of the Freeport/Clarksburg Festa’s organizing council at 17, and he remains a key organizer to this day. It is a mountain of work – “five days of preparation, one day of festivities, one day of cleanup.”
But it’s worth it.
He tells the story of a psychic advisor who came with a potential buyer to view the property next to the Hall where the Festa is held. The advisor told the buyer he could see someone on one side of the property who wasn’t happy.
“What do you see over there?” the buyer asked him, nodding at the Hall, Souza recalled.
“There’s just nothing but happiness,” the advisor said. “There’s children everywhere and they’re all smiling.”
Video screenshot of One Struggle One Fight marchers as they left Locke in March 2009
Gay activism in California is often associated with cities. But in March 2009, a group of activists took their cause on a march through the rural Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta – not a region known for protest marches or gay activism.
The trek was a five-day walk from San Francisco to Sacramento to call for the repeal of Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban that California voters added to the state Constitution in 2008. Organized by One Struggle One Fight, the march went through Walnut Creek, Antioch, Isleton, Locke, and Elk Grove before finishing at the steps of the state Capitol.
Three of the Delta’s five main counties voted in favor of Prop 8, so it might not have looked like sympathetic territory. But march co-leader Seth Fowler said that was part of the point.
“One Struggle One Fight was about direct action and talking to people. There was a really big urban/rural divide, and the question was, ‘How do we make queer people real to people who are mostly just interacting with headlines about us?’”
One answer: by walking through their towns.
He said there were times on the march when he could sense discomfort among people they interacted with.
But there were also many warm welcomes. What the 30 or so marchers were doing “is such important work” the Rev. Christy Parks-Ramage told them when they gathered at the First Congregational Church of Antioch. “And it’s work that we as a congregation have struggled with.”
The church had recently become “open and affirming,” officially welcoming LGBT people in its ministry. The decision caused a split, and so many congregants had left that the church was selling its building to forge a new path.
The marchers also found welcome in the tiny town of Locke, with a population hovering around 70. Locke was built by Chinese immigrants in 1915, two years after the state passed a law forbidding land ownership or long-term leases by non-citizens, so they couldn’t own the land they built on. (So-called Alien Land Laws were invalidated by the California Supreme Court in 1952.)
In an email to fellow organizers, Fowler described his advance visit to Locke, where he met with the Locke Foundation and discussed the march going through the town. “They were receptive and excited at the prospects of becoming the Gayest Town in America, if only for an evening,” he wrote.
The wooden statue of Guanyin, bodhisattva of compassion, now lives in the Locke home of Deborah Mendel and Russell Ooms (not pictured).
When marchers spent the night in Locke, they stayed in a former Baptist church. “There was a really large wooden statue there of Guanyin, the bodhisattva of compassion,” Fowler recalled. “It felt like a very lovely synchronicity to have this being of compassion watch over us as we slept there.”
He reveres Guanyin to this day.
Russell Ooms, who owned the church building at the time, said the group was delightful. “Locke is a quiet town, and suddenly it was filled with energy,” he said. “It was exciting. They were exciting.”
The marchers left behind a gift for the town: a donation to the Locke Foundation, commemorated in a tile that now lives at the Locke Memorial Park. And at least one of the townspeople – Stuart Walthall – joined them at the march’s finale: a rally at the Capitol.
Scenes from the Cherry Pit and Ah-May’s Strawberry U-Pick in Brentwood and Victoria Island Farms/Sabbatical distillery in Holt.
U-pick season has begun, and Northern California families are flocking to Delta farms to pick their own cherries, strawberries, blueberries, and more.
U-pick is an experience that combines a drive through the countryside, family time, tradition, fresh air, walking, perfectly ripe fruit, and connections with the farmers who produce America’s food.
It’s farm-to-table eating without a grocery store or a restaurant as middleman. And it’s the freshest fruit possible without the responsibility of managing a farm year-round.
Families we spoke with recently at the Cherry Pit in Brentwood all had stories to tell.
The Carter family came from Groveland – near Yosemite! – to continue an 11-year tradition that began when they lived in Half Moon Bay. The Gonzales family from Oakland had been picking there for 16 years, and proudly pointed out their teenage daughter, whose mother was still pregnant with her on her first visit.
Kyle and Caitlin Martin live in Brentwood and figured it was time to start checking out the local farms with their son Campbell, and they had a luscious Black Forest Cake in their future. Danny Pham and his uncle Thu Vo come at the beginning of every season, and Pham was planning to take 100 pounds of cherries back to Vietnam.
The u-pick experience is equally important to farmers, who get to forge connections – and share their world – with consumers.
Victoria Island Farms in Holt began blueberry u-pick operations in 2020 at the beginning of the Covid pandemic, when people were looking for opportunities to get outside and do things together.
“Blueberries are perfect for social distancing,” said farm co-owner and fourth-generation farmer Jack Zech. “You just send one family down each row.” Even as the pandemic waned, the program remained popular.
Financially, the u-pick operation doesn’t move the needle for the farm, Zech said. “But it makes our employees happier. They like it when people come see what they do and appreciate it. There’s a sense of pride that people come out.”
One year after the farm began u-pick, it opened a distillery – Sabbatical – that visitors can tour and shop at as well. “A lot of the older dads aren’t trying to go out there in the heat,” Zech said. The distillery, with its shaded patio, gives them another option.
For some farms, u-pick is an important part of their profitability. When customers pick their own, the farmer doesn’t have to pay for picking, packing, or shipping, said James Chinchiolo, owner of Lodi Blooms.
And he was unprepared for how popular it would be. “We get upwards of 2,000 visitors a day. The first year it happened, it scared me!”
The opportunities for agri-tourism keep growing.
In 2002, there were just 39 farms offering “agritourism and recreational services” in the six Delta counties (Alameda, Contra Costa, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Solano, and Yolo), according to the USDA Census of Agriculture.
In 2022, the count stood at 150.
Ready to start picking?
If you’re looking to visit a u-pick in the Brentwood area, there is a website dedicated to local farmers with a map and details about what’s available at each farm as various crops ripen: https://harvestforyou.com. You can also type “u-pick near me” on your phone’s map app during your next drive through the Delta.
RIO VISTA, Calif. (May 16, 2024) – The Delta Protection Commission appointed two new members and re-appointed four incumbents to the Delta Protection Advisory Committee (DPAC) on Thursday.
The new appointees are Emily Pappalardo, Delta Business Seat 2 (on the left in the photo), and Katherine Wiley, Delta General Public Seat 2 (on the right in the photo). Both are graduates of the Delta Leadership Program, a project of the Delta Protection Commission and Delta Leadership Foundation – Pappalardo in 2016, and Wiley this year.
Pappalardo is a principal engineer and partner in DCC Engineering Co. Inc. in Walnut Grove, which serves several reclamation districts in the North Delta and provides permitting, planning, and architectural services to the Delta community. She has an interest in Steamboat Resort, a private boat club and residence on the north end of Steamboat Slough, where she was raised. She is also incoming president of the Rotary Club of Walnut Grove, a board member of the Delta Leadership Foundation, an associate member of the Central Valley Flood Control Association, and a volunteer on the Pear Fair Committee.
Wiley owns Wiley Marketing & Design, which has a substantial client base in Rio Vista, Walnut Grove and Locke. She and her husband own a houseboat that’s been berthed in Walnut Grove for the past eight years, and both are avid boaters who spend most of their free time on the river.
The incumbents who were reappointed Thursday are:
Craig Watanabe, Delta Agriculture (Seat 2)
Douglas Hsia, Delta Cultural Preservation
Morris Lum, Delta Recreation (Seat 2)
Erin Chappell, State Agency (Seat 2)
All six will serve three -year terms.
DPAC provides recommendations to the Delta Protection Commission on diverse interests within the Delta, including the Delta’s socioeconomic sustainability, recreation, agriculture, flood control, environment, utility infrastructure, and other Delta issues. The Committee was created by the Delta Protection Act, Public Resources Code Section 29753(a).
The Delta’s history is deeply intertwined with the story of Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, and Sikh immigration to California. Drawn first by the Gold Rush and then by railroad construction, Asian immigrants fanned out across the Delta as farming ramped up. They built Delta levees, worked on farms, and even leased or bought their own farms … until the state forbade it for some nationalities.
The Asian presence in the Delta remains vividly on display in the towns of Isleton and Walnut Grove, which have distinct China- or Japantowns, and Locke, which was an entirely Chinese-American town until recent decades.
And the stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the Delta are actively being told. Here are six recent examples:
One
A piece of Locke’s history was recognized Saturday when E Clampus Vitus dedicated a plaque honoring the Bok Bok Man – the traditional Chinese night watchman who patrolled the town after dark, hitting a gong or hollowed wood block on the hour.
The Delta’s Japanese presence took a huge hit when the U.S. sent Japanese-Americans to incarceration camps during World War II. Many dispersed after they were released, never to be heard from in the Delta again. But one such family – the founders of the Locke Boarding House – recently surfaced, and Stuart Walthall shares the story here.
Four
The Delta’s Filipino community made big news last December when a collection of home movies from the 1950s to the 1970s shot by the Bohulano family in Stockton was one of 25 films added to the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry. The snapshot of Filipino family life and immigrant experience joined the registry alongside films including Apollo 13, Fame, Home Alone, Terminator 2, The Nightmare Before Christmas, and 12 Years a Slave.
Five
The Sikh presence in the Delta – Stockton was the home of the first Sikh temple in the United States – has been documented recently by Lea Terhune in the book, “California’s Pioneering Punjabis: An American Story” (The History Press, 2023).
Six
The National Parks Conservation Association on Wednesday highlighted the need to preserve America’s historic Chinatowns, and in the same post shone a spotlight on seven urban and rural sites already on the registered landmarks and historic places lists. Both Locke and Walnut Grove made the list.
Top image, L-R: the 2024 Class of the Delta Leadership Program – MacKenzie Owens, Krystal Moreno, Cintia Cortez, Malissa Tayaba, Katie Wiley, Matthew Brown, Nancy Young, Alice LLano, Min Park, Tim Cook (not shown: Priti Agarwal, Ahmad Majid, Samar Salma, Jacylyn Stokes, Pat Tirone). Bottom left image, L-R: Three alumni of the Delta Leadership Program – Chuck Winn, Anna Swenson, and Emily Pappalardo. Bottom right: Erik Vink, Coordinator of the Delta Leadership Program, a joint project of the Delta Protection Commission and the Delta Leadership Foundation
CLARKSBURG, Calif. (April 19, 2024) – The 2024 class of the Delta Leadership Program graduated Friday, and celebrated at a reception hosted by Bogle Family Vineyards in Clarksburg.
The graduates were welcomed there by existing Delta leaders, many of whom are also alumni of the program, including Delta Protection Advisory Committee Chair Anna Swenson, former San Joaquin County Supervisor Chuck Winn, and Delta NHA Advisory Committee Member Douglas Hsia.
The program, a joint project of the Delta Protection Commission and the Delta Leadership Foundation, is designed to build and support leadership within the Delta community.
The group visited locations around the Delta where it heard about diverse issues and perspectives on myriad challenges facing the region. Members also worked on group projects, which they will present to the Delta Protection Commission on May 16.
Some of the graduates reflected Friday on their “ah ha!” moments and key takeaways, including:
Krystal Moreno, Traditional Ecological Knowledge Program Manager for the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians: “Hearing from a panelist talking about rice farming conversion and its connection to salmon habitat, which was new to me. As an indigenous person, we have been fighting to restore salmon in our watershed. (This is) work we can connect to.”
Min Park, hospitality industry and Bethel Island community volunteer: “The fact that most of our water comes from the Delta, and my friends in Los Angeles have no idea about this. We need to protect this place – it’s special.”
Alice LLano, pear farmer: “We have to start teaching our children more about the Delta. Our kids live here, and we need to be teaching them about how fragile it is, what the issues are, so when they grow up, they can be Delta advocates.”
Min Park pours water into a to-scale map of the Delta at Big Break Regional Shoreline in Oakley.
Pat Tirone, Founder of Delta Sculling Center in Stockton: “It was standing on the map at Big Break, seeing everyone having fun pouring the water in, really seeing why water gathers in one place, and how much you need the water to flow from another place, and how all of it impacts each other.”
Jacylyn Stokes, fourth-generation farmer: “Being able to interact with the tribal community. I got to have conversations with my colleagues Malissa and Krystal, and hearing their perspective on how ownership and land have affected them, in comparison to my story, really changed the way I view things.”
Malissa Tayaba, Vice Chair of Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians: “I learned so much from other perspectives that were really important because there are so many different communities in the Delta. … (Also) the thought of building coalitions and relationships that make movement in the Delta. I think that’s how things move faster, when you get together with people with common goals and make things happen.”
Tim Cook, co-owner of Meyer and Cook Insurance Co.: “One thing that stood out to me the most was the part of it I’d never really thought about before – the interests of the California Delta from indigenous people’s perspective. I didn’t really understand why Shingle Springs had an interest in the Delta. Going through the program, I learned the history.”
Cintia Cortez during an exercise in Rio Vista about leveraging strengths and weaknesses
Cintia Cortez, policy analyst for Restore the Delta: “There was an exercise where we had to talk about our strengths and weaknesses and how to leverage those. We had to be vulnerable and share what we struggle with the most. One of my classmates, Min, she told me she really looked up to me and in those spaces she started to expect me to show up in a certain way. When I walked into that training, I felt like a closed rosebud, and after that, I felt like I bloomed, through the training and with a compliment from a classmate.”
NancyYoung, Mayor of Tracy: “I joined this group just to learn more about water, and my eyes have been opened. I see water everywhere: I see the reservoirs, I see the aqueducts, I see the Delta, I see the flow of life around me. I’m excited to have learned so much from individuals, from the Miwok tribe, understanding how it’s part of their land.”
WALNUT GROVE, Calif. (March 20, 2024) – The role women have played in Delta history has been somewhat invisible, said Maryellen Burns, president of the Sacramento River Delta Historical Society: “They’re the ones who did the interviews, they’re the ones who transcribed them, but the people they interviewed were men.”
The Society took steps to remedy that Tuesday with its program, “Hidden Figures – Women of the Delta,” at the Walnut Grove Library. The program highlighted four historical figures using the Readers Theater Method, with modern women acting out their roles.
Jean Harvie: The woman for whom Walnut Grove’s Community Center was named helped teach three generations of students in the town as a teacher, then principal, then superintendent. She was a woman of small stature, poor eyesight and little tolerance for tomfoolery. Harvie was played Tuesday by community leader Linda Van Loben Sels – lower right in photo above – whose father earned Harvie’s wrath by hotwiring her car one day and going for a joy ride.
Charmian London: Charmian London and her better-known husband and novelist Jack spent two months every year in the Delta – an experience that shaped his writing, and her substantial contributions to his work. Her eloquent recollections of that time included a passage about her and Jack contemplating going aboard a “red light” boat docked next to them, but thinking better of it as they considered being seen there, or seeing others who might not wish to be seen. London was played by Delta Mello, executive director of the Sacramento History Museum, upper right in photo above.
Aoifee McCarthy: McCarthy was a copywriter in the 1930s and 1940s whose work saturates the labels and advertisements of fruit and meat packers of the region. An immigrant from Ireland, she had intended to settle in New York with her brother, but he sent her to California, where a transcendent slice of peach pie on the train journey lit up her imagination. “I had never eaten a peach,” she wrote. “Those peaches came from seeds that John Sutter himself planted,” the chef told her before sharing the recipe for the pie. McCarthy was played by Burns, who has copies of that very recipe – which she’ll share on request.
Connie King: King was the informal “Mayor” of Locke who fought both to preserve the historic town, and to buy the land on which the town was built – something that was originally made impossible by the Alien Land Law, which prohibited Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, and other East Asians from owning land or leasing land for more than three years. King was also known for her famous “Toilet Garden,” made of toilets that were being thrown away by a new property owner. When she asked him why he was getting rid of them, he told her, “We don’t want to sit on a toilet Chinese people sat on.” King was played by Cynthia Lee, a retired teacher, upper left in photo above.
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The Delta’s history is deeply intertwined with the story of Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, and Sikh immigration to California. Drawn first by the Gold Rush and then by railroad construction, Asian immigrants fanned out across the Delta as farming ramped up. They built Delta levees, worked on farms, and even leased or bought their own farms … until the state forbade it for some nationalities.
