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People have gathered at this place throughout history. They have brought different ways of life and ways of seeing the world.

LANDSCAPE OF STORIES

Rancho San Antonio

All of what is now the Fruitvale district of Oakland was once a small piece of a vast estate called Rancho San Antonio—44,700 acres of East Bay land granted to Luís María Peralta in 1820 by the Spanish governor. Today, seven cities stand on the rancho’s former territory, from El Cerrito to San Leandro, from the tops of the hills to the shores of the bay.

The six acres that now form Peralta Hacienda Historical Park became the headquarters of the rancho. Here, the family of Antonio María Peralta and María Antonia Galindo farmed and raised cattle with Native American workers when California was part of Mexico.

The rancho still existed for many decades after the US takeover of California in 1848.

The flow of cultures to the East Bay first began more than 12,000 years ago, as American Indian peoples arrived in waves to the edge of the continent. Long before Columbus, this land had become home to the Ohlone.

This flow has continued over the past two hundred years, as people from all over the world and the United States have invaded, conquered, settled and mingled. They have created the seven modern cities we know today on the land of the old rancho, over Ohlone land.

The history of the Peralta rancho is part of a longer story that is still being lived.

You are part of that story.

City of OaklandOffice of Parks & Recreation250 Frank Ogawa Plaza, Suite 3330Oakland, CA 94612Phone: (510) 238-PARK(7275)Web Site: www.oaklandnet.com/parks

José Guzmán was the companion of María de los Ángeles Colós, the only Native American known to have lived on the Peralta rancho whose full name has survived. Their work in the 1920s preserved Chochenyo, the Ohlone language of the Oakland area.

Antonio Peralta, his second wife María Dolores Archuleta and other relatives and friends relax in the late 1850s on the porch of one of the adobe houses that stood where the park is today.

E v ery h u ma n be i n g make s h i s t ory Cada ser humano hace historia.

Moãi con ngöôøi ñeàu taïo neân lòch söû.

Flags of three nations that have flown over Rancho San Antonio.

SPAIN, 1769–1821

MEXICO, 1821–1848

U.S.A., 1850–present

Friends of Peralta Hacienda Historical Park Phone and fax: 510-532-9142Box 7172, Oakland 94601 Web site: www.peraltahacienda.org

Rancho San Antonio:State Historical Landmark No. 246

Antonio Peralta House:National Register of Historical Places, No. 77000285

Peralta Hacienda Historical Park: State Historical Landmark No. 925 and National Park Service Anza Trail Designated Site

Los folletos traducidos al español sobre todos los señalamientos se encuentran en Peralta House.

Coù caùc taäp saùch dòch sang tieáng Vieät cho taát caû caùc baûng hieäu taïi Peralta House.

Paisaje de Historias Maûnh Ñaát Traøng Ñaày Caùc Caâu Chuyeä

Over time, they have transformed grasslands and woodlands into ranches, farms, and today, into a neighborhood of Oakland.

A través de la historia, este lugar ha sido punto de reunión de personas que han aportado diferentes maneras de ver la vida y el mundo.

Con ngöôøi ñaõ taäp hôïp ôû nôi ñaây trong suoát quaù trình lòch söû. Hoï mang ñeán nhöõng phong caùch soáng vaø quan ñieåm khaùc nhau.

Con el transcurso del tiempo, praderas y bosques se fueron transformando en ranchos y granjas hasta llegar al vecindario actual.

Daàn daàn, hoï ñaõ bieán nhöõng ñoàng coû vaø caùnh röøng thaønh trang traïi, noâng traïi, vaø cuoái cuøng laø thaønh khu daân cö ngaøy nay.

Guests arriving for a Peralta wedding in the 1840s.

View of the City of Oakland, 1854, by Frank Soulé

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on ohlone landPeople entered this area more than 12,000 years ago and were among the first of a long migration of peoples and their cultures into the American continents.

About 2,500 years ago, a group now called the Ohlone settled in the Bay Area.

Whenever the Indians took a plant they fixed the earth up pretty afterwards . . . It was like giving her back something she gave to us.

Ramona Garibay, 2004 Ohlone, Pomo, Miwok and Yokuts descendant

The Ohlone cared for their families and their needs for food, fuel, and shelter, changing the landscape over time while respecting the delicate balance of their natural environment.

The Ohlone burned fields so that plants they used for food could get more sunlight. They harvested seeds, leaves and roots of over 500 native plants.

They hunted deer and other animals for food. They also ate fish caught in the waterways of the area.

In the early 1900s, Ohlone descendants were able to record how their ancestors used the native plants of the region. Ohlone people today are recovering this heritage.

The ancestral land rights of the Ohlone were swept away by Spanish missions, Mexican ranches and US settlements, as new cultures took root.

The signs in the Ring of Native Plants

give the plant names in four languages.

in the Chochenyo or

Rumsien branch of the

Ohlone language group

in Spanish

in English

in Latin, for the plant’s

scientific name

This special garden shows some of the native plants of the East Bay and tells how the Ohlone used them.

Illustrations by Ukrainian artist Louis Choris, who came to California with a Russian exploring expedition in 1816. He created sensitive and significant images of the Ohlone people under Spanish and Mexican rule.

Los folletos traducidos al español sobre todos los señalamientos se encuentran en Peralta House Coù caùc taäp saùch dòch sang tieáng Vieät cho taát caû caùc baûng hieäu taïi Peralta House.

underground History“On 34th Avenue in the dirt around our pepper tree you’d always find things in the

ground. It seemed like there was something deeper, and older, and richer that haunted the neighborhood.” — Claudia Albano, remembering playing in her parents’ yard in the 1960s. Her family home

on 34th Avenue was taken down to create the park.

In 1996, many years after Claudia Albano found

things under her parents’ pepper tree, the park was

being landscaped with a small tractor.

The tractor turned up very unusual material, near the

place where Claudia’s house used to be, which is

where you are standing now.

The tractor driver called Katherine

Flynn to look at the material

dug up by the machinery.

She is an archaeologist,

a scientist who studies

objects from the past.

Have you ever dug in your garden and found interesting things underground?

Were they left there long ago? How can you tell?

Flynn also found pieces of pottery, dating

from the 1830s and 1840s. This pottery came

from England, China, France, and Boston,

Massachusetts. How did that pottery from

so far away get here, 180 years ago?

Archaeologist Flynn found an underground area here

with many more bones and pieces of pottery, still in place.

She covered this original deposit with a protective blanket

before they were buried again.

Merchant ships came to California from all over the world during the 1830s and 1840s. The Peraltas traded hides and tallow* for luxury goods, such as fine china plates and bowls, and special foods, such as chocolate and sugar.

* cow fat

In 1999, archaeologist Julia Costello figured

out that the place where the artifacts were

found was probably an adobe-making pit.

Here, the Peralta family and Indian workers

made the bricks to build their houses out of

the underground layer of clay soil. Later, they

threw trash in the empty pit. We now study the

things they threw away almost 200 years ago.

Cheryl Smith-Lintner, an archaeologist at UC Berkeley, discovered that

most of the cattle bones found here were from animals slaughtered for

their hides, rather than for food. She has studied the artifacts and written

a special report for other scientists—and for you.

In April 2004 Trish Fernandez

excavated another area, under the

new lawn. She found bottles from

Fruitvale in the 1870s. They tell

another interesting story.

Would you like to study objects from the past and learn their stories?

Please come and see the artifacts and hear their stories in the Peralta House.

THIS IS A CALIFORNIA STATE PROTECTED ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE. ALL EXCAVATION MUST BE DIRECTED BY A CERTIFIED ARCHAEOLOGIST.

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Flynn found animal bones, mostly from

cows, from the time when the Peralta

family still owned this land.

Los folletos traducidos al español sobre todos los señalamientos se encuentran en Peralta House.

Coù caùc taäp saùch dòch sang tieáng Vieät cho taát caû caùc baûng hieäu taïi Peralta House.

Underground cross-section of the Peralta adobe-making pit.Courtesy of Katherine Flynn

lost history

Why did the Peraltas build an adobe wall? Historians’ brainstorm:

to have a gathering placefor social activities and work

so that their homestead would look like a traditional hacienda

to protect their livestock, gardens and orchards

An earthquake in 1868 destroyed the wall.

No drawings or photographs of the original

exist, only the stories that people told about it.

Today this wall of raw adobe has been

constructed in memory of the vanished wall

and the people who lived here. It serves as

a backdrop for the community stage, where

people today can bring their stories to life.

The word “adobe” comes

from the Arabic word for

“mud bricks,”

pronounced a-túb.

The Spanish adopted the

word “adobe” when the

Moors ruled Spain for over

700 years, from 777–1492.

TRADITIONAL ADOBE RECIPE:

Mix clay soil, dried grass, and sand

with water. Press the mixture into

wooden frames. Remove from

frames and allow to dry.

People use adobe all over the world today.

A massive adobe wall built in 1840 once enclosed the area around the Peralta homestead.

Do you know the story of something that has vanished?

California Rancho Scene, 1848, Alfred Sully. Courtesy of the Oaklnand Museum, Kahn Collection. Ocotepec, Hildago, MéxicoIllustration from Seventy-five Years in California by William Heath Davis.

The adobe wall blends many cultures and histories.

Los folletos traducidos al español sobre todos los señalamientos se encuentran en Peralta House.

Coù caùc taäp saùch dòch sang tieáng Vieät cho taát caû caùc baûng hieäu taïi Peralta House.

Tratado de Ajedrez, Dados y Tablas, c. 1283, El Escorial, Spain.

How does this wall compare with the original wall around the Peralta homestead?

This wall is only 100 feet

long. The original was about

500 feet long, surrounding

two-and-a-half acres.This wall is 9 feet tall and

3 feet wide, the same as

the original.

The bricks are smaller than

traditional adobe bricks.

Modern workers who made

this adobe wall carried

smaller and lighter bricks

than the Indian workers

who made most of the

adobe structures on

the ranchos and at the

missions.

This wall has a raw adobe

surface. In early California,

most adobe walls were

plastered, whitewashed,

and topped with red tiles.

The core of this wall is made

of steel rebar and concrete

to make it seismically sound.

Senufo Village, Ivory Coast. Courtesy of Dick and Beany Wezelman.