been a continual source of wonderment for the diversity of its people and the way they have carved out a way of life—and degree of tolerance and optimism—at odds with so much of the world. Not to be forgotten, however, is the dark side of this collision of peoples from many continents: a dissonant history of racism, repression, and annihilation of the native people. The lure of California has had many names: the California Dream, the Golden State, the Land of Sunshine. No doubt a favorable climate and hopes for the future have led people to our shores, but the foundations of the state’s allure are mostly practical: a thriving economy, lots of jobs, an open society, reuniting families torn asunder, and more. Once here, it is the people, their wits and their labor, who have built the California dreamworks. Few, however, wish to remember the failures and defeats, or simply the bent backs and unrewarded drudgery that mar the gilded image. California stands at a threshold today. The golden economy has lost some of its luster, inequality is growing, and the state is finding it hard to provide for the new Californians of this generation, the new majority of people of color. What we and they choose to do about it will tell if the Dream stays alive.
Immigrants protesting against US Congress Immigration Reform Proposal, Los Angeles, May 1, 2006.
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Land & Nature
California is so distinct in topography, climate and ecology that it has been called “an island in the land”. Facing the Pacific Ocean on the west, it is walled off by high mountains in the north and east and by deserts in the south and southeast. Within that realm lie nine major topographic regions. Dominating the state’s midsection are three parallel regions: Coast Ranges, Central Valley, and Sierra Nevada. Southern California has three regions, as well: Coastal Plain, Transverse Ranges, and Mojave Desert. The Transverse Ranges run east–west, cutting across the grain of the Sierras and Coast Ranges. Northern California has two subregions: Klamath and Siskiyou Mountains on the west and the volcanic landscape of the Southern Cascades to the east. Beyond the Sierra, California shares a piece of Nevada’s Basin and Range. California’s landscape is a creation of the tectonics generated by the collision of the Pacific and North American plates. In the distant past, the Pacific floor dove under the continent, pushing up the Sierra (as in today’s Cascades). Now the Pacific plate slides along the San Andreas fault system, twisting northwest and pushing upward, creating the Coast and Transverse Ranges, and periodically shaking up California’s cities. California has benefited greatly from the gifts of the land: gold, silver, and other minerals left by volcanism and uplift; oil deposits from sea beds driven far beneath the coast; and deep valley soils deposited from ancient mountains.
California’s geography sets it apart from the rest of North America. Its natural blessings have been a source of wonder and wealth, its frequent earthquakes a challenge.
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LAND & PEOPLE
California occupies one of the five Mediterranean climate zones of the world (wet winters, dry summers). Heavy fog off the Pacific cools the coastal regions from Mendocino to San Diego during the summer. Far Northern California sees the most rain, akin to the Pacific Northwest. In far Southeast California lies desert: the Mojave and pieces of the Colorado and Sonoran zones. The Sierra and northern mountains enjoy heavy winter snowfalls, the southern mountains a light dusting. The state’s flora and fauna are remarkably diverse, combining species adapted to a Mediterranean regime, those tolerant of the extremes of alpine and desert climates, and remnant species from wetter and colder epochs. California has more endemic (unique) plant species than any other part of the continental US. Some, such as the sequoias and bristlecone pines, are wonders of the world. Others, such as Monterey pines and California poppies, are common in gardens and plantations worldwide. Californians have profited from cutting the forests of redwood, fir and pine growing thick along the northern coast and along the mountain ranges, and even more so from farming the broad valleys beneath the summer sun. Yet resource extraction left a legacy of ravaged landscapes and agriculture introduced a host of new species that displaced the native flora and fauna. The combination of rare beauty and rampant devastation is key to Californian’s legacy of conservation.
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Public Lands & Parks
Half of California’s land is in public ownership, and much of that is protected in the most extensive system of national, state, and local parks in the United States.
Large areas of California are in public ownership, mostly federal lands administered by the US Forest Service, National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management. Public lands occupy over 47 million acres—almost half of the state’s 100 million acres. Only Alaska and Nevada have more acreage in public lands. California has more units of the National Parks system (monuments, historic sites, seashores, reserves, recreation areas) than any other state (32), covering 7.5 million acres. Yosemite and Sequoia were two of the earliest national parks, and Yosemite Valley is arguably the oldest in the country (given to the state to administer in 1864). The National Park Service (1916) was the brainchild of Stephen Mather, the first of several Californians to serve as its director. National forests began to be set aside in 1884 after most of the west had been sold into private hands. Almost 2 million acres of redwood forests were disposed of before the country woke up to the devastation of uncontrolled logging. California now has the second highest national forest area of any state: 20.7 million acres. Californians led the fight for the National Wilderness Preservation System (1964) and the state has more wilderness areas than any other, lying mostly in national forests. Desert lands were long thought of as useless, except for military purposes, but large tracts have recently been set aside in parks, such as the Mojave National Preserve. California has the largest state park system in the country: 278 units encompassing 1.4 million acres, including parks, historic sites, natural reserves, and recreation areas. Most are smaller than national parks, but they attract almost twice the number of visitors. The first historic site was marked in 1889 and the first park created in 1902, but a state parks system was not organized and financed until 1928, growing rapidly thereafter. Today, the state’s perennial budget crisis has hit the parks hard, with few new units added and many closed to regular use. California’s urban areas are packed with city, county and regional parks and open spaces, adding up to more than 1.5 million acres. Offshore, the state has thousands of square miles covered by four federal marine sanctuaries. The state has also designated over 100 state marine protected areas, and development along the 1,000-mile coastline has been tightly regulated since 1972. San Francisco Bay has been protected from further incursions since 1965 and includes five of the over 50 national wildlife refuges in the state. Californians have been leaders in national and global conservation for over a century. The movement has been inspired by the state’s magnificent landscape and by the devastation of the land by mining, logging, and urbanization. Since the days of John Muir, its momentum has never slowed, taking on new threats to the land and waters as they arose, such as large dams, ski resorts, suburban sprawl, bay fill, and coastal development. Today’s conservationists focus on climate change, energy conservation, and rethinking cities.
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LAND & PEOPLE
21
Colonialism & Native Californians
Native Californians arrived more than 10,000 years ago. They lived in families and clans of exceptional diversity, speaking 100 languages and 300 dialects. They prospered on the abundant wildlife, which they managed through seed collection, land-clearing fires, and fish ponds. Their numbers reached perhaps 300,000 in pre-Colonial times, the largest concentration north of the Valley of Mexico, but unlike the Iroquois they did not form nations. The Spaniards reached California in 1542, but left it alone until their empire was threatened in the late 18th century by British, French, Russian, and American expansion. The Christianizing Missions founded by Father Junipero Serra, where natives
