NOVEMBER 19:

1981 Ottawa Ontario - 3,000 Indians march on Parliament Hill, and more in other sites across Canada, to protest exclusion of aboriginal rights from constitution.

November 19, 1969:  "Indians of all tribes" are declared on Alcatraz.

November 19, 1876:  Big Leggings and Miles make a deal.

1794 Washington, DC - John Jay negotiates Jay Treaty 'to promote friendship and good neighbourhood' between the US and British North America; New York fur trader John Jacob Astor benefits when the export of furs to England is allowed, and the British agree to evacuate Ohio Valley forts.
 

BACKGROUND:
 

From:  http://www.nps.gov/alcatraz/indian.html

Alcatraz Island - "We Hold The Rock" - Indians of all Tribes

The Alcatraz Indian Occupation by Dr. Troy Johnson

European discovery and exploration of the San Francisco Bay Area and its islands began in 1542 and culminated with the mapping of the bay in 1775. Early visitors to the Bay Area were preceded 10,000 to 20,000 years earlier, however, by the native people indigenous to the area. Prior to the coming of the Spanish and Portuguese explorers, over 10,000 indigenous people, later to be called the Ohlone (a Miwok Indian word meaning "western people"), lived in the coastal area between Point Sur and the San Francisco Bay.

Early use of Alcatraz Island by the indigenous people is difficult to reconstruct, as most tribal and village history was recorded and passed down generation-to-generation as an oral history of the people. A large portion of this oral history has been lost as a result of the huge reduction of the California Indian population following European contact and exploration. Based on oral history it appears that Alcatraz was used as a place of isolation or ostracization for tribal members who had violated a tribal law or taboo, as a camping spot, an area for gathering foods, especially bird eggs and sea-life, and that Alcatraz was utilized also as a hiding place for many Indians attempting to escape from the California Mission system. Once Alcatraz Island became a prison, both military prisoners and civilians were incarcerated on the island. Among these were many American Indians. The largest single group of Indian prisoners sentenced to confinement on Alcatraz occurred in January 1895 when the U.S. government arrested, tried and shipped nineteen Moqui Hopi to Alcatraz Island. Indian people continued to be confined as prisoners in the disciplinary barracks on the island through the remainder of the 1800s and the early 1900s.

On November 9, 1969, Indian people once again came to Alcatraz Island when Richard Oakes, a Mohawk Indian, and a group of Indian supporters set out in a chartered boat, the Monte Cristo, to symbolically claim the island for the Indian people. On November 20, 1969, this symbolic occupation turned into a full scale occupation which lasted until June 11, 1971.

In actuality, there were three separate occupations of Alcatraz Island, one on March 9, 1964, one on November 9, 1969, and the occupation which lasted nineteen months which began on the 20th of November, 1969.

The 1964 occupation lasted for only four hours and was carried out by five Sioux, led by Richard McKenzie. This short occupation is significant because the demands for the use of the island for a cultural center and an Indian university would resurface almost word for word in the larger, much longer occupation of 1969.

The November 9, 1969 occupation was planned by Richard Oakes, a group of Indian students, and a group of urban Indians from the Bay Area. Since many different tribes were represented, the name "Indians of All Tribes" was adopted for the group. They claimed the island in the name of Indians of all tribes and left the island to return later that same evening. In meetings following the November 9th occupation, Oakes and his fellow American Indian students realized that a prolonged occupation was possible. Oakes visited the American Indian Studies Center at UCLA where he recruited Indian students for what would become the longest prolonged occupation of a federal facility by Indian people to this very day. Eighty Indian students from UCLA were among the approximately 100 Indian people who occupied Alcatraz Island.

It is important to remember that the occupation force was made up initially of young urban Indian college students. And the most inspirational person was Richard Oakes. Oakes is described by most of those as handsome, charismatic, a talented orator, and a natural leader. Oakes was the most knowledgeable about the landings and the most often sought out and identified as the leader, the Chief, the mayor of Alcatraz.

-----------------
ISSUED BY INDIANS OF ALL TRIBES:

PROCLAMATION TO THE GREAT WHITE FATHER 
(NOVEMBER, 1969)

We, the Native Americans, re-claim the land known as Alcatraz island in the name of all American Indians by right of discovery.  we wish to be fair and honorable in our dealing with the caucasian inhabitants if this land, and thereby offer the following treaty:

We will purchase Alcatraz island for twenty-four dollars in glass beads and red cloth, a precedent set down by the white man's purchase of a similar island about 300 years ago.  We know that $24 in trade goods for these 16 acres is more than what was paid when Manhattan was sold, but we know that land values have risen over the years.  Our offer of $1.24 per acres is greater than the 47 cents per acre the white man is now paying California Indians for their land.

We will give the inhabitants of this land a portion for their own to be held in trust by the American Indian Affairs and by the Bureau of Caucasian Affairs to hold in perpetuity - for as long as the sun shall rise and the rivers go down to the sea.  We will further guide the inhabitants in the proper way of living.  We will offer them our religion, our education, our life-ways, in order to help them achieve our level of civilization and thus raise them and all their white brothers up from their savage and unhappy state.  We offer this treaty in good faith and wish to be fair and honorable in our dealings with all white men.

We feel that this so called Alcatraz island is more than suitable for an Indian Reservation, as determined by the white man's own standards.  By this we mean that this place resembles most Indian Reservations in that:

1. It is isolated from modern facilities and without adequate means of transportation.
2. It has no fresh running water.
3. It has no adequate sanitation facilities.
4. There are no oil or mineral rights.
5. There is no industry and so unemployment is very great.
6. There is no health care facility.
7. The soil is rocky and non-productive and the land does not support game.
8. There are no educational facilities.
9. The population has always exceeded the land base.
10. The population has always been held prisoners and kept dependent upon others.

Further, it would be fitting and symbolic that ships from all over the world, entering the Golden gate, would first see Indian land, and thus be reminded of the true history of this nation.  This tiny island would be a symbol of the great lands once ruled by free and noble Indians.

What use will we make of this land?

Since the San Francisco Indian Center burned down, there is no place for Indians to assemble and carry on tribal life in the white man's city.  Therefore, we plan to develop on this island several Indian institutions.  1. A center for Native American studies. 2 An American Indian Spiritual Center, 3. An Indian Center of Ecology, 4. A great Indian Training School, and 5. An American indian Museum.

In the name of all Indians, therefore, we claim this island for our Indian nations, for these reasons, we feel this claims is just and proper, and that this land should rightfully be granted to us as long as the rivers shall flow and sun shall shine.

From Indians of All Tribes PHOTO ESSAY