Saturday, December 16, 2017

Sunol Hootenanny to celebrate East Bay’s pioneer spirit

Ranching and the pioneer spirit are foundational to East Bay’s history. On Saturday, November 5th, come out to historic Sunol and celebrate the region’s cowboy culture, have fun learning old-time crafts, watch exciting demonstrations of ranch-hand skills and lots more.

Pony rides, a petting zoo, and good old-time music bring ranch living to life while stilt walkers and corn husk artists amaze the crowds and instruct interested participants in old-time crafts.

Cattle came to California with the Spanish in the sixteenth century and by the mid-1700’s had become crucial to the economy of the twenty-one missions established up and down the coast. The cattle provided beef, of course, but equally important were the hides, which were sold, traded, or used on site to make clothing and saddles. The rendered fat, or tallow, was turned into soap and candles, the latter being especially important before the days of electric lights.

Spanish grants provided the grazing land for the large ranchos of California, including those of the East Bay. We are used to thinking of cattle ranches surrounded by barbed wire, but on the ranchos of Alta California, cattle were allowed to roam free. Since they were branded, they could be identified, and once a year a "rodeo" was held where all the cattle were brought and separated according to their brands. Calves that followed their mothers became the new property of the cattle owners. Any cattle that couldn’t be identified became the property of the hosting rancho.

Records indicate that by 1834, the twenty-one missions of California owned in total about four hundred thousand head of cattle. The Mexican government, having won independence from Spain in 1821, secularized the missions in 1834, and the herds of cattle were sold off, mostly to the landholding families of California. The cattle of Mission San Jose were believed to have gone to Jesus Vallejo, holder of Rancho Arroyo de Alameda and elder brother of General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, the influential Presidio commander and California statesman. (It was the latter Vallejo that John C. Fremont held prisoner during the Bear Flag Revolt of 1846.) Eventually, in the latter half of the nineteenth century, enterprising settlers in the East Bay bought out (some say swindled) the families of the ranchos, establishing their own operations.

Many of the early vaqueros were local Ohlone who had learned their skills tending the mission cattle. Following the gold rush, demand for beef rose, and so did demand for cowboys. Disillusioned miners returning from gold fields found they could earn several dollars a day, good money for the time, and many became cowboys. They brought with them the cultures, pastimes, and music of their homes, scattered as they were across the United States.

The Sunol Hootenanny promises to reconnect visitors with a glimpse into the cowboy culture that first appeared here more than a century ago. Sunol Regional Wilderness is located at the end of Geary Road off Calaveras Road about 5 miles south of Interstate 680 near the town of Sunol.

Sunol’s Old Timey Hootenanny
Saturday, Nov. 5, 2016
11 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Sunol Regional Wilderness
1895 Geary Rd, Sunol
Free. Parking $5 cash
http://www.ebparks.org/parks/sunol


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