Saying Good-Bye

I felt that I should come back one more time and thank all of you for following my blog these past ten weeks. It has been a great experience for me. I have appreciated accomplishing this assigment in blog style because it has pushed me to view history from different angles and aspects. For example, looking for images that spoke to my message was a challenge but it forced me to picture what the Californio women saw and experienced. When writing a paper , you tend to focus a lot of attention of grammar etc., but in a blog it's a bit more relaxed so your personality shines through which, I believe, enables the reader to bond with the writer.

I had the opportunity of turning my blog into a paper for my Modern Latin American History class which challenged me further by driving me to find a point to my blog. Most of all, I was able to prepare a presentation on my paper which I feel went well only because while I presented my paper I felt that I had a solid handle on my subject and argument. I know this is due to my blog research.

Anyway, Thanks Professor for guiding us through this real cool experience. You have helped me to ask questions that enabled me to look for a deeper meaning in my research. I know there is more I could have done and looked for and perhaps I'll have another opportunity to do so. For now, Adios and Good-bye.

Milly

Last Words and Thoughts

Well, this is my last post before signing off:( These past ten weeks have been quite an exercise. I started out with this idea of talking to you about immigration and how, in some way, we are all immigrants. I felt strongly that at some point in time all we or our ancestors have immigrated, migrated or moved to the Bay Area, that is why we should be able to sympathize with the newcomers. But as I began my research on that subject I came across a story and a name and became intrigued mainly because we shared the same surname. This is what caused me to switch subjects. As I began to research Maria Luisa Peralta, I found myself becoming more and more frustrated by the lack of information on her.

I got my break when I found the Peralta House in Oakland but quickly became disappointed when I was only able to obtain information on her brothers and father. I repeatedly asked myself, "Why is there nothing on her, her mother or any of the Peralta women?" That was strange to me. This started me on a long journey to piece together a composite character for Maria Luisa. I have used the lives of Californio women to infer what Maria's life could have been like.

I discovered that the social station of Maria and the Californio women was greatly influenced by hundreds of years of Catholic influence, political laws that supported the ideologies of the Church and by cultural customs that had been perpetuated, not only by the men, but, more importantly, by the women themselves. In the Centennial Yearbook of Alameda County, it speaks about the " strict code of laws" for "maintaining order" among the Californios. I believe that the Californio women believed in and were proud of their way of life, as strict as it might have been. For instance, this is evident by their view on birth control. In the nineteenth century, although primitive and unreliable in most cases, birth control was used by the middle-class white American women. Indigenous women had methods of birth control as well. The Hispanic women were taught that large families were a blessing from God. For the Californio woman it went a step further, for them, it was necessary to produce large families who would populate Alta California as well as help run a rancho. It was commonplace to see a mother walking to mass while herding her twenty-four children along. Many felt that, "sterility [had] become very common because the American women [were] too fond of visiting doctors and swallowing medicines. Este es un delito que Dios no perdona. (That is a crime that God does not forgive.)" (Rosaura Sanchez, Telling Identities. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), 191-192).

Women like Maria were the forerunners for the Mexican-American women of today's California. Many of their ideals and beliefs have lingered into the present day, some have taken different forms, others are done away but many, such as the mother being the matriarch of the family, still exist in today's Hispanic families and emphasis on the family is still a priority.

The Bear Flag Revolt and the takeover of California by the United States, left many Californios embittered and resentful towards the Americans. Felipa Osuna who lived with her husband at Mission San Luis Rey, was involved in the battles between the Californios and the Americans. Josefa Carrillo-Fitch struggled to come to terms with the changes the Americans introduced. She lost much of her land to squatters and suits. She learned to speak English but that was not the case with all the Californio women. Rosalia Vallejo had strong opinions and was angry with the Americans due to the way they mistreated her husband and brothers during the Bear Flag Revolt. She was so resentful that she refused to learn the English language, it was her way of spiting the Americans. On the other hand, Maria Antonia Rodriguez of Monterey told Cerruti, when he questioned her about the takeover, that it had happened before, "in every conquered nation." (Beebe and Senkewicz) I think it is very possible that their feelings towards the Americans were passed on to their descendents contributing to their present-day prejudice, as well as, acceptance of one another.

Would I be pushing it if I added that the Califronios were immigrants? Hah! I guess those who orginately came in the Anza and Rivera y Moncada expeditions from Mexico to populte Alta California were being that they left their homes and came to a foreign land, a land that was completely different from what they knew. They encountered strange peoples and customs eventually making this land their country. You decide.