Composed by Teri Wynne…

Where I now am living we call Concow Meadows in Concow California, in Butte county, the real name is Koyomk’awi. A name white people could not pronounce so they called it Concow.  I have just  learned so many new things of their history. For me, no matter where I am on earth, knowing this place is here has helped me feel peace.  I have always felt a strong connection for the land but it’s different now. Every step I take I’m now more aware of the fact that there were people here before.  Walking where I walk, sitting where I sit, talking where I talk, camping where I camp, making food where I cook, and playing where I play. I always knew this because of stories I’ve heard and the grinding holes in the granite, but now the memory of past life is more alive for me. How much it must have hurt to have their way of life ripped and stolen away.

  This place doesn’t look the way it used to before white people came here and desecrated everything. I used to think that the inherited loss I hear about that the people feel was because of the violence their ancestors experienced against their bodies and their families. Being taken away from home, trauma from being hunted and illnesses the invaders brought.  But I now realize the pain they feel must also be due to the violence committed against the land. 

  The colonizers, early settlers and gov. officials ruined the rivers, the trees and the wildlife. Rail tracks were put all over the mountains. The forest was logged, wildlife over hunted. Roads made throughout the land. The rivers and creeks were all invaded and messed up from gold mining and fences made to hold livestock. It was an apocalypse. Now, after the fire when everything is different and changed there is an intense trauma  in me, but I  cannot even compare my feelings to the magnitude of loss experienced and endured by the Konkau Ooo.  

  In 1863 the Konkau Uoo Maidu were forcibly sent on a trail from Chico to Covelo to be relocated from their homeland. They walked for a month where almost half of them died. I read horrifying accounts of their relocation.  But not all of the people were captured. There are still Konkau  people here in Koyomk’awi today who evaded the relocation. 

Members of the Konkow Band of Valley Maidu are exploring throughout Koyomk’awi for round house sites previously used by ancestors and grinding stones and artifacts. Just to prove to the Feds that the tribe exists. It seems incredibly ridiculous that the government doesn’t recognize them as a people and this as their homelands. The People have in recent years been re-learning their songs and dances and language. Sometimes here at the Concow campground they come to sing and dance, and it is  peaceful and right for the people to hear the songs and the earth to feel dancing feet.

I want the Konkau  to know that this land is so special to me. My heart is here. My soul is here. I honor Earth in this place I live. By careful tending, this spot is hopefully going to have enough native plants on it to give, to share for harvesting. I respect and appreciate all advice and knowledge shared with me