Research paper

Topic:
The American Indian Struggle for Liberation
-
The Indian Occupation of Alcatraz Island
20.11.1969 – 11.06.1971
Not a media gag but a cornerstone in Indian history

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Table of content

1. Introduction 1

2. Short History Of Alcatraz Island 1

3. Exacerbating Events 2
3.1 Indian Situation Around 1960 2
3.2 Termination Act – The Relocation Program 3
3.3 Social Movements in the 60’s 5

4. The Three Alcatraz Occupations 5

4.1 The First Occupation 6
4.2 The Second Occupation 6
4.4 The Third Occupation 7

5. Thesis Reworded 8

6. Concluding Statement 9

7. Works Cited 11

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1. Introduction
Native Americans have been a rather popular topic throughout the years in many
journalistic works but only a few of them dealt with the for Indian self-determination
important time around 1960. This time and therewith in the focus, the occupation of
Alcatraz island was an important foundation stone for modern Indian history. The
relationship between the United States of America and the Native American Indians
is strained for all times. It all began with the arrival of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock
and since then the white invaders took their land and enforced their superiority over
the original inhabitants of this country.

The objective target of this paper is to make clear that the Indian occupation of
Alcatraz Island was more than a media gag and a necessary answer to a centuries-
lasting oppression of the Indian people their culture and finally an awakening of the
Indian self-determination, which let to a springboard for Indian activism. Not all that
would have been possible without this occupation as a trigger to call the old and
nevertheless still current question of the native struggle for liberation to mind.

“They made us many promises, more than I can remember. But they only kept
but one. They promised to take our land and they took it.”1

2. Short history of Alcatraz Island

Alcatraz Island, also called “the rock” is situated in the middle of the Bay of San
Francisco in California. The sandstone island is 500 meters long and 41 meter high it
has an are of 101,190 square yard and on it the oldest lighthouse at the American
West Coast, built in 1854. The island got its name from the European discoverer Juan
de Ayala who named it La Isla de los Alcatraces – island of the Pelicans. John
Charles Fremont, once Governor of California bought the island 1847 for $5000 for
the United States from the Mexican Government. First, the island was used as a
military base, a fort to protect the Bay Area during the civil war.

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Used by an Indian occupant but originally from Chief Red Cloud, the Oglala Sioux

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Later on, the Government remodeled it to a high maximum penitentiary, which was
closed on March 21, 1963 due to the high pollution, the untreated wastewater was
piped in the Bay, and it was too expensive to maintain the buildings on the island
affected by the salty water. Today it is under the supervision of the National Park
Service and opened to the public.

3. Exacerbating Events
To understand the circumstances, which led finally to the occupation of Alcatraz
Island, one has to know and understand the situation of the Native Americans. Their
history and their situation around 1960 which was getting worse more and more. This
had to do with the so called “Relocation Program” or “Termination Act”, also the just
flourishing famous movements during the sixties, which had an extremely high
influence on people living in the Bay Area in San Francisco. The following
arguments try to explain the situation and atmosphere and finally how things could
come to a crisis and that it was only a matter of time that there was something done
about it.

3.1 Indian situation around 1960

Who is visiting a reservation today is very likely to see poverty, desperation and
alcoholism. These problems still exist in spite of the improvements in the recent past,
but it was even worse around 1960. Corruptions in the Bureau of Indian Affairs2
(BIA) and some tribal councils led to sales of Indian land and natural resources,
property of the tribes, to speculators in 1968, the senate established a committee of
inquiry to set up a report dealing with the life circumstances of American Indians
living in reservations. The inquiry ascertained that 50.000 Indian families live in
unhealthy dwellings that where ripe for demolition and many of them in hovels or
even disused cars at this time. The report went on, listing that the average income of a
native Indian amounts $1.500, which is 25% of the national average income. The rate
of unemployment is with 40% more than tenfold as the average and the average life
expectancy of a native American is said to be 44 years of age whereas the not native

2
The BIA is a department of the United States Department of the Interior (DOI) that look after the
interests of the Native American Indians and their reservations.

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American has a life expectancy of 65 years of age. Furthermore, one can read in the
report that the birth mortality rate amounts twice as much as the national average.

Considering all these facts one would ask why is the situation of this people, who are
the native inhabitants of that country so increasingly bad and it is not surprising that
an action like the occupation of Alcatraz island was planned and realized to call
attention to this problems and to make the population of this nation aware of the
Indian problems.

3.2 Termination Act – The Relocation Program

The catchphrase for the United States government which had and still has to deal with
the rightfully habitants of this country has long been assimilation. The government
tried this by relocation. The first relocation took place in the nineteenth century
during the western expansion, Indians were moved from their ancestral homeland and
moved into reservations. Most of these reservations are located in areas that haven’t
been considered useful for white settlers but later many mineral resources like
uranium3, coal4 and oil5 have been discovered. Even though all this mineral resources
are on Indian reservation land, they have few possibilities to defend themselves
against this exploitation and furthermore this reservations amount a great quantum of
land in the United States.

During the 1950’s, the government focused upon breaking up those reservations to
solve these accruing problems. The new tactic was to assimilate the Indians into the
society and the government argued that it would be a benefit for the Native people by
eliminating the reservations, because thereby breaking up tribal structures, cultural
beliefs and religious practices so they would have no problem to adapt themselves in
their new society. A way to break Indians and to make them forget about their one
culture and roots was seen in education, teaching them white culture or as U.S. Army
captain Richard H. Pratt, founder of the Charlisle Indian boarding school in

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55% of all uranium existence in the United States is located on Indian ground.
4
One third of all coal existence in the United States is located on Indian ground.
5
5% of all oil existence in the United States is located on Indian ground.

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Pennsylvania said: “the only good Indian is a dead one (…) All the Indian there is in
the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him and save the man.” – Albert and
Albert, The Sixties Papers, 121. So all traditional manners like culture or speaking the
traditional language or wearing traditional clothing was prohibited. The government
tried then by the 1952 developed national relocation program to relocate American
Indian families and with this to urbanize them. Family heads that that unemployed
was offered assistance in finding a job and apprenticeship training and those who
chose to take place in this program were provided transportation to one of eight fast-
growing metropolitan regions. The result of this can be seen in the total number of
100,000 Indians that have been moved to Los Angeles, Phoenix, Denver, Dallas,
Cleveland, and San Francisco.6 The number of the Indian population of the Bay Area
in San Francisco grew in 1964 between 15,000 and 20,000 but because of different
ethnic classifications used in governmental reports experts reckon that the Indian
population was as high as 40,000 and two-third of them were participants in the
federal relocation program. Many Native Americans couldn’t cope with this new
situation in these new surroundings and tried to get help from the Bureau of Indian
Affaires but were even more disappointed after that for real help wasn’t to get.
Although the Indian termination policy was disestablished in 1958, it was still feared
by Indian people as the Josephy report authored for the Nixon administration
ascertained.

Melvin Thom, a Native American Indian and the cofounder and president of the
NIYC7 described the termination policy as a war that is fought by the government
against the Indians, he said:

“The opposition to Indians is a monstrosity which cannot be beaten by any single

action, unless we as Indian people could literally rise up, in unison, and take what
is ours by force…. We know the odds are against us, but we also realize that we
are fighting for the lives of future Indian generations. … We are convinced, more

7
In the 1960's, NIYC was an Indian civil rights organization – National Indian Youth Council

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 than ever, that this is a real war. No people in this world ever have been
exterminated without putting up a last resistance. The Indians are gathering.8

3.3 Social Movements in the 60’s

In this new environment, abandoned, farthermost from family and cut off from their
traditional cultures the disillusioned people found and started working together.
Not only the Indians were frustrated; a larger social movement arose, especially in
San Francisco.

This movement created by mostly African Americans, Hispanics, women and other
civil right groups infected these times, in history known as times of political and self-
awareness. Student organizations like the “Student Non-Violent Coordination
Committee (SNCC) led by young black people were founded. The Vietnam War
became a central topic in their policies and this war divided the county in supporter
and protesters. A nation was torn up and in times of unrest, dissatisfaction and the
new cultural icon Malcolm X established the Black Panther Party (BPP), and it’s
guiding principle of “Black Power”. This newly awakening of people’s consciousness
led to the political engagement of young people and within this so called
“Movement” which was a generic term for a groups native Americans formed their
own groups, under the leadership of Richard Oakes, who played an important part in
the Alcatraz occupation and other enlightened Indian students like Dennis Banks or
La Nada Boyer such groups as “Indians Of All Tribes” and “American Indian
Movement” should be establish later on out of this times.

This educated politically involved young leaders understood the plight of the urban
Indians who suffered from relocation, isolation, poverty and helplessness and as
members of the scarcely established Red Power organizations they started to think
about their role in society and what they are capable of doing against it.

4. The Three Alcatraz Occupations

The main purpose of this work is to emphasize on the third occupation in November
1969 because it was the most sophisticated, longest and immensely lasting one.

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But it would not have been able to realize this without the knowing of the two
forerunners for they had great influence on the last one and are therefore a necessary
cornerstones, that should be shortly mentioned, in the history that led finally to the
nation wide known occupation.

4.1 The First Occupation

The first of three occupations took place on March 9 in 1964 and lasted only 4 hours.
Five Sioux men followed by journalists, photographers and a notary entered the
island and claimed it back from the government. This was undergirded by a treaty of
Fort Laramie from November 6 in 1868 made by the government, with the Indians. It
conceded the Indians, inviolably by the government, parts of land and says that all
abandoned federal land that was once populated by them could be taken back by
them, legally. In actuality, this contract was annulled in 1934 by the congress but
with an exception for the tribe of the Sioux because they were forced even after the
1869 contract to give up huge parts of land because of gold mining and the building
of forts.

The five men offered the government to pay the sum of $0.47 per acre precisely the
same amount that the Indians were offered for stolen land during the gold rush by the
state, which made $9.40 for the whole island of Alcatraz. Later the five men left the
island without any resistance on advise of their lawyer before federal policemen
arrived to remove them. One can see by this that this short occupation of Alcatraz
was more or less a publicity hoax then a serious well planned action but it was also a
foreshadow and trigger to the upcoming events.

4.2 The Second Occupation

This so-called second occupation is in truth not like the first one not a single action,
which can stand alone, more a prolog to the big one. The main cause was an accident
happening in late October in 1969 when the San Francisco Indian Center burned
down. It was the meeting place for the United Bay Area Council, which was led by
Adam Nordwall – who later became Adam Fortunate Eagle – an important figure in
the Indian struggle for liberation like Richard Oakes. The center was also a place for
the new awoken student movement, a place to discuss about politics and devising

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strategies for making the Indian everyday life better. So the members of the Indian
Center and the students started working together and on the 9th of November 1969
Richard Oakes, some fellow students and center members, all from different tribes
calling themselves “Indian Of All Tribes” set out on a boat to Alcatraz island. They
did the same as the five Sioux Indians during the first occupation and claimed the
land as their property. They went back and started to work out a plan for the longest
and last occupation of this island by the Indians.

4.3 The Third Occupation

Oakes, Nordwall and other Indians privy to the plans decided that a longer lasting
occupation could be realizable. Richard Oaks made it his business to incite as many
students as possible for the upcoming event and on November 20 in 1969, 70 of 89
occupiers have been from UCLA9.

They also informed the media a week before the takeover and so the Indians landed
on the island and invoked on the treaty of Laramie of the year 1868 and released
immediately a press statement in which it says:

“We the native Americans, re-claim the land known as Alcatraz Island in the
name of all Indians.…[W]e 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] an
AMERICAN INDIAN MUSEUM.
…In the name of all Indians, therefore, we reclaim this island for our Indian
nations…. We feel this claim is just and proper, and that this land should
rightfully be granted to us as long as the rivers shall run and the sun shall shine.
Signed, INDIANS OF ALL TRIBES.10

As soon as this was done the Indians started to organize their daily life and
established a leadership. All this was more difficult than they expected it to be

9
University of California, Los Angeles

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because the government shut down the electricity and water supply and during this
time, two oppositional parties arose and worked against Richard Oakes. In May 1970,
Richard Oakes left the island because his stepdaughter died while playing. She felt
down the stairs in the abandoned jail. After Oakes left the struggle on the new
leadership began again. With no real leader and people on the island who haven’t
been involved in the original planning and creation of the idea of “holding the rock”
it wasted inevitable to anarchy. Tedium began to rise under the remaining Indians and
as the students started leaving for college and University urban Indians and supporter
of the Hippie culture took their place. That means a new society grew on the island
not knowing in which direction to go. The main idea of an occupied Alcatraz Island
was strongly accompanied by a positive media support but know under this regime
reporters were molested and the occupiers although neglected the ban of alcohol and
drugs.

They also had many supporters from the mainland and not only Native Americans but
also white American people that made it difficult for the government to act, too.
Under these new circumstances, it was only a matter of time until something was
going to happen and in January 1971, two oil tankers collided in the Bay of San
Francisco. This incident was used by the government that argued that is was only able
to happen because of the not functioning lighthouse on the island. Later was
investigated that this was not true but a favorable event for the government to remove
the last occupiers, peacefully from the island. The occupation ended in June 11, 1971.

5. Thesis Reworded
The purpose of this research paper was to buttress the thesis that the Alcatraz
occupation was neither a publicity gag nor a useless rise up against disparities but an
important step for Indian self-determination in a difficult time for Native Americans
in their own country. It is also important to keep in mind that this event led to a social
consciousness of the American people relating to this suppressed ethnic group. It will
be clarified in the next chapter, if the thesis pointed out the main objects.

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6. Concluding Statement
It was the aim of the Indians by occupying this specific island to make clear to the
American population under which circumstances they are living and what for a heavy
burden they have to carry. They have chosen Alcatraz to show that this island which
has neither fresh water support nor electricity, not even a waste water treatment plant
or proper premises to live in to show that it is there not really worse than in many
reservations where they lived before.

It is a surprise that it took so long for that century long suppressed nation to act for
their rightfully status in this country. The circumstances of the times in mind when
make it understandable why this could happen. All the social and political uprisings,
the awakening and discovering of the Indian consciousness precipitated by the
relocation and termination act made it important for this people to discern that it is in
their hands to do something. One problem of the Indians was always that they rather
fought against themselves than united for themselves this old problem could be seen
in Alcatraz too, the end of the occupation was initiated by this.

The realization of building educational and cultural institutions a center for American
Indian studies a museum and many more of these goals the Indians targeted failed but
should the success or failure of this be juged? Nevertheless, two very important
things for Indian were realized by this action.
First the influence that the occupation had on the American society, the awakening of
the American public to see the burden the first Americans have to carry and as a
consequence thereof the need for Indian self-determination. Another point would be
to see the occupation as a decisive factor for the following actions that happened
during and after it.

Richard Nixon for example, former president of the United States took office in
January 1969. In the midst of the occupation on July 8, 1970, in an address to the
Congress Nixon said, that it was

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 “ long past time that the Indian policies of the Federal government began to
recognize and build upon the capacities and insights of the Indian people…The time
has come to beak decisively with the past and to create the conditions for a new era
in which the Indian future is determined by Indian acts and Indian decisions.”

Short after Nixon took office he ended the relocation programm and started a
American Indian policy which tried to integrate the Natives not pushing them on the
edge of society.

The Indians may have lost Alcatraz but it was the birth of a political awakening and a
springboard for new self-confidence and consciousness which led to more actions of
the AIM which are lasting until today.

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7. Works Cited

6
Ablon, “Relocated American Indians,” 297.
8
Guy B. Senese, Self-Determination and the Social Education of Native Americans
(New York: Praeger, 1991), 148.
10
Blue Cloud, Peter. “Unsigned Proclamation” Alcatraz is not an island. Berkeley,
Calif.: Wingbow Press, 1972. 40-42

Fortunate Eagle, Adam and Findley, Tim. Heart of the rock : the Indian
invasion of Alcatraz. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002

Johnson, Troy R. The ocupation of Alcatraz island : Indian self-determination

and the rise of indian activism. Urbana [u. a.]: University of Illionois Press,
1996

Johnson, Troy R. American Indian activism : Alcatraz to the longest walk.

Urbana [u. a.]: University of Illionois Press, 1997

Website of the government: URL: http://www.archives.gov

Website of the Government of the National Park Service, U.S. Department of

Interior: URL: http://www.nps.gov/alcatraz

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