Speaker 1: You know, I don't talk enough about the YouTube channel
Speaker 1: that we launched about six months ago. I had Earth
Speaker 1: Ancients was on YouTube for a good five years. We
Speaker 1: had a London based company and we were posting, you know,
Speaker 1: a video every week. But we got caught up in
Speaker 1: some bad material I guess or the editors thought it
Speaker 1: was bad material having to do with I think it
Speaker 1: had to do with the Sphinx and Robert Shock and Zi.
Speaker 1: I might have said something about Zachie had Hawas that
Speaker 1: got me in trouble. I think I was very frustrated.
Speaker 1: I'd just coming I had just come back from a tour,
Speaker 1: and I think I talked about this. I had a
Speaker 1: conversation with Egypt Egyptian archaeologist, and I was asking This
Speaker 1: was all recorded, I probably should have edited out. I
Speaker 1: was asking why you're not using ground penetrating radar and
Speaker 1: this was over at the Serapim. I was talking to
Speaker 1: this guy and he was very very forthright, and he
Speaker 1: basically said we don't use it. And I was shocked
Speaker 1: because I was like, well, how the hell do you
Speaker 1: do excavations with all the sand and this everything is
Speaker 1: covered and is he said, we use the old survey
Speaker 1: if something has a hill or a bump or something,
Speaker 1: we look at it, we dig into it, and then
Speaker 1: if it's what we think it is, then we start excavating. Well,
Speaker 1: I was flabbergasted, and I think I was frustrated, and
Speaker 1: I said something that was not great about the Antiquities
Speaker 1: Department of Egypt, which is still He's not officially part
Speaker 1: of it anymore. Zahi watched us to be the Supreme Leader.
Speaker 1: Supreme Leader. Anyhow, long story short, I got in trouble.
Speaker 1: They asked to take that episode down. I think we
Speaker 1: waited too long and they ended up taking the whole
Speaker 1: channel down and we eventually got it back up, but
Speaker 1: at the time I said, I have many a great
Speaker 1: relationship with the organization. So they took the whole thing
Speaker 1: down and it was down for over a year, and
Speaker 1: six months ago we relaunched it and so Earth Asia's
Speaker 1: YouTube channel is back, so I hope people can get
Speaker 1: back on there and see some of the great editing
Speaker 1: and programming that we do. Of course, everyone listens, which
Speaker 1: is good, but if you want to see details and
Speaker 1: you're not one for Facebook, check out the YouTube channel
Speaker 1: Earth Ancients YouTube and you'll see everybody we talk to
Speaker 1: each week, so YouTube's very sensitive. There was a time
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, if you spoke out about
Speaker 1: a certain drug, or you are speaking out against the
Speaker 1: AMA American Medical Association, they would flag you. It's really
Speaker 1: gotten bad. And of course no foul language, no nudity, obviously,
Speaker 1: no pornographic imagery, cartoons or anything like that. But I
Speaker 1: still get flagged occasionally, and I know people that are
Speaker 1: getting flaked. I know Kob people have their whole site
Speaker 1: taken down. So anyhow, if you can take a look
Speaker 1: at the Earth Ancients on the YouTube channel and see
Speaker 1: what's going on there. Hey, today we are going to California.
Speaker 1: We're going to talk about the Conquistador, and that is
Speaker 1: the period when Cortes Hernanez Cortes landed in Mexico and
Speaker 1: basically destroyed the Aztecs. But today's story has to do
Speaker 1: with northern Mexico and Baja California, and my guest today
Speaker 1: is talking about really his belief on how California was developed,
Speaker 1: the various indigenous people there, and his own personal trek
Speaker 1: into Baja California in the late nineteen seventies. It's kind
Speaker 1: of cool for me because I'm a Native California, and
Speaker 1: I'm always interested in what the history is. We have
Speaker 1: a history in the late fifteen hundreds where we had
Speaker 1: father Sarah Jenupero Sarah coming up from Mexico into southern
Speaker 1: California and eventually into northern California, and he placed missions
Speaker 1: in I think every five hundred five hundred miles increments.
Speaker 1: And if you come to California today, you can see
Speaker 1: a mission in San Diego, in Santa Barbara, LA, all
Speaker 1: the way up into Marin County, which is in the
Speaker 1: San Francisco Bay area. There's one in San Francisco too,
Speaker 1: and and they're they're kind of cool. Uh, They're they're stucco.
Speaker 1: And the sad thing is they were made by slave
Speaker 1: labor and they you know, if you they crowd the
Speaker 1: local natives together and they forced them to build these
Speaker 1: these missions. They were also made to support the local
Speaker 1: military and they would, you know, barricade themselves in I
Speaker 1: don't think there was ever any an uprising, but there
Speaker 1: may have been. But that's that's a little bit of
Speaker 1: California history. This program we're presenting today is more on
Speaker 1: the final period of Corteza's stay in northern California, North America,
Speaker 1: and he actually came and settled in what is today
Speaker 1: Baja California. But it's a it's an interesting show, and
Speaker 1: I thought it would be one for the books and
Speaker 1: we like it. So today's program is The Elusive Conquest
Speaker 1: of Queen Khalifa, California History Revisited, and my guest is
Speaker 1: Alan Ergot. If you're a fan of California history like
Speaker 1: i am, you're always looking for new bits and pieces
Speaker 1: of data, and we got a new one that just
Speaker 1: came out, actually came out last year. It's called The
Speaker 1: Elusive Conquest of Queen Califa, California History Revisited. And I'm
Speaker 1: a native California and of course when you study California history,
Speaker 1: you learn about the Spanish who came here, but also
Speaker 1: the mission fathers who indoctrinated the Native Americans, and the
Speaker 1: history is always very flowery and positive, but really in
Speaker 1: real life it wasn't very flowery at all. But this
Speaker 1: new book is excellent, and we have the author with us,
Speaker 1: Alan Ergott, who's going to explain to us just what
Speaker 1: he discovered and the reason why he wrote this book.
Speaker 1: So Alan, welcome to Destiny. Great to have you on
Speaker 1: the program.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Talk a little bit about this journey. Nineteen seventy five, you,
Speaker 1: your brother, your friend decided to go to Baja California
Speaker 1: and you literally, over what was it six months, hiked
Speaker 1: the entire length of Baja I mean, what was the
Speaker 1: thought process to do about doing that, because that's a
Speaker 1: huge undertaking.
Speaker 2: Yes and no, I think as far as a huge
Speaker 2: undertaking is concerned, we were young and probably naive and
Speaker 2: just decided to do it. Two years previously, in nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy three, I hiked the the vast majority of the
Speaker 2: Simit Crest Trail from the Mexican border to the Oregon
Speaker 2: Orshington border at the Columbia River, and I just I
Speaker 2: love the impact it had on me of just hiking
Speaker 2: through the landscapes, getting to know what lived there and
Speaker 2: how that landscape had shifted or had guided their you know,
Speaker 2: their their lives. And we had traveled to Baja California
Speaker 2: before driving down the highway one the highway, you know,
Speaker 2: goes through the path of least resistance, which means it
Speaker 2: stayed in the flatlands, and there were seven mountain ranges
Speaker 2: in the world. Parts of Baja California that were essentially unroaded,
Speaker 2: and I just I just had to find out what
Speaker 2: was in what was in those mountains. And my brother
Speaker 2: and friend felt the same way I did, and it
Speaker 2: turned out that we we created a partnership and that's
Speaker 2: what happened.
Speaker 1: So that's approximately twelve hundred miles.
Speaker 2: The peninsula itself. If you fly like the crow, it's
Speaker 2: from the border to Cabo San Lucas at the very
Speaker 2: end of the peninsula. It's about eight hundred miles. Yeah miles, okay,
Speaker 2: But when you figure in the ins and outs of
Speaker 2: trails and the topography, we figured it was about twelve
Speaker 2: hundred miles.
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, So just get a sense of this trek.
Speaker 1: So did you land in San Diego, put your backpacks
Speaker 1: on and physically walk this or did you actually drive
Speaker 1: this this adventure both.
Speaker 2: We strategically decided that we would drive down in every
Speaker 2: eighty eight miles plant a food can about two feet
Speaker 2: underneath the surface of the earth. These were steel five
Speaker 2: gallon paint cans that you can find in any paint store,
Speaker 2: but they had the metal tabs that fit around the
Speaker 2: top of the rim and secured the contents pretty darn well,
Speaker 2: we figured two feet deep the food would remain somewhat cool,
Speaker 2: and this was the kind of the core of the
Speaker 2: food that we needed to complete our hike northwards. So
Speaker 2: again we drove down to Cabo San Lucas heading south,
Speaker 2: took bearings, tried to understand where we might find water
Speaker 2: here and there, and did our best to drive up
Speaker 2: into the mountains to bury those food cans along our
Speaker 2: route predominantly for two thirds of the peninsula. It was
Speaker 2: about El Camino Real, which is still a dirt trail
Speaker 2: in Baja California, and it took us about three months
Speaker 2: to do that, to take our bearings, map the food sites,
Speaker 2: the water sites, sites of interest, and then at Cabo
Speaker 2: San Lucas, we put on our backpacks and started hiking north.
Speaker 1: Start hiking north. The initial intention sounds like exploration, but
Speaker 1: it was so much And you're right about this, and
Speaker 1: I want to mention to our listeners this is also
Speaker 1: somewhat of a memoir. As you're hiking, you're running into
Speaker 1: these caves and finding these these amazing paintings. Was that
Speaker 1: an outcrop from your initial idea of doing this or
Speaker 1: was it something that just happened as you began following
Speaker 1: this trail.
Speaker 2: I think it was one of the attractions. You know,
Speaker 2: Earl Stanley Gardner made the cave paintings of the Sierra
Speaker 2: San Francisco famous in the early nineteen sixties with his
Speaker 2: illustrious helicopter exploration of that that's mountain range what I
Speaker 2: prefer to call the Sacred Canyons, and then that was
Speaker 2: followed up by a number of archaeologists that went down
Speaker 2: and reported, you know, factual content within the midden of
Speaker 2: the cave caves themselves and started talking about the anthropology
Speaker 2: and likely time frame with which those paintings had been
Speaker 2: actually sketched out by the artists. So it was an attraction,
Speaker 2: but the real thing was way beyond my expectations. And
Speaker 2: as we spent hours looking at them, stories began to
Speaker 2: present themselves to me at least, and I realized that
Speaker 2: the paintings themselves were the Indians, the indigenous natives way
Speaker 2: of telling history, of describing their own personal history. I mean,
Speaker 2: they don't have a written language, so oral language and
Speaker 2: their painted history is what we have.
Speaker 1: Is there And you're write about this in your book.
Speaker 1: Are there descendants or are there actual Kochimi Natives? That
Speaker 1: are still alive up and down the Baja.
Speaker 2: There are few homer astmen and anthropologist, geologist or geographer.
Speaker 2: I should say estimated about thirty thousand natives in Baja
Speaker 2: California at the time of the spaniards arrival about fifteen thirties,
Speaker 2: and I think they're and the Coach of Me were
Speaker 2: one of the largest tribes, tribal groups, and they occupied
Speaker 2: the very central part of Baja California. And I think
Speaker 2: that the most recent census put the number at about
Speaker 2: one hundred Coach to Me speakers left, mostly in Tijuana
Speaker 2: and Sonata, maybe MEXICALI.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The reason I asked that is that you document
Speaker 1: that you observed one hundred and fifty cave paintings, and
Speaker 1: I wonder if you were able to get any interpretation
Speaker 1: from the remaining indigenous people that are in the area,
Speaker 1: just to get a sense of because they didn't have
Speaker 1: any writing, right, they had no written language, So what
Speaker 1: were these representing.
Speaker 2: It's hard to find the Coach of Me and we
Speaker 2: did not do that, but we were able to interview
Speaker 2: I should say a number of other Indian tribes, the
Speaker 2: Pie Pie in the very northern part of Baja California,
Speaker 2: and also the Kumier or Kumia in the San Diego area,
Speaker 2: so that was the closest we could come by. There
Speaker 2: are some symbols that I think are universal, like a
Speaker 2: concentric circles representing water, Like when you drop a pebble
Speaker 2: into a pond, you get that concentric flow of lines
Speaker 2: moving out from the impact of the of the rock.
Speaker 2: That's I think that's globally fairly uniform as a symbol
Speaker 2: of water. But some of the storylines they could not confirm,
Speaker 2: and they were hesitant to do so. It was like,
Speaker 2: those are ancestors. That's their story. It's not my story,
Speaker 2: and I don't want to presume to know that story.
Speaker 1: That's that's interesting. Are there paintings of interactions with the
Speaker 1: Spanish that you found or are they much much earlier
Speaker 1: by thousands of years.
Speaker 2: It's a very good question. There have been some carbon
Speaker 2: dating of implements in the caves themselves that go back
Speaker 2: let's say four hundred to six hundred years, so they're
Speaker 2: not ancient paintings like you would find in Europe. They're
Speaker 2: not ten thousand years old. These are much more contemporary.
Speaker 2: And I know of one painting that had gold crosses,
Speaker 2: much like you would see on the chest of a
Speaker 2: Jesuit priest. There's another painting in the southern Sierra Ares
Speaker 2: of an expedition, specifically an expedition that Spanish lad in
Speaker 2: the mid seventeen and seventeen sixties, and these were clearly
Speaker 2: cowboys or cowboy like on horses, and I believe that
Speaker 2: that is part of that expedition, which was only two
Speaker 2: hundred and it's only two hundred and fifty years ago.
Speaker 1: Oh interesting.
Speaker 2: So there is a range I think of more contemporary paintings,
Speaker 2: perhaps extending before the Spanish arrived, but I think it
Speaker 2: includes the early part of mission history.
Speaker 1: That's fascinating. Did according to your book, were there explorations
Speaker 1: that were sanctioned by Cortes into the Baja area or
Speaker 1: did it just was it just kind of a natural
Speaker 1: migration that the Spanish would be seeking out as many
Speaker 1: lands as they could, and so Baja became another destination.
Speaker 2: The fascinating part of the history to me is that
Speaker 2: Cortes conquered the Aztecs Tinachalon in the fifteen twenties fifteen
Speaker 2: twenty three, twenty four, and her name was her Nan.
Speaker 2: Cortes was he was. He's a conquistador, and he wasn't
Speaker 2: much of an administrator, although some would say he was
Speaker 2: a good governor of Mexico when it first was created.
Speaker 2: But his natural inclination was to extend New Spain Northwarods
Speaker 2: and that meant mainland Mexico. But it also meant California,
Speaker 2: which was the name was popularized by a writer in
Speaker 2: Seville in fifteen ten. It became a very popular book,
Speaker 2: and California was described as being to the right of
Speaker 2: terrestrial paradise and run by a queen Khalifa. Actually it's
Speaker 2: Queen Kalais. Some say Khalifa. Wo, so sorry, and I
Speaker 2: think Hernand Cortes felt that if he could equate that
Speaker 2: northern island of California with something that was close and
Speaker 2: it had some fictional popularity with it, that it would
Speaker 2: be easier to convince the king to underwrite his conquest northwards. Well,
Speaker 2: the King was interested, but he basically told Cortes, hey,
Speaker 2: you've got plenty of money from plundering the Aztecs. Use
Speaker 2: your own money to find this California. So Cortes did.
Speaker 2: He was expecting more gold, more silver, more riches, akin
Speaker 2: to what he found with the Aztecs, which he did not,
Speaker 2: but ultimately it took three voyages northwards from the Pacific
Speaker 2: coast of New Spain of Mexico to actually land in
Speaker 2: the southern part of Baja California. He called that spot
Speaker 2: Santa Cruz, but a later conquistador renamed it a Lapase.
Speaker 2: So it's the city of Lapause in the very southern
Speaker 2: cape region of Baja California, which became the first landing
Speaker 2: place of Europeans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I had to remark that you have
Speaker 1: this great map in your book that shows some of
Speaker 1: these trailways. But what also was intriguing is all the
Speaker 1: missions that are located in Baja are those actually functioning
Speaker 1: missions now or are they just more like foundations in
Speaker 1: the buildings themselves are gone.
Speaker 2: There's a mix there. The Spanish when they say they
Speaker 2: found did a mission and let's say fifteen or let's
Speaker 2: say sixteen ninety seven that was Loretto founding, is really
Speaker 2: the the location of where the mission is going to be.
Speaker 2: It has nothing to do with the completion of any
Speaker 2: structure itself. Oh something happened here?
Speaker 1: Does that mean you're coming across perfect? Oh? Good?
Speaker 2: So the first mission was typically stick constructed I mean
Speaker 2: branches providing some shade and relief from the sun. The
Speaker 2: second was typically adobe that replaced it, and adobe walls
Speaker 2: and probably woodn't roof structures as well. The third was
Speaker 2: actually cut rock that was strengthened with cement, and it
Speaker 2: would take typically eighty to one hundred years to get
Speaker 2: from the sticks to the cut rock finished a church itself.
Speaker 2: So many of these churches were begun by the Jesuits,
Speaker 2: and some reached cut rock proportions by the time they
Speaker 2: were kicked out of California seventy years later, but most
Speaker 2: were completed by the Dominicans in the early eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I've been to Mexico many times. In
Speaker 1: the Yucatan, they take they deconstruct the pyramids of the
Speaker 1: Maya to build their cathedrals. Is that what some of
Speaker 1: the there weren't temples or pyramids by this indigenous people
Speaker 1: were there, No.
Speaker 2: They were not. They were a hogan, willow constructed structure
Speaker 2: that was small enough for typically a family. There were
Speaker 2: larger hogans that were used as tribal meeting rooms, but
Speaker 2: to my knowledge, nothing was really constructed of cut rock
Speaker 2: or cement that was definitely a European invention brought to
Speaker 2: the New World.
Speaker 1: Interesting, let's talk about Khalifa, who exactly is she? Is
Speaker 1: she an actual person or is it more of a myth.
Speaker 1: Lifa is definitely a myth. In the book that was
Speaker 1: printed in Seville in fifteen ten, she was an Amazon
Speaker 1: queen of the island of California that used golden.
Speaker 2: Armaments to fend off men that the island was strictly
Speaker 2: of women. Men were invited on occasion to presumably replicate
Speaker 2: the race, but as soon as as soon as that
Speaker 2: was done, the men were kicked off the island, and
Speaker 2: so it was just it was a fictional character from
Speaker 2: an author that actually named a fictional place called California.
Speaker 1: I took that.
Speaker 2: Fictional figure, Khalifa, and turned it into a primary personage
Speaker 2: of the book itself. Queen Khalifa, I use the word
Speaker 2: Cali in the book, but she was a seventeen year
Speaker 2: old young woman healer who had a great deal of
Speaker 2: empathy and an ambition to become a chief of the
Speaker 2: Kachin tribe. And she was created primarily from one of
Speaker 2: the cave paintings in the Sierra San Francisco just north
Speaker 2: of San Ignacio. She was incorporated next to a painted
Speaker 2: man and then a painted mountain lion, larger than life
Speaker 2: mountain lion, and she was between the mountain lion and
Speaker 2: the man, and her positioning was at the very apex
Speaker 2: of the mural, in the most noticeable position. And I
Speaker 2: could not help but feel that she had played a
Speaker 2: large part in the coach Me tribe history, cultural history,
Speaker 2: and that she was a person of renown. So she
Speaker 2: became one of the focal characters of the book of
Speaker 2: the story.
Speaker 1: As you're on this trail in seven nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 1: you are befriended by different families and you direct you
Speaker 1: write a great deal about this who were very open
Speaker 1: and receiving you, and occasionally you had a meal and
Speaker 1: were able to sleep there. We're going to take a
Speaker 1: short commercial break to allow our sponsors to identify themselves,
Speaker 1: and we will return shortly with my guest today, Alan Egart,
Speaker 1: discussing his newest book, The Elusive Conquest of Queen Khalifa,
Speaker 1: will be right back.
Speaker 3: Don't you want to get to know me? I bet
Speaker 3: I'm stuck inside yourn. I see you with mighty but
Speaker 3: look in my way all night to keep your hands.
Speaker 1: My guest today is histori orian Alan Egart, who has
Speaker 1: written a new book called The Elusive Conquest of Queen Khalifa,
Speaker 1: a fictitious character whose name eventually morphed into California. Did
Speaker 1: you get any kind of a historical reference from these
Speaker 1: visits with the people who have lived there for perhaps generations, Yes,
Speaker 1: we did.
Speaker 2: They're very On one hand, they're very proud of their history.
Speaker 2: They know how many generations back. The first of their
Speaker 2: name a surname Cain. For instance, in the Cape region
Speaker 2: of Baja California, there were parts of the Sierras that
Speaker 2: had just one name associated with all of those ranches,
Speaker 2: and for instance it was a a name made of
Speaker 2: Sisaania and Banyagau. Sosanio was Italian and Benyaga, unusually was
Speaker 2: a Filipino. And I realized that many of the Philippines
Speaker 2: came back from the Asia during the days of the galleons,
Speaker 2: the Spanish galleons, and actually homestead at the southern part
Speaker 2: of Baja California. So there was I think there was
Speaker 2: a pride in the fact that they had been there
Speaker 2: for generations to come. They were also they also admitted
Speaker 2: to having Indian blood in their veins, that they were
Speaker 2: essentially the descendants of an Indian woman and a Spanish
Speaker 2: soldier that accompanied typically the missionaries. Many of the soldiers,
Speaker 2: of course, were given grants, land grants to create ranches,
Speaker 2: and there were no European or Spanish women there at
Speaker 2: the time, and it's only natural for Indian women to
Speaker 2: become married to these Spanish men over time, so they
Speaker 2: understood that they were part Indian or Mestizo, but they
Speaker 2: liked to be called Mexicans first, Latino second, andina Mestiso
Speaker 2: kind of a distant there's still a bias against the
Speaker 2: indigenous natives. But you know, to me, in my view,
Speaker 2: there was a richness in their hereditary that actually helped
Speaker 2: them survive in that landscape, and there was a genius
Speaker 2: that that came with that hunter gatherer culture that extended
Speaker 2: well into the Mexican bloodline.
Speaker 1: Fascinating. How did the Spanish expl yours come to believe
Speaker 1: that the area was ruled by a powerful queen? The book.
Speaker 2: The book was I don't have the name of it
Speaker 2: right in front of me, and I'm embarrassed to say it,
Speaker 2: but it was again published in Seville, Spain, in fifteen ten,
Speaker 2: and by the time that Cortes had conquered the Aztecs,
Speaker 2: I think it was in its fourth printing, and so
Speaker 2: Queen Khalifa was again a purely fictional romantic figure in
Speaker 2: that book, but was used frequently by Cortes and his
Speaker 2: captains and soldiers. California became the name of this peninsula
Speaker 2: what then was thought to be an island that extended
Speaker 2: from Kabosu Lucas all the way up to the marine
Speaker 2: area of Upper California. And so California was large, and
Speaker 2: in the early maps it was portrayed as a very
Speaker 2: large island offshore of New Spain or Mexico. But in reality,
Speaker 2: of course, it was a part of peninsula of the continent,
Speaker 2: and it took them almost two hundred years to confirm
Speaker 2: the fact that it was indeed an island.
Speaker 1: Wonderful, So we're does Cortes go around the tip of
Speaker 1: the Cape Horn and then up to the Pacific Ocean
Speaker 1: to settle or are they crossing the land from Mexico
Speaker 1: to Baja and then coming up.
Speaker 2: That's what intrigued me, you know, of course, as governor
Speaker 2: of the newly designed of Mexico City, moving to the
Speaker 2: west coast of Mexico, somewhere around Port of Varta or
Speaker 2: a little bit south. It was a short joannt I mean,
Speaker 2: it was a ride of three or four days, and
Speaker 2: there were ports in that area that, soon after the
Speaker 2: conquering of the Aztecs, became boat construction ports, and so
Speaker 2: actually one of Cortesa's captains was instructed to build him
Speaker 2: three ships to explore the northern parts of Mexico as
Speaker 2: well as the portions now called California. It took him
Speaker 2: eight years to come up with the boats, the money,
Speaker 2: the crew, and the first two voyages north were assigned
Speaker 2: to other captains. Both failed. Both ships were actually of
Speaker 2: the two ships in each voyage that would be four ships,
Speaker 2: two were lost and two came back, one after having
Speaker 2: discovered an insignificant chain of islands, and the other with
Speaker 2: a mutineer or the crew of a mutineer who had
Speaker 2: discovered the area around Lapause or the Cape region. On
Speaker 2: the third voyage. Frustrated having spent so much money building
Speaker 2: ships and crew and provisioning the ships, Cortes decided to
Speaker 2: take the captainship himself, and he led that group to
Speaker 2: the area of Lapause, which had an extraordinary court that
Speaker 2: was said to be able to house all of the
Speaker 2: the you know, the Spanish oh gosh, this, you know,
Speaker 2: the Spanish ships all at one time. And he landed
Speaker 2: in fifteen thirty five. He actually stepped ashore at La Pause,
Speaker 2: Baja California in fifteen thirty five, took title to the land,
Speaker 2: as most explorers did at that point, and proceeded to
Speaker 2: build a colony, but it lasted only one year and
Speaker 2: he left California very dispirited. By that time, the law
Speaker 2: had caught up with him and he found himself defendant
Speaker 2: of a lot of lawsuits that came about as a
Speaker 2: result of his conquering the Aztecs. And he was, you know,
Speaker 2: he was out of favor with King Carlos, the Spanish
Speaker 2: king at the time. I believe something happened to him
Speaker 2: during his journeys into the interior of Baja California, into
Speaker 2: the Cape Mountains. He we know, he lost four horses,
Speaker 2: and he was definitely a horseman and was very fond
Speaker 2: of his horses. But he lost four horses, didn't say
Speaker 2: how they were lost, and he left defeated. And I
Speaker 2: believe that the reason for that was the resistance on
Speaker 2: the part of the Peraku and Guaikura Indian tribes that
Speaker 2: occupied the very southern part of Baja California when he
Speaker 2: had landed.
Speaker 1: So when he's encountering resistance, is this he's losing his people,
Speaker 1: his soldiers or because I mean, are they as are
Speaker 1: they as aggressive as the Aztecs were, Because we do
Speaker 1: know that when he was in Mexico City that in
Speaker 1: the beginning he took a pretty good beating and then
Speaker 1: after a while, obviously he had weapons that were superior
Speaker 1: to the Aztec. When he's in Baja, is that the
Speaker 1: same kind of a resistance he's dealing with, Or they're
Speaker 1: not as sophisticated, Uh.
Speaker 2: They're perhaps not as sophisticated uh as the Aztecs. And
Speaker 2: we can go into detail in terms of how Cortes
Speaker 2: managed to defeat a technologically, at least from the indigenous
Speaker 2: point of view, superior as technicians. But I think of
Speaker 2: the Guaykura and the Peraku in the southern part of
Speaker 2: Baja California as being oh, what's the word I'm looking for?
Speaker 2: You know, they fought in not an upright fashion. They
Speaker 2: were guerrilla fighters. They chose the time and period of
Speaker 2: their of their wars and their battles. They would pop
Speaker 2: up and disappear, and it was a difficult foe for
Speaker 2: the Spanish to to find and defeat soundly.
Speaker 1: It was a war of.
Speaker 2: Well, pardon me, it was a war of of period. Well,
Speaker 2: it lasted a year, and I think it was a
Speaker 2: war of attrition is the word I was trying to
Speaker 2: think of. Where the Spanish eventually had consumed almost all
Speaker 2: of their supplies. Their water supply that they had depended
Speaker 2: upon was seasonal, and they found that they were having
Speaker 2: to deep deeper and deeper into the wells, and they
Speaker 2: found that the workers were being shot at at you know,
Speaker 2: poor times, and a lot of the supplies that they
Speaker 2: had stocked on land were stolen by the Guaycura and Peracut.
Speaker 2: So it was a protracted guerrilla war that did not
Speaker 2: favor the Spaniards, and that was in but that was
Speaker 2: particularly true for the next one hundred and sixty years.
Speaker 2: Not until sixteen ninety seven did a colony become permanent
Speaker 2: in California.
Speaker 1: But it was done.
Speaker 2: The work was done by Jesuit padres and not the
Speaker 2: Spanish soldiers. The King of Spain was so frustrated at
Speaker 2: not being able to complete a colony in California, and
Speaker 2: had put out tons and tons of money, I mean
Speaker 2: silver and gold to that effect, and he finally, out
Speaker 2: of frustration, gave a monopolistic license to the Jesuits to
Speaker 2: not only colonize Baja California, but to administer the business
Speaker 2: and the wealth that would eventually come out of it
Speaker 2: through trade.
Speaker 1: Is this prior to Jenneparo Sarah arriving or is this yes?
Speaker 1: Was he one of the ones who started Baja and
Speaker 1: then moved into proper California? No?
Speaker 3: Who?
Speaker 2: Nippros Sarah was a Franciscan missionary and he was brought
Speaker 2: into California after the Jesuits were kicked out. The Jesuits
Speaker 2: lasted in Baja California in California for seventy years, and
Speaker 2: they built about fifteen missions in that period of time.
Speaker 2: And the Jesuits.
Speaker 4: Were very good at what they did, but they also
Speaker 4: managed to create some enemies and throughout the world, and
Speaker 4: eventually those enemies had convinced the king that the Jesuits
Speaker 4: were hiding large amounts of money of funds that were
Speaker 4: not giving their appropriate twenty percent share to the crown
Speaker 4: to the Spanish crown.
Speaker 2: And they were also seeking to remove the the current
Speaker 2: Spanish king. So the king became very upset over this
Speaker 2: what was essentially a rumor, and kicked the Jesuits out the.
Speaker 1: Group.
Speaker 2: The next group of missionaries that came in were the Franciscans,
Speaker 2: and they were only in Baja California for a year
Speaker 2: because they were directed to march northwards into Upper California
Speaker 2: which is now Upper California meaning San Diego to San
Speaker 2: Francisco and create a number of colonies on the west
Speaker 2: coast of Upper California. The Dominicans were immediately given the
Speaker 2: keys to the missions that the Jesuits had built and
Speaker 2: had started, and they ran the miss in Baja California
Speaker 2: through the eighteen twenties.
Speaker 1: Interesting. Was there a political and social system attributed to
Speaker 1: the indigenous people that the Spanish encountered or was that
Speaker 1: more of a myth? And could you kind of write
Speaker 1: about that. You make it sound like there may have
Speaker 1: been a system, but this may have come from the book.
Speaker 2: I believe there was. I think that tribal groups were
Speaker 2: anywheres from twenty on up to eighty people in size.
Speaker 2: They were typically loaded located at water sources year round,
Speaker 2: water sources that also had the game and the plant
Speaker 2: foods that would support the tribe. The leadership I very
Speaker 2: much know to be a meritocracy. Any hundred gather societies
Speaker 2: are of course that that way you you you support
Speaker 2: a leader by following him or her, and it's because
Speaker 2: they produce good decisions and the tribe survives under their leadership.
Speaker 2: And I think, you know, I don't think there are
Speaker 2: polling booths and ballots, but it was you voted upon
Speaker 2: a leader based on your willingness to follow him and
Speaker 2: accept his suggestions or his direction. And uh, that was
Speaker 2: kind of confirmed by a number of missionaries. There were
Speaker 2: historian missionaries that wrote about the native coach me Me in particular,
Speaker 2: I think, in somewhat of at least an neutral standpoint.
Speaker 2: They felt that the natives were not of an intelligent variety,
Speaker 2: that they were dirty, they didn't even dig wells, and
Speaker 2: they didn't really construct know how to construct certain simple
Speaker 2: weapons systems. But the ideology was that we Europeans are
Speaker 2: far superior and we're going to show you the way.
Speaker 2: But in reality they were up against the wall with
Speaker 2: a very tough terrain and landscape that they were trying
Speaker 2: to colonize. They did not know how to survive as
Speaker 2: well as the indigenous and that became a problem for
Speaker 2: one hundred and sixty years.
Speaker 1: Wow. One of the things that's come out in the
Speaker 1: last few decades is that the Maya were maritime people.
Speaker 1: They actually had boats that went up and down the coast.
Speaker 1: There's some speculation they may have been in the Gulf,
Speaker 1: and they were in Florida and Louisiana. You mentioned Lapage
Speaker 1: as a port. Were the indigenous people of Baja somewhat
Speaker 1: maritime related and had fishing and exchange with other groups
Speaker 1: up and down the Baja coast.
Speaker 2: That's a very good question, and I thought a lot
Speaker 2: about it. The Peracu occupied the very tip of Baja California,
Speaker 2: and then the tribal group that was just north of
Speaker 2: them was the guay Kura. They were both recognized as
Speaker 2: having much darker skins than the peninsular humans to the north,
Speaker 2: and they were also focused on a more maritime or
Speaker 2: marine style of survival. They were much greater fishermen and uh,
Speaker 2: you know, used all the resources of the sea to survive,
Speaker 2: and they had boats that the that the tribal groups
Speaker 2: north of them did not, so both the Peraku and
Speaker 2: the Guaikura were assumed to be uh. We're assumed to
Speaker 2: have arrived by boat, probably from the north, down the
Speaker 2: Humboldt Current that they had reached, perhaps from from the
Speaker 2: Japan's uh So or from Micronesia, essentially moving northwards to
Speaker 2: the Japans and then catching the Humboldt Current as it
Speaker 2: was brought down the northern coast of Washington, Oregon, California
Speaker 2: to Baja California, which was a warm uh semi tropical
Speaker 2: habitat that they were familiar with. Now, in terms of
Speaker 2: having gone first further down into south of Cabo San
Speaker 2: Lucas down into mainland Mexico, I'm not aware of that.
Speaker 2: There are certainly stories that support that, but I haven't
Speaker 2: seen much anthropological evidence to confirm it.
Speaker 1: Okay, we're going to take a short commercial break to
Speaker 1: allow our sponsors to identify themselves, and we'll return shortly
Speaker 1: with my guest today, Alan Ergot, discussing his new book,
Speaker 1: The Elusive Conquest of Queen Khalifa. Will be right back
Speaker 1: with you. My guest today is Alan Egart. He has
Speaker 1: written a new book called the elusive conquest of Queen Khalifa.
Speaker 1: This also chronicles the last days of Cortes, the well
Speaker 1: known Spanish conquistador who traveled north in and up through
Speaker 1: Baja California Lapause. You mentioned La Pause being a really
Speaker 1: good port when the Spanish came, where the natives building
Speaker 1: of a support or are you suggesting that early Spaniards
Speaker 1: came and made it into a superior port.
Speaker 3: It was.
Speaker 2: It was kind of a landlocked port that had a
Speaker 2: fairly small canal entrance, and the Spanish liked it because
Speaker 2: it had just enough depth for oh probably hundreds of ships.
Speaker 2: But it was also it would also protect those ships
Speaker 2: from the southern storms, the Chebasco's as they called it,
Speaker 2: that you know, created winds in the excess of one
Speaker 2: hundred miles per hour and would literally destroy an unprotected anchorage.
Speaker 2: The Indians did travel to the islands in and around
Speaker 2: the Pause and to the north, so they whether they
Speaker 2: were balsa type canoes, I believe that they were on
Speaker 2: that order, they were not larger. There were tales of
Speaker 2: Seri Indians coming by canoe all the way across the
Speaker 2: Sea of Cortez, which is roughly one hundred mile wide.
Speaker 2: Gulf of California to the peninsula. There was some communication
Speaker 2: between mainland tribes and peninsular tribes, and it is felt
Speaker 2: that there was a limited amount of trade that occurred
Speaker 2: there as well.
Speaker 1: So we're not talking about any sophisticated sea worthy boats
Speaker 1: or like a catamaran like you've seen in Polynesia. We're
Speaker 1: looking at hallowed out trunks of trees, which are I
Speaker 1: think you call them canoes, right.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, I think so balsas or canos canoas. But
Speaker 2: there was you know, in Upper California there is quite
Speaker 2: preponderance of the balsa rafts or canoes, that is, particularly
Speaker 2: around San Francisco, and I believe that they were seeing
Speaker 2: in some of the island natives off the coast of
Speaker 2: Baja California too. They just weren't utilized by the tribes
Speaker 2: north of La Pause very much because all the water
Speaker 2: was confined to the interior. The surface water was found
Speaker 2: in the mountains of Baja California and not along the coast.
Speaker 2: So the vast majority of the populations of those indigenous
Speaker 2: group beings were always in the interior of Baja California
Speaker 2: and not so much along the coast.
Speaker 1: So are you suggesting that Cortees landed and actually maybe
Speaker 1: surveyed true California, or did he always stay in Baja
Speaker 1: and hope for the to make a big killing there.
Speaker 1: Of course he didn't find gold, but maybe you know,
Speaker 1: you mentioned that they divided up the land, and of
Speaker 1: course that would be Haciendez is what they would create. Yes,
Speaker 1: Sanchero's haciens Ranchero's. How far north do you think Cortes got.
Speaker 2: He didn't get any further north than Lapause. I mean
Speaker 2: it did make He did make some some journeys into
Speaker 2: the interior of what we would call the northern part
Speaker 2: of the Sierra del Cabo, the Cape Mountains, and the
Speaker 2: book has a story about what he saw and did
Speaker 2: there that I you know, that helped explain why he
Speaker 2: became so dispirited upon leaving California. But the portions of
Speaker 2: upper Baja California, in California were it took the middle
Speaker 2: to late fifteen hundreds for those explorations to actually occur,
Speaker 2: and they were done by Viscaino, by an admiral Atando.
Speaker 2: There were probably no i'd say nine or ten expeditions
Speaker 2: that were intended to find places of colonization that ended
Speaker 2: up in total defeat. Uh typically Spaniard soldiers attacking the
Speaker 2: women and then unleashing an onslaught of male indigenous men
Speaker 2: that basically ran them out of the country, ran them
Speaker 2: out away from shore. And I believe it or not,
Speaker 2: that happened again and again and again, much to the
Speaker 2: consternation of the Jesuit padres that sometimes journeyed with those
Speaker 2: initial conquista doors.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, that's interesting, Alan, because I'm wondering, if
Speaker 1: these expeditions are constantly failing, what motivated them to stay
Speaker 1: you know, I guess some of them did stay back,
Speaker 1: but they it was a failure for the most part,
Speaker 1: wasn't it. It was.
Speaker 2: The drive was I think primarily featuring two situations. One
Speaker 2: was that there was some wealth in Coastal Ba, California.
Speaker 2: They did find pearls and there was a sustained pearl
Speaker 2: fishery much later on off the Gulf coast of southern Baja, California.
Speaker 2: The second situation was in the fifteen sixties. The trade
Speaker 2: route between the Philippines and Coastal Baja or the Pacific
Speaker 2: coast of Mexico City, was actually created by the Black
Speaker 2: galleons that found a huge profit margin in the trade
Speaker 2: of silver from New Spain from that which they took
Speaker 2: from the Aztecs, and they came back with silks, perfumes, spices,
Speaker 2: all the riches of Southeast Asia that were traded to
Speaker 2: the Philippines, and that route was at that time became
Speaker 2: one of the the most profitable enterprise of Spain. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: the English and the Dutch pirratized those galleons and Mexico
Speaker 2: the king realized that they needed colonies on the west
Speaker 2: coast of Baja California and Upper California to create ports
Speaker 2: and ships to protect that trade route, and that was
Speaker 2: the primary motivation for the king to keep on trying
Speaker 2: to colonize both what is now Baja California and Upper California.
Speaker 1: So when Mexico revolted against Spain, I guess that area
Speaker 1: became owned by Mexico. And then eventually it was after
Speaker 1: the Louisiana purchase that we the Americans took that it
Speaker 1: made it California, Upper California, Upper California.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the territory of California soon to be the state
Speaker 2: of California.
Speaker 1: Fantastic. The books called the Elusive Conquests of Queen Khalifa,
Speaker 1: and my guest today has been Alan Eric Ox. Hey, Alan,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about this myth. How did the
Speaker 1: myth of Khalifa evolve after each failed attempt, because it
Speaker 1: must have kept growing after these Spaniards were not getting
Speaker 1: what they had hoped for.
Speaker 2: It did, and it was it was a matter of
Speaker 2: pride for Spain. You know, at that time, Spain and
Speaker 2: Portugal had the two largest navies in the world, and
Speaker 2: they colonized an incredible amount of land. It was just
Speaker 2: immediately after Columbus's quote unquote discovery of the New World
Speaker 2: that led to the Pope and his Treaty of Torsidias
Speaker 2: that divided the New World into both Spain and Portugal.
Speaker 3: And uh.
Speaker 1: So Spain was or they felt that they.
Speaker 2: Were, you know, the prime of the prime or the
Speaker 2: conquistadors of the conquistadors. And there was such a large
Speaker 2: amount of gold in the New World, primarily from the
Speaker 2: Incas and the Aztecs, that supported Spain's power. And it
Speaker 2: really wasn't until oh Thomas of Cavendish, who took down
Speaker 2: the Santa Ana galleon on its way back from from
Speaker 2: the Philippines right at Cabo San Lucas. I mean that
Speaker 2: that ship battle was right there at Cabo San Lucas,
Speaker 2: and Thomas of Cavendish captured the Santa Anna and brought
Speaker 2: it back to London and the Queen and was knighted,
Speaker 2: and it infuriated the king and the whole Spanish nation.
Speaker 2: And so they doubled up or doubled down on the
Speaker 2: amount of money they were spending to colonize what was
Speaker 2: now uniformly called California, and that included Baja California.
Speaker 1: Wow, so how far I know? We know that the
Speaker 1: English got to northern California, Sir Francis Drake got into
Speaker 1: San Francisco. How far north did the Spanish get And
Speaker 1: is there any known established cities that can be attributed
Speaker 1: to Spanish settlements?
Speaker 2: Well, Cabrio Nscuyano. There were a number of I wouldn't
Speaker 2: call them necessarily contista doors, Let's call them explorers for
Speaker 2: the minute, for the moment they did make. They did
Speaker 2: travel up the coast of Baja California in upper California
Speaker 2: during the fifteen hundreds, but they were unable to bring
Speaker 2: with them enough material and colonists to create a colony.
Speaker 2: They discovered first San Diego and Monterey Carmel area. San
Speaker 2: Francisco really wasn't discovered until after who nippro uh brought
Speaker 2: his expedition into upper California. Yeah, but certainly the Marin
Speaker 2: County area was discovered by Sir Francis Drake, and he
Speaker 2: found he actually had a very nice run in with
Speaker 2: the meewalk No, yeah, I mean yeah meewalk. I believe
Speaker 2: it was coastal meewalk and very profitable relationship that was
Speaker 2: never nothing came of it because Drake of course went
Speaker 2: south and then west back.
Speaker 5: To to London as well, with the horde of treasure
Speaker 5: that he had somehow managed to take through piracy off
Speaker 5: the coast of of mainland Meco.
Speaker 2: I think he took a ship called the Cacafuego, which
Speaker 2: basically translates to fire shitter. But that ship had an
Speaker 2: enormous amount of wealth to it, and Sir Francis Drake
Speaker 2: actually became Sir Francis Drake on returning to London with
Speaker 2: roughly one hundred and eighty million dollars in today's you
Speaker 2: know standard amount. But you're right, Drake and Cavendish both
Speaker 2: were knighted Drake first and then Cavendish later, and that
Speaker 2: was a lot of money that just dropped from Spanish
Speaker 2: hands into their enemies and you can imagine how much
Speaker 2: it infuriated them. And this was particularly during the time
Speaker 2: of the Spanish Armada, which was you know, the giant
Speaker 2: naval war between Spain and England, and this amount of
Speaker 2: money being returned to England actually helped the queen in
Speaker 2: fighting off the Spanish Ramada and achieving primacy between the
Speaker 2: two waring nations.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's a history we don't know about. As we
Speaker 1: close Alan, what is it about the story that we
Speaker 1: are told in the interpretations of history that are so off?
Speaker 1: I mean, you've found out some You've discovered some very
Speaker 1: very key bits of information in your research that we
Speaker 1: don't hear about in typical history books. It seems like,
Speaker 1: you know, the Spanish have their narrative about what they did,
Speaker 1: and there's also the indigenous side of it that is
Speaker 1: interesting as well. Is this just the way history is?
Speaker 2: You know, when you ask the question, I immediately think
Speaker 2: Winston Churchill and this famous line that the propaganda propaganda
Speaker 2: of the victors becomes the history of the defeated, And
Speaker 2: that does seem to replicate itself throughout history. I think
Speaker 2: typically the native or indigenous side of history is the
Speaker 2: one that has been defeated culturally, and I don't think
Speaker 2: it's recognized. I don't think they are recognized for the
Speaker 2: intelligence they have. In Baja California. I think that shows
Speaker 2: up more than other places because it was such a
Speaker 2: difficult place to live. It is dry. There are parts
Speaker 2: of Baja California, large parts of Baja California that do
Speaker 2: not receive rain for four years, five years at a time.
Speaker 2: The central desert of Baja California had very little rain,
Speaker 2: and survival in that area required literally literally generational intelligence
Speaker 2: that had been passed down where to go when there
Speaker 2: is a drought, what to do when there is a drought,
Speaker 2: and uh that was unknown to the conquistadors, to the
Speaker 2: Spanish who tried to colonize the area, and it literally
Speaker 2: took them one hundred and sixty years to figure it out.
Speaker 2: So I suspect that storyline replicates itself in other parts
Speaker 2: of the world for one reason or another. I just
Speaker 2: know the California side of the story, but it it
Speaker 2: it kind of points out a bias that we have
Speaker 2: till to this day. That you know, the technology is there,
Speaker 2: but perhaps the knowledge of survive in difficult habitats or
Speaker 2: environments is not. And I think that's that intelligence, that's
Speaker 2: the value of an indigenous society that we need to
Speaker 2: recognize on a firmer basis.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we don't hear anything about that whatsoever. It's
Speaker 1: just like a lost narrative of indigenous lifestyle.
Speaker 2: I agree.
Speaker 1: Yeah, real quickly. Where does Khalifa eventually morph into California?
Speaker 1: Where is that? Where does that happen.
Speaker 2: In the book that was written in fifteen ten, both
Speaker 2: California and Khalifa or Colofia was a part of that book,
Speaker 2: So they were they came together in the mind of
Speaker 2: the author in you know, in his romance novel.
Speaker 1: Fascinating is that the question you asked, Well, it's I
Speaker 1: need to if you can expand on that. It's like
Speaker 1: Khalifa is part of California, the wording and the full
Speaker 1: word California. I'm just wondering how that was established and
Speaker 1: was it established by the time the Spanish had firmly
Speaker 1: entrenched themselves in Baja.
Speaker 2: That is a great story, a short one. It turns
Speaker 2: out that the Muslims occupied conquered and occupied Spain for
Speaker 2: seven hundred years, from about seven hundred AD to about
Speaker 2: fourteen hundred AD, So this book was written in the
Speaker 2: fifteen hundreds. And I believe, as do many other historians,
Speaker 2: that Khalifa in California came from the Arabic or Muslim
Speaker 2: word khalif, which means either a religious or administrative leader
Speaker 2: of a country or a tribe. So khalif c Alif
Speaker 2: is a shortened version or shortened spelling of khalif in
Speaker 2: the Arabic of sense, and that became a California, So
Speaker 2: in essence, the great state of California is named after
Speaker 2: an Arabic leader.
Speaker 1: Wow, fantastic, All right, hey, real pleasure, Alan. Won't you
Speaker 1: let people know how they can get more information? What's
Speaker 1: your website address?
Speaker 2: Yeah, the website is just californiaconquest dot com and we
Speaker 2: are in the process of updating some of the photos.
Speaker 2: If you're interested in knowing more about the cave paintings
Speaker 2: and some of my interpretations of those cave pains, you're
Speaker 2: welcome to look at that. Those additional photos should be
Speaker 2: popping up in a couple of weeks on the website.
Speaker 2: Californiaconquest dot com.
Speaker 1: Fantastic and the book came out in October of last year.
Speaker 1: It's available on Amazon, and I would think pretty much
Speaker 1: anywhere else, right.
Speaker 2: That's correct, Kindle Goodreads, it's there, or you can order
Speaker 2: the book too from the website itself.
Speaker 1: And before we started, I mentioned the cave paintings there.
Speaker 1: It was one hundred and fifty of them, and you
Speaker 1: are at some point going to put a few of
Speaker 1: the color ones up on the website. Absolutely fantastic, All right, Alan,
Speaker 1: much success, Thank you for joining me. And I really
Speaker 1: appreciate the history as a native California and I'm like
Speaker 1: wonderfully informed with this detailed information. Thank you well, thanks
Speaker 1: for reading it, and I appreciate the time.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: The maps in this book are kind of worth the
Speaker 1: price by themselves if you're a fan of maps. He
Speaker 1: illustrates and tracks the missions that are up and down
Speaker 1: the Baja Peninsula and I cannot believe how many there are.
Speaker 1: And I asked him before we started the interview if
Speaker 1: they're still functioning. Yeah, the Mexican government has made sure
Speaker 1: that they're restored. That would be kind of a neat
Speaker 1: trip by itself to go down to Mexico to Baja
Speaker 1: California and check out those missions, just to see what's there,
Speaker 1: because the archives might be very, very cool. So the
Speaker 1: other thing that I did not mention is the fact
Speaker 1: that he has over a one thousand illustrations or excuse me,
Speaker 1: a thousand photographs of these petroglyphs, of these wall paintings,
Speaker 1: and he didn't he hasn't done anything with him. He
Speaker 1: had him shot and this is nineteen seventy five, so
Speaker 1: the it was all film and he shot the wall
Speaker 1: paintings in slide film. And I didn't realize that you
Speaker 1: can use id stretch, that amazing product that you can
Speaker 1: upload into your either your desktop or your laptop. That
Speaker 1: was created by the engineer John Harmon, and John Harmon
Speaker 1: designed it because he was a huge fan of the
Speaker 1: wall paintings and petroglyphs at in Baja California. That's why
Speaker 1: he designed it. And so I think it's fifty bucks
Speaker 1: and he can up Alan can upload it and really
Speaker 1: clarify what's on those walls. A thousand paintings. I mean,
Speaker 1: he's got to do a book on that by itself.
Speaker 1: That's totally amazing. So there you go id stretch. If
Speaker 1: you don't know about id stretch, check it out. I
Speaker 1: the letter I and then D and then stretch rock
Speaker 1: Art photograph enhancement or rock Art photo Enhancement. I think
Speaker 1: the version now is two point two. And you color
Speaker 1: correct the stone that the painting's on, and you can
Speaker 1: actually extract the original colors. It's really an amazing tool,
Speaker 1: and so Alan probably has well over enough images to
Speaker 1: create a catalog or a website or something. But if
Speaker 1: you have anything that is on stone painting in your
Speaker 1: area and you want to enhance it and in some
Speaker 1: cases actually bring back the colors that were originally applied
Speaker 1: to the stone, it can be you know, hundreds of
Speaker 1: thousand or a thousand years older. Use id stretch. Check
Speaker 1: it out. The phone version is fifty. I think the
Speaker 1: desktop version has double that, maybe one hundred bucks, well
Speaker 1: worth the investment id stretch. All right, that's it for
Speaker 1: this program. I want to think my guest today, Alan Ergott,
Speaker 1: coming to us from northern California. As always a team
Speaker 1: of Gael Tour, Mark Foster and Feya Pavar. You guys
Speaker 1: rock all right, take care of every well and we
Speaker 1: will talk to you next time