Bad Indians: A Tribal Memoir

Established in 1770 by Father Junipero Serra, the Carmel Mission served as headquarters for all 21 Spanish missions in California. Through her paternal grandfather, Miranda traces her ancestry to the Esselen group who lived at this mission.

Both an official term and derogatory epithet for Indigenous people in northern California during and after the 1849 Gold Rush, “Digger” appears as an official term in US government documents, though it is now considered offensive. Miranda includes images of “Digger Belles,” sketches or photographs of 19th-century Indigenous women. She also includes a newspaper entry celebrating the burning-in-effigy of the “Digger” name in 1922, when the US government accepted “Miwok” as the appropriate tribal name for official communications.

The California ranch belonging to Estefana Real, Miranda’s direct ancestor, before it was stolen from her by a wealthy American named Bradley Sargent, was El Potrero. Its theft is the subject of “Ularia’s Curse” in Part 2. Near the end of the book, Miranda describes discovering that her ancestors’ land still exists as part of a nature preserve/real-estate development funded and maintained by wealthy residents.