Changing Life for the Nisenan

Changing Life for the Nisenan. . In the years leading up to the Gold Rush, life changed dramatically for the Nisenan who called this valley home., Cullumah , To the Nisenan, “Cullumah” was home. For generations, they thrived in the valley and mountains, building large villages and living off abundant salmon, deer, acorns, and manzanita berries. Cullumah was far from the reach of Spanish and Mexican colonizers, so the Nisenan maintained their autonomy and way of life into the 1800s., Contact and Change , European fur trappers started to enter Nisenan territory in 1820, looking for abundant animal pelts. Nisenan life changed drastically with this contact. Fur trappers unknowingly brought diseases with them; one epidemic in 1833 killed half of the Valley Nisenan. European influence had arrived in Cullumah., Forced Labor , When John Sutter established Sutter’s Fort in 1839, the impacts of his actions rippled from present-day Sacramento all the way to Cullumah. Sutter exploited laborers from the surrounding tribes, including the Nisenan, when he raided villages and took them in as slaves and forced them to live at the fort and work for him in the building, farming, and ranching.