HVCA and the Can of Worms

Last year I published a little essay that was provoked by something the
Homestead Valley Community Association did to me and delivered copies of
it up and down the West Coast from Portland to Beverly Hills. Today is the
day we experiment whether I have learned enough about this blogsite to
post it here. I will attempt to transcribe the first page and a half from
Rich Text, or whatever it's called, to Plain Text, or whatever it's
called, and if it works I'll soon hang it up here from start to finish. It
isn't much anyway. The whole thing can be read in a few minutes, and if it
doesn't give you a bellyache you may enjoy a good laugh.

the cut & paste version doesn't look anything like the original, but I'm
going to give it a try. Hang on!

Marino, Moses, and Manifest Destiny

Measure "A" Measured Up

An Opinion

by
Ray Cook

At his inauguration, January 20, 2009, President elect Barak Obama with
his left hand upon a Bible held for him by his wife, Michelle, and his
right hand solemnly

raised, swore to defend the Constitution of the United States, "So help me
God!" This essay will explain the relationship between that event and a
relatively minor

one described by the Mill Valley Herald, a local weekly in Marin County,
California, in its edition May 13-19, 2009, in a front page article
entitled, "Honoring the

first Mill Valleyans."

Mill Valley is a small city in Marin County, the first county north of San
Francisco across the Golden Gate Bridge. Mention is made of this
propinquity to assist

readers in understanding the relationship of historical events to their
geographical setting.

Perhaps it would be helpful here at the beginning to remind ourselves that
the intrepid explorer Christopher Columbus, discoverer of the New World,
was sailing for the

Crown of Spain, and that within California and which occupy a conspicuous
niche in its proud and eminent heritage are twenty one missions built by
Spain, stretching

from San Diego in the south to Sonoma in the north, a distance of nearly
six hundred fifty miles, and that after the Mexican revolution against
Spain, California was

part of Mexico until 1848, when it was ceded to the United States by the
treaty of Guadelupe Hidalgo at the conclusion of the war with Mexico,
which Mexico lost.

A color photograph accompanying the Mill Valley Herald event mentioned
above had a striking inset of a newly emplaced bronze plaque in a tree
lined middle class

neighborhood, and subject of the commemoration, "Chief Marin, 1781-1839,
Namesake of Marin County."

This relatively small, relatively obscure plaque, 12"x5", embedded for
posterity flush in the public sidewalk is a lightning rod for
contemplation, or contempt, as the

mood strikes the beholder. It's text reads:

THE COAST MIWOK NATIVE, HUICMUSE, WAS BORN HERE
AT THE TRIBAL VILLAGE OF NANAMAS. AT AGE 20, HE WAS
BAPTIZED "MARINO" AT MISSION DOLORES AND WAS LATER
KNOWN AS MARIN. HE BOTH COOPERATED WITH AND
DEFIED THE PRIESTS AND THE MILITARY, AT ONE POINT
HIDING ON THE ISLAND OFF OF SAN RAFAEL WHICH STILL
BEARS HIS NAME. HE DIED AT MISSION SAN RAFAEL.
Mill Valley Historical Society 2008