This year marks the 100th anniversary of the public debut of a
man called Ishi. Ishi was Native American, a Yana from the Deer
Creek area, about 150 miles northeast of Berkeley. And for the
past century he’s been known as “the last wild Indian in North
America.” In some ways, he’s famous: The anthropology department
building at UC Berkeley is named for Alfred Kroeber, the scholar
who worked closely with Ishi, and Dwinelle Hall’s outdoor
enclosure is named Ishi Court. UC Berkeley’s anthropology
community held a conference in September dedicated to Ishi’s
memory, and the California Museum in Sacramento has a yearlong
exhibit featuring some of his possessions. So, who was Ishi? And
how could Ishi have been the so-called “last Indian” when close
to a million Native Americans live in California today? Reporter
Terria Smith – who is also California Native American – tells us
Ishi’s story. * * * TERRIA SMITH: Imagine spending three years
alone in the woods of California. You’ve lost your entire
family, and all of yo