The Santa Barbara Maritime Museum will present “Revitalization of the Chumash Tomol” by Alan Salazar and Ray Ward at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 20 at the museum, 113 Harbor Way in Santa Barbara.
The cost is free for members and $10 for nonmembers. A members-only reception will be held at 6:15 p.m. To register, click here or call 805.962.8404 x115. Please register for tickets early to guarantee admittance.
Salazar has been a Native American traditional storyteller, a traditional paddler of Chumash tomols (plank canoes), and a Native American consultant/monitor. His family has traced their family ancestry to the Chumash village of Ta’apu, now known as Simi Valley, and the Tataviam village of Pi’ing near Castaic.
He is a founding member of the Kern County Native American Heritage Preservation Council, the Chumash Maritime Association, a member of the California Indian Advisory Council for the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History and a member of the Environmental Review Board for the City of Malibu.
Salazar helped build the first working traditional Chumash plank canoe called a tomol in modern times, and has paddled in this plank canoe for over 15 years. He has been involved with protecting Native American cultural sites for 20 years as a consultant/monitor on sites in Ventura, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Kern counties. He is one of the few consultant/monitors that has taken college classes in archaeology and has worked as a field archaeologist, to help him better understand the field.
He has self-published the first-ever Chumash coloring book featuring important Chumash animals and the Chumash language.
Salazar has also worked as a juvenile institution officer for about 20 years at juvenile facilities in Santa Barbara and Bakersfield, and believes by sharing his knowledge about the Chumash/Tataviam cultures, he is saving these rich Native cultures.
The lecture series is sponsored by the Santa Barbara County Arts Commission and Silvio Di Loreto.
— Dennis Schuett is a marketing coordinator for the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum.