Members of the American Indian Student Association at UCLA spent their Thanksgiving Day traveling to San Francisco to participate in the Indigenous Peoples Thanksgiving at the Sunrise Gathering on Alcatraz Island. They were following in the footsteps of UCLA Indian students 40 years ago who made the infamous trek from Los Angeles to San Francisco.

“We drove all night and it was very cold,” said Karina Martinez (Mexican), AISA member, “I had never been to Alcatraz before and it was very exciting to travel there just like the UCLA students did years ago.”

The ceremony, an annual event held every Thanksgiving, commemorated the 40th anniversary of the occupation of Alcatraz by a group of Indian protestors in 1969. The occupation was a stand for social justice and the fair treatment of Indian people. It was planned by a group of Indian students and a group of urban Indians from the Bay Area called “Indians of All Tribes.” One of the group’s leaders was Richard Oaks, a Mohawk Indian and a student at San Francisco State University.

In November 1969, Oaks traveled to UCLA to recruit Indian students to start what would become the longest occupation of a federal facility by Indian people. The occupation began Nov. 20, 1969 and ended June 11, 1971. More than 80 students from UCLA were among the approximately 100 Indian people who occupied Alcatraz Island on that day in November.

Citing an 1869 Sioux Treaty, the Indian activists claimed the abandoned island as surplus government land and the occupation of Alcatraz became a symbol of contemporary Indian resistance. The 19-month occupation of Alcatraz is a pivotal American Indian protest and activist movement, bringing together hundreds of Indians who lived on the island during the occupation and influencing Indians all over the country who also called for self-determination, autonomy and respect for Indian cultures.

The Alcatraz occupation sparked other movements of Indian activism like the occupation of the Bureau of Indian Affairs building in Washington, D.C. (1972) and the stand-off at Wounded Knee in South Dakota (1973), which were integral to the fight for Native rights and tribal sovereignty.

The UCLA student ancestors were part of that fight for social justice. They came back to L.A. with a new-found understanding of their identity, their roles as Native students, and the importance of Native activism.

With that positive spirit and pride, students who occupied Alcatraz returned to the UCLA campus and formally created the politically-motivated American Indian Student Association. They also advocated for the creation of the American Indian Studies Center in 1969. Their vision led to UCLA being at the forefront of American Indian studies in undergraduate education and later sparked the development of American Indian graduate programs in the form of Master’s degrees, law degrees, and the joint degree programs with UCLA graduate schools.

“No other colleges have Indian programs like UCLA,” said Theresa Stewart, (Luiseno, Tohono O’odham) AISA alumni, “Those students involved in the take-over of Alcatraz were really instrumental in the formation of AISA and the AISC. They had a powerful influence and presence on this campus.”

AISA has continued to promote student advocacy; AISA is the sponsoring student organization of two Community Programs Office projects: RAIN and AIR. The Retention of American Indians Now was created in 1990 to deal with the retention issues among the American Indian students on campus. The RAIN project offers peer counseling, workshops, mentoring and other cultural events and activities designed to retain and facilitate the graduation of more American Indian students.

The American Indian Recruitment Project created in 1997 is an outreach program that works with AI youth in Southern California. The AIR Project offers tutoring, peer advising, workshops, field trips and other programs designed to encourage more American Indians to enter institutes of higher education. The RAIN and AIR projects are both student-run and student-initiated efforts.

AISA also sponsors annual events like the Youth Conference and Basketball Tournament in March and the UCLA Pow Wow in May. American Indians currently represent less than 1 percent of the entire UCLA student population; earlier this year, AISA was also involved in creating a Task Force which addressed the recruitment efforts of American Indians to UCLA.

“The Pow Wow is one of our big annual events,” said Liz Fasthorse (Luiseno), UCLA Pow Wow coordinator. “It is considered one of the largest events on campus organized by one of the smallest student groups – AISA. Even though we have low numbers of students in AISA, we have great volunteers that help us. We wear a lot of hats in AISA, not only as leaders in our community but as students often representing AISA on multiple committees in many spaces.”

This Thanksgiving, AISA traveled to Alcatraz to honor and celebrate the students of 1969 and their accomplishments, particularly to commemorate the 40th anniversary of AISA and the AISC at UCLA. The Annual Sunrise Ceremony honored the descendents of the original occupiers with song and dance. Elders spoke about the occupation’s long-term effects on Indian people. AISA members shared the same blessings, sage, prayers, and sunrise together with thousands of people, Native and non-Native, and felt the presence of the original occupiers.

“AISA took a journey back to our beginning. It really grounded us in an understanding of our roots as an organization,” said Tazbah Chavez (Owens Valley Paiute, Navajo, San Carlos Apache), AISA president. “The take-over of Alcatraz was a movement that inspired change for Native people in regard to policy, culture, and preservation. The trip served not only as a tribute to those before us but also as a journey back to our roots. We come from a legacy of revolutionary people and that is something to be proud of.”