Hamiinat! SCCM is honored to host a Native Storytelling Series featuring the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians in honor of Native American Heritage Month in November. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from them about the ancestral lands that we occupy, native culture, and language in this native-led storytelling and craft series for families with children 8 years and younger.

Bio: Lucia Alfaro serves as the Secretary of the FTBMI. She is a descendant of the Santa Clarita, San Fernando, and Antelope valleys. Her passions include protecting and preserving FTBMI homelands through her seat on the Tataviam Land Conservancy.

About the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians:
The citizens of the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians (Tribe) are the people of northern Los Angeles County. After thousands of years, foreign powers began colonization in the late 1770s with the arrival of the Spanish followed by the establishment of Mexico and the United States. Despite settler colonization, the Tribe continues to operate as a tribal community.

The Tribe originates in the lineages, villages, and cultures of the period that came before the establishment of Mission San Fernando in 1797, from which their ancestors received the name Fernandeño during enslavement by the Spanish. The Native Americans that were taken to the Mission originally inhabited the villages originating in the Simi, San Fernando, Santa Clarita, and Antelope Valleys. After the Mission period, they became known as the Fernandeño historical Indian tribe. The Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians is comprised of the descendants of that historical tribe of Fernandeños.