The History of California Slavery by Jean Pfaelzer

Slavery, observed Frederick Douglass, is a “hydra-headed monster.” In California this monster appeared and reappeared as if shape-shifting. The history of slavery in California unsettles the North/South view of American slave labor. This is a history of captivity, flight and resistance, of Indians held captive at the missions, Alaska natives brought to Fort Ross in Sonoma County, enslaved African Americans transported for the Gold Rush, a West Coast Underground Railroad, Native Americans who were legally kidnapped and forced into indentured slavery, Chinese prostitutes held in cages in SF, convict laborers sold from San Quentin, and modern victims of labor and sex trafficking. Jean Pfaelzer is the author of California Bound: The History of Slavery in California (forthcoming 2019), and Driven Out: the Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans. She’s the author of many other books, has written for Huffington Post, the Globalist, curated for the Smithsonian, and speaks regularly on NPR and Pacifica.
You can watch her presentation on July 23, 2018 – click here.