Editor’s Note

Links to the Past

We seldom have enough space to include all the details we want to share with our readers, so I’d like to add a little more about our cover photograph.

Ethnographer Brian Bibby, a longtime friend of Dorothy Morehead Hill, sent us the following biographical sketch of Emma Cooper, who graces the cover of this issue:

“Emma (Latta) Cooper was born in 1877 at the village of Udawi, located on Chico Creek in Upper Bidwell Park. Her family was last to leave the village. As a youth, she moved to the Keefer Ranch near Lake Almanor and later married Richard Cooper. Emma was a fine basket maker. Three of her baskets were collected by Stewart Culin in 1908 for the Brooklyn Museum, where they remain today. She lived for most of her life at the relocated village of Mechoopda in Chico, on West First Avenue. Emma’s native name was Yo-tut-na. She died July 22, 1960.”

We appreciate all the letters, contest entries, and alum updates you sent us after the last issue came out. Please keep in touch—we enjoy hearing from you.

Marion Harmon