Hey everyone, if you listened to the previous episode we did about a group of Hopi men who were imprisoned on Alcatraz Island in 1894,

you may have heard me make an offhand remark about the story of the Native American activists who occupied Alcatraz in

1969 a century later and you may have off-handedly heard me say you know what we

should rerun that episode so here I am fulfilling my promise to you. I am, if nothing, a man of my word. But really, we did that episode a while ago and the two stories do pair nicely. So here is the story of the 1969 Alcatraz occupation from the

This Day Archives. Take a listen.

Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avergan.

This day, November 24, 1969, day four of the Alcatraz occupation.

So yeah, we're fudging the date a little bit,

but at the beginning of what would end up

being a 19-month occupation of Alcatraz Island

in San Francisco Bay.

On November 20th, 78 American Indians

from 20 tribal groups calling themselves the Indians of all tribes took the

island reclaiming it as native land. In case you're wondering, yes, Alcatraz it was a prison for many decades, but it had been decommissioned, essentially abandoned in 1963, and now this occupation in 1969 was part of a larger indigenous civil rights movement.

Many point to the occupation of Alcatraz as the birth are certainly one of the key moments in the modern

Native American civil rights movement.

So here to discuss as always is

Nicole Hammer of Columbia.

Hello, Nicky.

Hello Jody.

And our guest for this episode is Julian Brave Noiscat,

...