Immigration and Transformation in Central California: A Case Study from the Samuel Adams Limekiln Complex, Santa Cruz County, California

Summary

The mid- to late-nineteenth century in California was marked by rapid and dramatic technological, economic, and social change. These transformations were spurred largely by the substantial influx of multiple diasporic communities from across the globe, being both pushed and pulled to the state by various factors. As a result, from their origin, many industries, places, and communities were multi-ethnic, with internal social and labor divisions being based on complex, fluid, and historically situated understandings of ethnicity and nationality. The work, domestic, and leisure spaces of these pluralistic communities, therefore, become important sites for the exploration of cultural persistence, resistance, and change. With these questions and issues in mind, this paper will use new archaeological data to examine the different (but intersecting and overlapping) stories of Irish, Portuguese, Italian, and Chinese laborers that lived and worked at the nineteenth century Samuel Adams Limekiln Complex on the Santa Cruz Coast of Central California.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Archaeologies of Diaspora and Dispersal   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 842