Captain Boling’s Boo-boo

Yosemite has been beset with many problems and controversy over the years.  Mistakes have been made and mistakes will be made but perhaps, the biggest mistake ever made in or about Yosemite was made in the early 1850’s by Captain Boling when he led a militia into Yosemite in an attempt to round up Chief Tenaya’s tribe of Indians and transport them to a reservation near Fresno and in the process shot and killed Chief Tenaya’s favorite young son.

 

            As a consequence of this act the old chief laid down a curse upon the white man. He said that he would never leave Yosemite and that his spirit would be with the spirits of the rocks, the waters, and in the winds and would always be but one step behind and the white man would always be afraid and cold..

 

             Since then there have been many instances where people have simply disappeared or fallen off of the mountains or great floods have appeared and as said in the curse, the white man has never found any lasting peace in Yosemite.

 

            The Indians and many others say the ghost of Tenaya lives in the deepest and darkest shadows of the mountains.

 

            Geologists and scientist say the rock slides are caused by the changing temperatures causing the expanding and shrinking of the rocks and by the tremors deep within the earth but many believe the old chief is merely shaking his fist still making the white man afraid and uncomfortable.

 

            At any rate many believe that Captain Boling’s boo-boo, will as the old chief’s curse says, haunt us forever