News

The Chronicle reports that Humboldt State is now the last member of the California State University system to have no building named for private donors. Probably not for lack of trying.

A new history -- Driven Out: The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans -- is reviewed in the Chicago Tribune . According to the review, the book at least touches on Humboldt County's Chinese Expulsion :

In some places, like Eureka, Calif., marauding mobs drove the Chinese from their homes; in other places, like Truckee, Calif., white threats to burn their communities or boycott their employers effectively prompted the Chinese to flee. In still other places -- Rock Springs, Wyo., for instance -- outright terrorism and assassination accomplished the same end.

On Amazon, reviewer M. L. Lamendola expounds:

Pfaelzer took great pains to thoroughly research events, sort through the facts, and reconstruct what happened. Her method is one of first providing a macro view and then providing a detailed accounting of the subsequent events. For example, she talks about the Eureka method (named after the town of Eureka) in Chapter 4 and explains what it was about. Then, she goes into specific events that occurred as part of putting the Eureka method into practice. Pfaelzer shows the rationalizations that people used to justify their reprehensible behavior.

Eureka was just one of many towns that embarked on a vicious and insane program of forcing the Chinese to leave. In Chapter 5, Pfaelzer uses the same approach to reveal the Truckee method and the atrocities committed there.
The book was written by University of Delaware American Studies Professor Jean Pfaelzer and is published by Random House.

Finally, the Sacramento Bee notes that weasel lovers working to overturn California's anti-ferret law have found very little traction. Ferrets Anonymous, an advocacy group, has been contacting legislators hoping to find a bill sponsor; the only response that the group has received is an "I'll think about it" from our own Assembleymember Patty Berg .

Ferret politics are endlessly fascinating.

Creative Commons -licensed ferret photo by Flickr user (and apparent ferret freak) Stacy Lynn Baum .