PAGE THREE
(under construction)
But the frauds are not over. Now we go to the coastal mountains and a traditional hunting camp of the Coastal Samala people. It is called, "Flores Flats" and was a part of an original Spanish land grant to the family by that name. It was a special place for that family which has many branches of other names and to this day is widespread around the Santa Barbara area. It was located near the summit of the coastal mountains at the top of Gibralter road.
USGS map and aerial of Flores Flats on Gibralter road (High res)
Having its own water source, it was an important place for hunters to regroup and perhaps trade the meat they had taken, then return to hunting. On March 27, 1887 there was a plat map filed in the District Government Land Office establishing the families ownership. It was a seasonally used camp, even of antiquity. From the 1950s forward, it saw perhaps even less use.
In about 1969, a group that had formed in Santa Barbara, somewhat of a cult, called "The Brotherhood of the Sun", a religious corporation, had made a deal to rent the property. After some months, the founder, a man thought of by the Coastal Samala people as having integrity and trusted, came to them and said that the "The Brotherhood of the Sun" wanted to purchase the parcel and that the current tenants would actually conduct the agreement. He was trusted by the Samala people, descendants of the Flores family, and those renting were extended a similar trust.
A man named Ralph H. Ellison and his wife Anne Belle Ellison were the persons living there.
The agreement they ended up making with the Coastal band was that they would pay something in the area of $220,000 dollars for the land. An initial down payment of $30,000 dollars was provided with the balance due at the end of the year. After the year had passed the native owners seeking payment were told, "We will have it in a few months". This story was repeated a few times with no payment forth coming. Then the scope of the fraud became evident as the "tenants" simply wrote a Grant deed and granted to the "Brotherhood of the Sun" the entire 160 acres belonging to the Flores family for the "valuable consideration" of $70,000 dollars paid to the tenants, Ralph and Anne B. Ellison. Notice, the land once again is not shown as ever being granted to those selling it. The deed was signed by John Slayter on May 13, 1971 as the acting vice president of the non profit religious corporation organized under the laws of the state of California.
The Coastal Samala people learned in consulting with an attorney that "no contract for exchange of land, not in writing is valid" and that "no contract for exchange of land taking longer than one year is valid" and that courts will not recognize fraud in conjunction with gaining such agreements. The producer of this documentary has personal experience with this and finds that it is indeed legal to conduct fraud in California as long as it concerns contract for land not in writing taking longer than a year, no matter how the agreement was gained.. This is true despite the fact that the common law history of "partial performance" where courts typically compel completion of contract partially performed have no meaning nor does the United States Constitution,
Article I, Section 10, which provides that "[n]o State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation," or "pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts."
The "Brotherhood of the Sun" went on to conduct business as "Sunburst Farms" a major retailer of organic produce in the Santa Barbara area and the Coastal Samala people chose to not chance alienating the public by attempting a lawsuit against the socially powerful non profit religious organization and instead, silently suffered the loss of a piece of land very valuable to their many families.
We have traveled from the line along the beacon on west camino cielo, out into the pacific ocean, then around to the Los Prietos and Najalayegua and Carpinteria, then up the coast to Hope ranch. From the coastal mountain hunt camp of the Flores family we travel north along the coast to where the beacon from the summit of the mountains shines to draw the Tomol canoes of the fisherman and sea hunters, with their food into the Deveraux slough and the village of 'ukshulo'.
Land granted to Nicholas Den by Mexico. Ukshulo' was a village adjacent to the canyon named after a chief, Tomatillo. Who was a peace maker between Russians and Spaniards during the Spanish colonization and a great leader of the Samala people. Tomatillo canyon runs next to the line of the beacon from the fire,
near the winter solstice shrine called the grandmother.
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