In California, a native people fight to recover their stolen waters
When Noah Williams was about a year old, his parents took him on a fateful drive through the endless desert sagebrush of the Owens Valley—which the Nüümü call Payahuunadü—in California’s Eastern Sierra. Noah was strapped into his car seat behind his mother, Teri Red Owl, and his father, Harry Williams, a Nüümü tribal elder who loved a teachable moment. “Hey look—that’s our water!” he liked to tell Noah whenever they drove past the riffling cascades of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. … In a state shaped by water grabs, drought emergencies, and “pray for rain” billboards, Payahuunadü is the locus of California’s most infamous water war—the fight between Payahuunadü residents and the city of Los Angeles, over 200 miles away. … Around 1904, Los Angeles city officials came up with a plan to take the valley’s water for themselves.
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