Rose Marie Beebe and Robert M. Senkewicz illustrate how Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo helped form early California and how his story reflects major concerns in the study of nineteenth-century California and the American West. Rather than composing a traditional biography, Beebe and Senkewicz present eight essays that bring together sources to explore California’s Spanish, Mexican, and American periods. An important project, this work compiles sources from across the three periods, developing California’s history beyond the American nation-state. This work’s ecumenical approach is enhanced by primary sources as well as eight significant essays that connect Mariano Vallejo and California history to the broader world.
Sifting through various sources from the late eighteenth and the entire nineteenth century, the authors examine Mariano Vallejo’s role as a major player in California’s nineteenth-century military and political affairs. This book challenges conventional thinking about Californios, which is often depicted as nostalgic for the Spanish past or...
University of California Press