Biography: Katherine Siva Saubel

Born in March 1920 at Pa’chahualpa on the Los Coyotes Reservation and raised in Palm Springs, Katherine Siva Saubel is an internationally known and respected scholar of Cahuilla Indian history, literature, and culture. She grew up speaking the Cahuilla language and learning tribal traditions from her parents Melana Sawaxell and Juan C. Siva. She is the first female Native American graduate of Palm Springs High School. With her husband, Mariano Saubel, and her friend Jane Penn, Katherine Saubel helped establish the Malki Museum, the first nonprofit tribal museum on an Indian reservation in California. The Malki Museum, on the Morongo Indian Reservation in Banning, is noted for its Cahuilla display and impressive collection of a variety of artifacts from prehistoric and historical periods, including basketry, pottery, plants, photographs, and hunting materials. The Malki Museum also serves as a forum for publishing scholarly works on Native Americans, including several by Katherine Saubel herself.

For many years, Katherine Saubel served on the Riverside County Historical Commission, which selected her County Historian of the Year in 1986. In 1987 she was recognized as Elder of the Year by the California State Indian Museum. Governor George Deukmejian appoined her to the California Native American Heritage Commission, and she has served with distinction, preserving sacred sites and protecting Indian remains. Katherine Saubel has testified as an expert on Indian culture and history by the California legislature, the United State Congress, and many boards, commissions, and agencies.

Many believe that Katherine Saubel’s greatest achievements have been in her efforts to preserve the language of the Cahuilla people. She has worked closely with the linguist Hansjakob Seiler on writing down and providing authentic translation of the Cahuilla language that had previously existed only in spoken form. Their work together resulted in the publication of both a Cahuilla grammar book and dictionary. She has also published her own dictionary, I’sniyatam Designs, a Cahuilla Word Book. Katherine Saubel’s work also includes several authentic transcriptions and English translations of Cahuilla folklore.

Another major focus of Katherine Saubel’s work is in Cahuilla ethnobotany, the study of the useful knowledge of plants. In 1972, Katherine Saubel collaborated with anthropologist John Lowell Bean to publish Temalpakh: Cahuilla Indian Knowledge and Uses of Plants, a wide-ranging study in Cahuilla ethnobotany. She is known to be an expert on the unique Cahuilla uses of such plants as mesquite, screwbean, oak and many others. A variety of government agencies, academic institutions, and museums have published her writings. In addition, Katherine Saubel has taught on various aspects of Cahuilla history, literature, and culture here at UC Riverside; at UCLA; California State University, Hayward; at the University of Cologne and at Hachinohe University in Japan.

Katherine Saubel has received numerous awards and honors for her achievements as an author, historian, teacher, and activist. Her recent awards include the First Recipient of the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of the American Indian, Art and Culture Award (1994); the Desert Protective Council Award; YWCA Woman of Achievement Award (Riverside County); Bridge To Peace Award; Latino and Native American Hall of Fame (Riverside); in 2000 the First Recipient of the California Indian Heritage Preservation Award by the Society for California Archaeology (2000); and the Indian of the Year by the California Indian Conference (2000). The award of which she is most proud is her 1998 induction into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York, the first for a Native American Woman.