Saahatpa

Cooswootna, Yampoochee to his own people and Juan Antonio to everyone else, led the Mountain Cahuilla, and the plaque credits him with defending settlers' property and livestock. It leaves out where that got him. His men killed a gang of American outlaws in 1851, a judge ruled the killings lawful, the Americans stayed angry regardless, and he moved his people east to Saahatpa to be away from them. Smallpox took him and most of the village in the winter of 1862-63. His grave was found in 1956, identified by Army epaulets.

What the plaque says

Chief Juan Antonio and his band of Cahuilla Indians helped white settlers in the San Bernardino area defend their property and livestock against outlaws during the 1840's and 1850's. In late 1851 Juan Antonio, his warriors and their families, settled at nearby Saahatpa. During the winter of 1862-63 a smallpox epidemic swept through Southern California killing many Native Americans, including Juan Antonio. Cahuilla tradition asserts that the U.S. government sent army blankets that were contaminated with smallpox. After this disaster, Saahatpa was abandoned.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Original McDonald's Site — 20 mi
  The corner where two brothers invented fast food, now an unofficial museum the corporation has never blessed.
• Wigwam Motel — 22 mi
  Nineteen concrete teepees on Foothill Boulevard, the last of Frank Redford's Wigwam Villages and still renting rooms.

More markers nearby

• Yucaipa Adobe — 6.5 mi
• Yucaipa Rancheria — 6.5 mi
• Kimberly Crest — 10 mi
• The Zanja — 11 mi