Site of Indian Village of Pochea

Pochea was one village in Pahsitnah, a settlement strung along the ridge either side of this hill, and the plaque introduces its ending with the words a tragic story tells. That is a hedge, and an epidemic does not need one. Smallpox arrived with the Spanish in the 1770s and Pahsitnah emptied. Survivors went north across the San Jacinto River, and their descendants are there now as the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians, whose own greeting is written in two languages, Luiseño and Cahuilla. The pageant marker a few steps away tells a story about them instead.

What the plaque says

Pochea was one of cluster of Indian villages forming the very large settlement of Pahsitna which extended along the ridge east and west of Ramona Bowl. Pahsitnah was thriving when the Spanish first passed by in 1774. A tragic story tells of the natives contracting smallpox from Europeans; a terrible epidemic spreading, and some survivors fleeing to the area of the present Soboba Reservation.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• March Field Air Museum — 21 mi
  A century of the same field, still working — the museum parked outside the fence of a base that has flown since 1918.
• Palm Springs — 25 mi
  Cahuilla homeland, checkerboard reservation, mid-century playground, and the square mile the city burned.
• Harada House — 30 mi
  The 1884 cottage a Japanese American family bought in their children's names, and kept in court.
• Riverside Chinatown Site — 31 mi
  Riverside's second Chinatown — an empty lot on purpose, with eighty percent of it still underground.

More markers nearby

• Ramona Bowl, Site of the Ramona Pageant — steps away
• Soviet Transpolar Landing Site — 4.3 mi
• Hemet Maze Stone — 7.5 mi
• Donaldson Futuro — 12 mi