Peveril Meigs Baja California Research Materials

Finding aid prepared by Special Collections & Archives

Special Collections & Archives

9500 Gilman Drive

La Jolla, California, 92093-0175

858-534-2533

spcoll@ucsd.edu

Descriptive Summary

Title: Peveril Meigs Baja California Research Materials

Identifier/Call Number: MSS 0530

Contributing Institution: Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego

9500 Gilman Drive

La Jolla, California, 92093-0175

Languages: English

Physical Description: 12.4 Linear feet (5 archives boxes and 8 oversized folders)

Date (inclusive): 1925 - 1979

Abstract: Photographs, journals, maps and related research materials on Baja California, Mexico, created by geographer Peveril Meigs III. Meigs conducted field research in northern Baja between 1925 and 1936 observing geology, climate, indigenous populations, mission sites, and local culture in preparation for his 1932 doctoral dissertation entitled "The Dominican Missions of Lower California" and his ethnographic monograph entitled The Kiliwa Indians of Lower California (1939).

Creator: Meigs, Peveril, 1903-1979

Related Materials

SEPARATION NOTE: Published books, journals, and maps from the Peveril Meigs collection have been separated from the papers and added Library's holdings. To identify and list these items, conduct an author search in the ROGER catalog on the term "Meigs, Peveril 1903 1979 Former Owner."

Scope and Content of Collection

Photographs, journals, maps and related research materials on Baja California, Mexico, created by geographer Peveril Meigs III. Meigs conducted field research in northern Baja between 1925 and 1936 observing geology, climate, indigenous populations, mission sites, and local culture in preparation for his 1932 doctoral dissertation entitled "The Dominican Missions of Lower California" and his ethnographic monograph entitled The Kiliwa Indians of Lower California (1939).

The collection contains journals with daily observations of people, the natural environment and historical sites; photographic prints, scans of negatives, and glass lantern slides, some of which have been mounted in albums; and hand drawn maps, particularly of the area around Arroyo Leon. The journals and all photographic images have been digitized and are available for viewing on the UC San Diego Library Digital Collections website. The collection also includes notes and typescripts on Meigs's fieldwork and published sources on Baja California and Dominican mission history; annotated publications; and correspondence with his dissertation advisor, Dr. Carl Sauer, and other notable scholars including ethnographer A.L. Kroeber, geographer Homer Aschmann, and historian Peter Gerhard. Of interest is Meigs's translation, from Spanish into English, of Dominican padre Luis de Sales's "Noticias de la Provincia de Californias en Tres Cartas," notes and data compiled in the 1950s on Baja California's climate history, and several papers by Meigs on peninsular Indian culture written in the 1970s. The collection does not contain material related to Meigs's research on other arid deserts or tide mills.

Arranged in eight series: 1) CORRESPONDENCE, 2) WRITINGS BY MEIGS, 3) WRITINGS BY OTHERS, 4) JOURNALS, 5) PHOTOGRAPHS, 6) MAPS, 7) MISCELLANEOUS MATERIALS, and 8) ORIGINALS OF PRESERVATION PHOTOCOPIES.

Biography

Peveril Meigs, III was born in Flushing, New York, on May 5, 1903. His family moved to Santa Barbara, California, and Meigs later attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he received an A.B. (1925) and a Ph.D (1932) in geography. As an undergraduate studying with Dr. Carl O. Sauer, Meigs became interested in Baja California and planned his first trip to the peninsula in the summer of 1925, accompanied by fellow graduate student Charles Warren Thornthwaite.

On his first trip, Meigs and Thornthwaite travelled as far south as San Fernando de Velicatá and visited David Goldbaum in Ensenada, the Johnson Ranch in San Antonio del Mar, the Hamilton Ranch, the flour mill and saltworks at San Quintín, the Meling Ranch, and the mining center of Real Del Castillo. They also made a long stay in the town of El Rosario, a brief tour of Mexicali and visited the Dominican mission sites of San Fernando, El Rosario, Santo Domingo, and San Pedro Mártir.

Meigs returned to Berkeley as a graduate student in the fall of 1925, presented his photographs to a seminar in geography and stimulated interest in the peninsula among graduate students and faculty, including Dr. Oscar Schmieder, who went on to study the Russian colony in the Guadalupe Valley. In the summer of 1926, Dr. Sauer, Meigs, and graduate students Sam Dicken and Fred Kniffen embarked upon a second trip that retraced many of the destinations of the first and concentrated on Dominican mission sites. Sauer and Meigs returned and published "Site and Culture at San Fernando de Velicatá," the first installment in a Baja California series published by the University of California Press. Sauer served as Meigs's advisor as he continued his graduate studies and began work on his dissertation.

Meigs returned to Baja California each summer for the next three years, focusing on the history and geography of the Dominican missions and the native populations surrounding them. In 1927, Meigs was accompanied by Horace Byers, a Berkeley undergraduate interested in making meteorological observations. In 1928, Meigs, under the direction of Dr. A.L. Kroeber and accompanied by his wife Yvonne, spent several weeks living with and studying the Kiliwa Indians in Valle Trinidad. He was joined by his brother Stewart on a similar trip in 1929.

Meigs returned to the peninsula to complete his studies of the Kiliwa Indians in 1936. The results of these studies were published in 1939 as The Kiliwa Indians of Lower California.

Following several teaching apppointments in California and Louisiana, Meigs served as a geographer with the Office of Strategic Services (1942-1945) and the Arctic Institute of North America (1948-1949). While he spent most of his professional career studying the physical geography of arid and arctic zones, Meigs returned to his Baja California studies in the 1970s, publishing several articles in Pacific Coast Archaeological Society Quarterly that reexamined his earlier field work.

Peveril Meigs died September 16, 1979, in Wayland, Massachusetts.

Digital Content

Journals and photographic images from the collection have been digitized and can be viewed through links in the container list, or by clicking the link below.

Items available online

Preferred Citation

Peveril Meigs Baja California Research Materials, MSS 530. Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego.

Acquisition Information

Acquired 2000, 2001.

Subjects and Indexing Terms

Dawson, Glen, 1912-

Gerhard, Peter, 1920-

Kelly, William H. (William Henderson), 1902-

Kroeber, A. L. (Alfred Louis), 1876-1960

Sales, Luis de, 1745-1807

Sauer, Carl Ortwin, 1889-1975

West, Robert C. (Robert Cooper), 1913-2001

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- Climate

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- Description and travel

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- Geography

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- History

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- Maps

Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula) -- Pictorial works

Indians of Mexico -- Mexico -- Baja California (Peninsula)

Kiliwa Indians

Maps -- Mexico -- Baja California -- 20th century

Meling Ranch (Baja California, Mexico)

Missions -- Mexico -- Baja California (Peninsula) -- History

Missions -- Mexico -- Baja California (Peninsula) -- Pictorial works

Photographic prints -- 1920-1929

Photographic prints -- 1930-1939

Ranches -- Mexico -- Baja California (Peninsula)

CORRESPONDENCE

Scope and Content of Series

Series 1) CORRESPONDENCE: Letters from other Baja California historians, geographers, and anthropologists, as well as editors, booksellers, and family members. Notable correspondents include Carl Sauer, A.L. Kroeber, Homer Aschmann, and Peter Gerhard. Arranged alphabetically by correspondent.

Box 1, Folder 1

A-Z Miscellaneous

Box 1, Folder 2

Antigua Libreria Robredo 1949

Box 1, Folder 3

Aschmann, Homer 1954

General note

Includes Baja California climatic data charts.

Box 1, Folder 4

Brand, Donald D. 1939

Box 1, Folder 5

Dawson's Book Shop 1979

General note

Glen Dawson.

Box 1, Folder 6

Gerhard, Peter 1943 - 1951

Box 1, Folder 7

Kelly, William 1940 - 1949

Box 1, Folder 8

Kroeber, A.L. 1932 - 1939

Box 1, Folder 9

Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery 1935

Box 1, Folder 10

Meigs, Loren (brother) 1925 - 1932

Box 1, Folder 11

Sauer, Carl 1927 - 1931

Box 1, Folder 12

Smith, Helen 1970 - 1971

Box 1, Folder 13

West, Robert 1979

WRITINGS BY MEIGS

Scope and Content of Series

Series 2) WRITINGS BY MEIGS: Drafts summarizing field notes, typescripts, notes on bibliographic sources, and reprints of Meigs's work related to Baja California, including research notes for his published works on the Kiliwa Indians and several reprints of articles published in Pacific Coast Archaeological Society Quarterly. Of interest is Meigs's translation of Padre Luis de Sales's "Noticias de la Provincia de Californias en Tres Cartas," an important account on Dominican activity in Baja California. Materials are arranged alphabetically.

Box 1, Folder 14

Baja California bibliographies 1952 - 1961

Box 1, Folder 15

Baja California climatic data 1919 - 1967

General note

Notes and charts.

Box 1, Folder 16

Capes of Human Hair from Baja California and Outside 1970

General note

Reprint and negative of illustration. Published in Pacific Coast Archaeological Society Quarterly, Vol. 6, No. 1, January 1970.

Box 1, Folder 17

Creation Myth and Other Recollections of the Niji Mishkwish 1971

General note

Reprint, draft, photograph, drawing, and map. Published in Pacific Coast Archaeological Society Quarterly, Vol. 7, No. 1, January 1971.

Box 1, Folder 18

Crespi diary notes

Box 1, Folder 19

Dominican Mission Frontier of Lower California 1935

General note

Notes.

Box 1, Folder 20

Kiliwa Indians - Dialects

Box 1, Folder 21

Kiliwa Indians - Notes 1917 - 1977

Box 1, Folder 22

Kiliwa Indians - Valle Trinidad notes 1929

Box 1, Folder 23

Kiliwa Indians of Lower California 1932 - 1969

General note

Correspondence and manuscript draft.

Box 1, Folder 24

Miscellaneous notes

Box 1, Folder 25

Notes on the Paipai of San Isidoro, Baja California 1977

General note

Reprint. Published in Pacific Coast Archeological Society Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 1, January 1977.

Box 1, Folder 26

Noticias de la Provincia de Californias en Tres Cartas, by Luis Sales. Translated by Meigs

General note

Manuscript.

Box 1, Folder 27

Noticias de la Provincia de Californias en Tres Cartas, by Luis Sales. Translated by Meigs

General note

Typescript.

Box 1, Folder 28

Rains and hurricanes in southern Baja California 1966

General note

Draft and notes.

Box 1, Folder 29

Some Pictographs in Northern Baja California 1976

General note

Reprint. Published in Pacific Coast Archeological Society Quarterly, Vol. 12, No. 1, January 1976.

WRITINGS BY OTHERS

Scope and Content of Series

Series 3) WRITINGS BY OTHERS: Baja California-related publications by other authors that have been heavily annotated by Meigs. Arranged in alphabetical order.

Box 1, Folder 30

Diary of Junipero Serra; Mch. 28 - June 30, 1769. Part III 1902

General note

Published in OUTWEST, vol. 16, no. 5.

Box 1, Folder 31

Gifford, E.W. "The Kamia of Imperial Valley" 1931

General note

Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 97.

Box 2, Folder 1

Gifford, E.W. and R.H. Lowie. "Notes on the Akwa'ala Indians of Lower California" 1929

General note

University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. 23, No. 7, pp. 339-352. 2 copies, both annotated by Meigs.

Box 2, Folder 2

Hastings, James Rodney, ed. Climatological Data For Baja California 1964

General note

University of Arizona. Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Technical Reports on the Meteorology and Climatology of Arid Regions, No. 14.

Box 2, Folder 3

Hendry, George W. "Francisco Palou's Boundary Marker" 1926

General note

California Historical Society, San Francisco, 1926.

Box 2, Folder 4

Mexico. Secretaria de Agricultura y Ganaderia. Servicio Meteorologico Mexicano 1924 - 1954

General note

Manuscript meteorological data charts recording temperature, rainfall, dominant wind direction, number of days of fog, and number of cloudy days for reporting stations in Baja California and Sonora from the 1920s to the 1950s. Completeness of the data varies for each station

Box 2, Folder 5

Nelson, Edward W. Lower California And Its Natural Resources 1921

General note

Published in Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. XVI.

Box 2, Folder 6

North Mexican Center for Anthropology 1953

General note

Brochure.

Box 2, Folder 7

Rogers, Malcolm J. "The Stone Art of the San Dieguito Plateau" 1929

General note

Reprinted from American Anthropologist, Vol. 31, No. 3, July-September 1929.

Box 2, Folder 8

Shreve, Forest. "A Desert by the Sea" 1935

General note

Carnegie Institution of Washington, News Service Bulletin, School Edition. Vol. 3, No. 26, Release Date Sunday, September 29, 1935.

Box 2, Folder 9

Shreve, Forest and R.D. Mallery. "Desert Investigations" 1934

General note

Annual Report of the Division of Plant Biology, Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1933-1934. Issued December 14, 1934.

JOURNALS

Scope and Content of Series

Series 4) JOURNALS: Meigs's field notes from his annual summer expeditions to Baja California, 1925-1929. Notably absent from the series are his notes from 1936. While the journals mostly contain daily accounts of his field work, including land measurements, sketch maps, photograph captions, and interviews with subjects, the 1925 journal begins six months before he enters the field, offering a glimpse of Meigs's life as an undergraduate at UC Berkeley. The final entry in the series is a copy of Dr. Oscar Schmieder's study of the Russian colony at Guadalupe Valley, heavily annotated by Meigs while he studied the Kiliwa Indians in 1929. The journals were numbered by Meigs and are arranged chronologically.

Box 2, Folder 10

Outlined account of Baja California explorations 1926 - 1928

General note

Contains references to journal page numbers and photographs. Probably created in preparation for a publication for the Baja California Travel Series.

Box 2, Folder 11

Journal 1 1925 January 1-August 3

Journal 1, 1925 January 1 - August 3