“One of the truths about historical research is that it is never finished. So many sources are consulted, there are always more to be added. There are certainly more sources of information about early Bear Dances and about early Mountain Maidu life that I could not get to when researching this book.” — Leigh Ann Hunt, Preface for the 1996 Edition of Rite of Spring: A History of the Mountain Bear Dance .

Rites of Spring is Leigh Ann Hunt’s thesis for Master of Arts of Anthropology at California State Unversity, Sacramento, 1991. I met Leigh Ann back in the 1980s when she is doing her research. In 1996, the Lassen County Historical Society published Leigh Ann’s thesis. I am not if it is still available, though I highly recommend it.

One of notable inclusions is Edith Young’s notes, a field matron in Susanville, who was only such employee in the Greenville Agency of Bureau of Indian Affairs. Young was in Susanville during the 1910s, and I, too, have some of her  observations, and I think a possible photograph of her. I will add it to my to do list.

Tim