LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A film about Anderson Marsh State Historic Park in Lower Lake has won an Emmy Award.
“A Walk Through Time: The Story of Anderson Marsh” won in the “Historic/Cultural-Program/Special” category in the 46th annual Northern California Emmy Awards, which were presented on Saturday in San Francisco.
The 28-minute film documents 14,000 years of the park’s history and the first people who lived there, the Koi Nation of Northern California.
“Everything was just fantastic,” said Dino Beltran, the Koi Nation’s tribal administrator and treasurer who also was a producer and the narrator for the film.
He was on hand to collect the Emmy and called the experience “pretty exciting.”
Along with Beltran, production team members who attended the Emmy Award ceremony on Saturday included Director Dan Bruns of the Advanced Laboratory for Visual Anthropology at California State University, Chico; archaeologist Dr. John Parker, another of the producers, along with his wife, Cheyanne, who also is an archaeologist; Executive Producer Leslie Steidl, a retired associate state archaeologist with the California Department of Parks and Recreation; and Eduardo Guaracha, the superintendent of the California State Parks Northern Buttes District, which includes Lake County.
“It was an incredible experience to take part in the award ceremony, but even more amazing to be involved in a project that brought together archaeologists, Native Americans, pioneer families, volunteers, State Park representatives, geologists, and media specialists to shine a light on a piece of Lake County’s past,” said Dr. Parker.
The film debuted in 2015, but was nominated for an Emmy for its broadcast in 2016 on Sacramento-based KVIE 6, a Public Broadcasting System member television station.
“A Walk Through Time” was produced through a partnership of the Koi National and the California Department of Parks and Recreation.
Beltran said the film’s production took about two years, between weather and scheduling.
Parker said that during work on the film, the production team established friendships that will last a lifetime. “We learned from each other and many of us continue to work together to protect Lake County’s cultural legacy.”
“We didn’t anticipate winning,” said Beltran.
He said “A Walk Through Time” was just a little film that was the result of a lot of people working together using a small amount of money.
It was in competition with “Emperors' Treasures: from the National Palace Museum,” produced by KGO ABC 7, and “Jimmy Borges - A Life Story,” by KGMB 9, nominees that were backed by big television stations and had name recognition.
“We went there for the experience, and the next thing I know, they announced our film and we were all elated,” Beltran said.
On the stage, the group members were handed facsimile statuettes. Once offstage, they were directed to the interview area. After the award presentation they also exchanged the statuettes given to them during the ceremony for ones with their names on them, which they had to sign for, Beltran said.
“A Walk Through Time” features interviews with archaeologists including Parker and Greg White, geoarchaeologist, Jack Meyer, Koi Nation Chair Darin Beltran and Vice Chair Drake Beltran and retired State Parks Ranger Tom Nixon.
It discusses the Clear Lake Basin’s oak woodlands, riparian habitat, obsidian resources, flora and fauna, archaeology and history.
In particular, it describes the journey over thousands of years of the Koi Nation.
“They lived in Paradise,” Darin Beltran explained in the film.
White said that in most regions of California there are big breaks in the archaeological record that are indications of widespread movement and movement.
However, in the Clear Lake Basin, the evidence shows that there was gradual change among the peoples living there, which indicates the same people were living there throughout the entire 14,000 years of the archaeological record.
“This is unique. It’s unlike any other place in California,” White said.
He added, “We have every reason to believe that the Pomo were the first people. And they are still here.”
By the 1840s, however, the Koi Nation and other local Pomo tribes began to come under pressure from white settlers. Up to one half of the Koi Nation was forcibly resettled for use as slave labor to Gold Rush settlements and Mexico ranchos in areas in current-day Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties.
By the 1950s, they lost complete access to their ancestral lands.
In the 1970s, the effort began to preserve Anderson Marsh as a state park, an effort facilitated by the work of Parker, who has studied Lake County’s natural and human history for 45 years.
He said it was during the first 15 of those years that the uniqueness of Lake County’s prehistoric sites prompted him to lobby locally and in Sacramento to preserve 38 of those sites in Anderson Marsh as a Cultural Preserve State Park.
In 1982, the 1,300-acre Anderson Marsh State Historic Park was created.
“Since then, I have tried to share this amazing history with others, hoping to instill an appreciation that would help preserve those resources,” he said. “I think the documentary ‘A Walk Through Time’ is a giant step in that direction. The honor given to the film by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences brings the value of Lake County’s unique natural and cultural resources to a much wider audience. Those of us who live here should be proud of these resources and strive to protect them.”
The film also won the Governor’s Historic Preservation Award in 2015 and, that same year, was selected for the 40th annual American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco.
With an Emmy now in hand, Beltran and his colleagues are looking forward to more filmmaking endeavors.
“We’ve already started production on another one, without big money,” he said, adding that the Emmy gives them “a head start.”
This new short documentary, which also will be close to 30 minutes long, will focus on sacred site protection efforts here in Lake County, Beltran said.
Beltran said the Koi Nation and Habematolel Pomo of Upper Lake are working together to produce the film, which will look at the evolution of Ancestors 1, a consortium formed by the Koi Nation, Robinson Rancheria and the Habematolel Pomo.
Ancestors 1 in turn entered into a memorandum of understanding with the county of Lake in 2015 to increase protections for cultural resources, winning the Governor's Historic Preservation Award for 2016 for those efforts.
“It’s also going to cover our relationship with Sheriff Martin and how he’s been backing us for our sacred site protection and archaeological signs,” he said of the film.
Peter Coyote, the award-winning actor, director and documentary narrator, has agreed to narrate the new film, said Beltran.
The two men became friends after Beltran was asked to narrate “A Walk Through Time.” He reached out to Coyote, who in turn responded with advice and tips on narration and then agreed to work on the newest effort.
Beltran said he’s also gotten Gov. Jerry Brown to agree to make an appearance in the film. He said he met the governor at an event where Brown spoke about sacred site protection, one of his interests.
Chico State’s Advanced Laboratory for Visual Anthropology also has signed on once again to film this newest documentary, Beltran said.
The new film’s outline has just been completed, said Beltran.
He said their target for completion is a year.
“A Walk Through Time” can be seen in its entirety above.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
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