Elsie Allen

Elsie Comanche Allen (September 22, 1899 – December 31, 1990) was a Native American Pomo basket weaver from the Cloverdale Rancheria of Pomo Indians of California in Northern California. She is notable for historically categorizing and teaching Californian Indian basket patterns and techniques, as well as for sustaining traditional Pomo basketry as an art form.

Background Elsie Comanche Allen was born on September 22, 1899, near Santa Rosa, California. Her parents, George and Annie Comanche As a child, Allen was raised by her grandmother near the Pomo village of Cloverdale, located north of Lake Mendocino in northern California. At that time, she spoke only the Pomo language. After her father died in 1907 when she was eight, her mother remarried and moved the family to Hopland. She endured additional unpleasant experiences and engaged in several activities that seemed meaningless to her, which contributed to her lack of motivation to learn. Consequently, she attended the boarding school for less than a year before deciding to transfer to a day school near Hopland, where she felt more comfortable. As she continued her education at the day school, Allen became proficient in English. These clubs offered scholarships, and Allen contributed to their funding by making and selling baskets.

In May 1942, eleven-year-old Marceline Allen, a Pomo girl, was ordered to move to a balcony section at the State Theater in Ukiah, California, solely because she was Native American. Marceline's mother filed a discrimination lawsuit, Marceline Allen vs. the State Theater, seeking $1,000 in damages. This lawsuit was financially supported by the Pomo Mothers Club, in which Elsie Allen and her mother, Anne Burke, were active members. Eventually, the case was settled out of court, with the theater agreeing to pay a penalty and change its discriminatory practices. This victory compelled many local businesses to also end their blatant discrimination against Indian people.

In the 1970s, the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) planned the Warm Spring Dam and Lake Sonoma in Northern Sonoma County to reduce flooding on vineyard properties. The construction of the dam presented a serious threat to the cultural sites and ancestral villages of the Makahmo and Mahilakawna Pomo tribes, as well as to locations where materials like sedge, used in traditional basket-making, were gathered. The Native American Advisory Committee for the Warm Springs Cultural Resources Study was formed to work with archaeologists, historians, linguists, and botanists to assess the cultural impact of the dam's construction. The committee, which included Allen and other prominent basket weavers such as Mabel McKay, Lucy Smith, and Laura Somersal, documented the history of the Makahmo and Mahilakawna Pomo. Allen continued this Pomo tradition of female leadership. She addressed issues affecting women As a child, Allen learned to gather plants for basket weaving by observing her mother and grandmother.

Co-founded by Allen and her mother, along with other weavers, With Billy, Allen felt she had found an apprentice who would carry on the basket weaving tradition and teach it to others.

Legacy Allen died on December 31, 1990, at the age of 91. Allen is the subject of several books, including Dot Brovarney, Susan Billy, and Suzanne Abel-Vidor's 2005 Remember Your Relations: Elsie Allen Baskets, Family, And Friends and Sandra J. Metzler's 1996 A promise kept: Basketry of the Pomo and the Elsie Allen basket collection.

Elsie Allen High School in Santa Rosa, California, is named for her.