Craig Bates

Craig Bates worked for the National Park Service for more than 30 years, and was a nationally-recognized expert in the history and culture of the Pauite, Miwok, and other native peoples of the Yosemite area. Born in 1952 in Oakland, California, and raised in the Northern California communities of Hayward and Pleasanton, Bates studied at Columbia College before joining the National Park Service in 1973 as a park technician with the Indian Cultural Program at Yosemite National Park. Bates spent his entire career at Yosemite, moving on to become Indian Cultural Specialist, Assistant Curator, and Curator of Ethnography. He retired from Yosemite in 2006. In addition to working on ethnographic projects, museum collections, exhibits, interpretive programs, craft presentations, and educational programs at Yosemite, Bates became a noted scholar and prolific author. He specialized in Native American basketry, but also conducted research and wrote widely on Indian languages, shamanism, genealogy of Northern California tribes, crafts, dance, mythologies, and legends. He published more than 100 articles and monographs, and wrote or contributed to many books on the history, languages, art, and material culture of Native Americans in the Western United States. Bates' work attracted some criticism in the 1990s and early 2000s from members or supporters of the Pauites, who claimed that Bates favored self-professed Miwoks who were seeking Federal recognition. Bates' reputation in the scholarly community, however, remained strong. He received grants from the Lanon Foundation and others to carry out studies or conduct crafts workshops, he participated as a member of a cultural group that traveled to Russia, and he served as consultant to various museums on exhibits, acquisitions, and documentation.