Thank you for inviting Loyola Marymount University tonight!
Hello! My Name is
Lisa Fimiani, and I am the Drollinger Environmental Fellow in the Center for Urban Resilience (CURes) at the Westchester Campus of Loyola Marymount University, located in Los Angeles
What does Loyola Marymount University (LMU) offer for you?
Downloadable Report:
What does Loyola Marymount University (LMU) offer for you?
Loyola Marymount University is home to 20 interdisciplinary research centers and institutes, and 7 Colleges and Schools
Colleges and Schools:
Centers and Institutes:
The Center I work at!
What does Loyola Marymount University (LMU) offer for you?
Our Indigenous Experiences Throughout the Years
Grateful!
1987 - 2023
LMU Land Acknowledgement
As part of Loyola Marymount University's recognition of our history, location, and relationship to the indigenous communities in Los Angeles, we acknowledge the Tongva peoples as the traditional land caretakers of Tovaangar (the Los Angeles basin and southern Channel Islands) and the presence of LMU on this traditional, ancestral, and unceded land. We are grateful to have the opportunity to live, study, create, and be in this place.
Tongva Monument
By Robert Dorame
Location:
Ballona Discovery Park
13110 Bluff Creek Drive
Playa Vista, CA 90094
13110 Bluff Creek Drive
Playa Vista, CA 90094
Interpretive Panels showing
the history of the area, below
Loyola Marymount University
Entrance to the Park
Lisa Fimiani from LMU teaching about Native Plants
Garden Programs
Ballona Discovery Park (Playa Vista)
13110 Bluff Creek Drive, CA 90094
(310) 306-5994
Check the Friends’ website for Gardening Club, Classes, and Workshops
Learn how to recognize and take care of native
plants in a demonstration garden. Tasks include:
weeding, trimming, planting, mulching, watering
Garden
Club
Neighborhood Wellness begins here!
Students using Journals to record their experiences in the Park
Interpretive Panel in Madrona Marsh Nature Center
Visiting the Ki-ish... (aka mah-mah-har-ke(ch)
The Story of
Juana Maria
LMU students smelling California Sagebrush
Swimmer Medicinal Garden
Plants and Herbs used by the Native American tribes of Southern California: the Chumash, the Tongva, and the Cahuilla are featured in a unique collection of some of the most important and common medicinal plants of Southern California. The plants are presented clearly with color coded signs for identification, including descriptions of how they were used by tribal healers-called ‘shamans’-for thousands of years. This garden is a tribute to David Swimmer, by his brother Mike Swimmer.
Swimmer Medicinal Plant Garden in Ballona Discovery Park
Location:
Ballona Discovery Park
13110 Bluff Creek Drive
Playa Vista, CA 90094
Dear Visitor,
The plants displayed here are representative of the hundreds of plants used by local Native American tribes for medicinal purposes. These plants were discovered and identified over thousands of years of experimentation and were deemed by tribal healers to be effective in treating various ailments. The main tribes considered here are the Tongva, in the Los Angeles area, the Chumash along the coast, and the Cahuilla in the desert areas. Many of these plants are still used by tribal members to treat numerous ailments.
Various parts of the plants were harvested and processed into teas, or poultices, or salves. A tribal healer-called a 'shaman'- administered the treatments, which often included sacred rituals, dreams, and healing songs. Many of these rituals have been lost to our modern way of life.
A Garden of Medicinal Plants used by Native Americans
From Signage in the Swimmer Medicinal Plant Garden, located in Ballona Discovery Park
LMU students learning
about Medicinal Plants
2019: Osprey Pole Goes Up at LMU!
View from Ballona Discovery Park
LMU Honoring our Native American Ancestors
Dedication of our osprey pole and platform made possible by Susan and Dan Gottlieb,
Southern California Edison & The Center for Urban Resilience
SPECIAL BLESSINGS BY:
Robert Dorame
Tribal Chairman,
Gabrielino Tongva Indians
Fr. Randall Roche, S.J.,
Director,
Center for Ignatian Spirituality
Loyola Marymount University
Tuesday, Sept. 17,
2019
Osprey spotted on nest platform by LMU Facilities Management Team shortly after being installed in 2019
Now we wait!
Poem blessing written and read by Robert Dorame at Dedication
https://smbasblog.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/the-gabrielinos_thomson.pdf
Mary was one of the original Board Members of the Friends of Ballona Wetlands who brought native Dune plants back by hand-watering them with buckets, volunteers in the early days (late 70s/80s/90s/20s)
“Wiyot’s Children” by Mary Leighton Thomson. Prints are available on
the Friends Website: http://www.ballonafriends.org/history.html
Justin Farmer, Ipay, Teaches Girl Scouts how to Basket Weave
in the sacred village of Guaspet (FKA Sa Angna), Ballona Wetlands
September 11, 2010
Ruth Lansford, Founder of the Friends of Ballona Wetlands and Robert Dorame, Most Likely Descendant of the Gabrielino Tongva Indians in 2018
10 Years Earlier:
https://www.dailybreeze.com/2008/02/10/finding-a-resting-place-for-the-gabrieleno-tongva-ancestors/
Ballona is a Sacred Site
The Tongva (their name means “People of the Earth”) are thought to have first settled what’s now the Los Angeles area between 9,000 and 2,500 years ago
Here are two of the sacred Tongva plants that
you can find in the Ballona Watershed
Sacred Datura
Datura wrighti
White Sage
Salvia apiana
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datura_wrightii#/media/File:Datura_wrightii_flower2.jpg
http://southwestdesertflora.com/WebsiteFolders/All_Species/Solanaceae/Datura%20wrightii,%20Western%20Jimson%20Weed.html
LMU Bellarmine Native Lands Sept 2019
https://bellarminenews.lmu.edu/on-native-lands-indigenous-histories-environmental-justice-and-contemporary-challenges/
LMU Native American and Indigenous Community
New Website: https://resources.lmu.edu/dei/indigenous/
LMU Native American and Indigenous Community
LMU Native American and Indigenous Community
Reconnecting to Redo an Exhibit 2023
Ballona Discovery Park Migration Celebration May 20, 2023
Loyola Marymount University and�Friends of Ballona Wetlands Programs!
We have been actively engaged in saving and restoring the Ballona Wetlands for over 40 years!
Your GO-TO Organizations
Center for Urban Resilience (CURes)�https://academics.lmu.edu/cures/partners/ballonadiscoverypark/��Friends of Ballona Wetlands �https://www.ballonafriends.org/ballona-discovery-park
Ballona Discovery Park
Located at: 13110 Bluff Creek Drive,
(off Lincoln Boulevard) Playa Vista, CA 90094
Online Information about
Thank you for inviting Loyola Marymount University tonight!
Please contact me directly by email
with any questions!
Lisa Fimiani
Drollinger Environmental Fellow
The Park is at the Trailhead of the Ballona Wetlands, the gateway to the last remaining wetland in LA County!