Connecting new generations to the land, the third annual Wakamatsu Farm Festival reached out to new audiences on May 18 by celebrating all the diverse groups that have populated the historic site.

Acquired by the American River Conservancy in 2010, the 272 acre Gold Hill Ranch is notable for the many groups who have called it home. In the past, the focus was on its use as the first permanent Japanese settlement in North America. However, according to Michael Dotson, Director of Development and Communications for the American River Conservancy, this year’s festival was designed to be different.

“Our vision is to educate people on the diverse cultures in the area to bring in a wider audience and connect them to the land,” he said.

In line with that goal, spread out over the ranch were four venues reflecting the four main groups that lived on and drew their sustenance from the land. Trooping from staging area to staging area on Saturday were an estimated 700 people who traveled by foot, in buggies and covered wagons, or in golf carts across the grass and oak-studded landscape to sample the culture of each group.

The venue pertaining to the earliest residents went to the Miwok and Nisenan Indians …

There’s a definite slump to Deena Court in the Deer Crossing subdivision of Placerville. The center of the street where the water mains are has sunk 8 inches. Of the five houses on the cul-de-sac, four of them have had to replace water regulators due to water pressure in excess of 100 pounds per square inch. One home also sustained damage due to flooding of water lines into the house. There are lumps and ruts in the asphalt, alligator cracks everywhere, loose gravel and failed pavement.

Placerville has many substandard streets, but Deena Court is in a subdivision that is only 23 years old. Deena Court resident Richard Evans has lived on the street since 2002 and he has been trying for a year to get the city to repair it.

“Teaching provides an unlimited opportunity to do good,” said Steve Seely. Seely, an Oak Ridge High School social science teacher, who was selected from over 90 educators to be the California League of High Schools’ 2013 State High School Educator of the Year. “I see these kinds of awards as a way to recognize the teaching profession, not just individuals,” said Seely. “Teaching is a noble profession and I am surrounded by gifted people.”

Doing good by helping kids develop the skills to master their lives is the focus of Seely’s 25 years of teaching. In the speech before the CLHS selection committee Seely recounted his first days as a new teacher: “I learned that kids are not just kids, they are people. People first. Then students. Those students taught me that to think of them as any less was likely to diminish the power to matter in their lives …It’s an old cliche, but apt I think: They don’t care how much you know unless they know how much you care.”