Note: This is a hybrid event! We invite you to join us in-person at a new location, the Santa Cruz Elks Lodge, 150 Jewell Street Santa Cruz, 95060, or via Zoom (see below for Zoom registration form)!

Join SCAS for a presentation by Dr. Alan Leventhal on: “8,000 years at the Murphy Springs Site, Morgan Hill.”

DATE: Thursday, December 4, 2025

TIME: 7:30 – 8:30 PM (Pacific)

ZOOM REGISTRATION FORM: Meeting Registration – Zoom RSVP for Zoom by 6:30 PM on Thursday, November 6, 2025

In 1988, a construction supervisor encountered prehistoric groundstone and flaked stone tools at a housing development in the Murphy Springs area of Morgan Hill. This discovery led to a significant archaeological excavation project that was directed by San Jose State University lecturer and archaeologist, Dr. Alan Leventhal, performed in partnership with the City of Morgan Hill, the Morgan Hill Historical Society, the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, and local colleges. On December 4, Dr. Leventhal will present to the Santa Cruz Archaeological Society on the prehistory, history, and heritage of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, with a focus on the Murphy Springs Project (CA-SCL-671) and Bay Area prehistory. His talk will provide a fascinating look into the Native American culture that once flourished in the Morgan Hill area long before Euro-American contact.

Alan Leventhal is a trained archaeologist, anthropologist, and ethnohistorian with particular expertise in California archaeology and ethnography. For the past 45 years, he has worked with the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area on many of their ancestral heritage sites. He has also worked with the Amah-Mutsun and the Esselen Nation as a tribal ethnohistorian and archaeologist.