Jerry Boisclair

Jerry Boisclair

Jerry Boisclair was a Pala Band member of the Cupeño Indian Tribe born February 26, 1939, a son of Florence Boisclair. He served in the US Army from 1956 and joined the religion in 1971, the same year he was named director of the All Mission Indian Housing Authority and started a housing project. He was soon named Indian Community Affairs Officer for the San Diego County Human Resources Agency. He remarried in 1975 to Patricia Bohmfalk who had joined the religion in 1968. By May 1975 they had decided to pioneer and moved to Chile and then in 1982 to Botswana but returned to America the following year. By 1987 Jerry was elected as tribal chief of the Pala Band and served some years during which there were several disputes with neighboring organizations and Jerry was the voice of the positions of the Pala Band. Then in 1990 the Boisclairs decide to pioneer to Czechoslovakia and Jerry was elected to the first national assembly and on the Slovakia side when the nation split the Boisclairs served on the Romany community Spiritual Assembly in Medzev, Slovakia and were known to reach many of the region with the religion. However Patricia contracted Leukemia and the family returned to America where she died in 1996. Jerry then suffered two heart attacks and died 23 January 1997 and was buried on the Pala Indian cemetery.

Born and raised

Gerald “Jerry/Gerry” Boisclair, legally known as Joseph Ovila Francis Gerard Boisclair Jr., was born February 26, 1939, a son of Florence Boisclair, née Freeman, who was then about 29 years old, though the father was not listed on many forms.

The 1940 US Census marks the family as living at Pala, California, near San Diego, living on the Pala Indian Reservation.

The next known mention of Boisclair was in the summer of 1956 near the age of 18 when he enlisted with the US Army for the office of Public Information.

In 1968 later wife of Boisclair, Patricia, joined the Bahá'í Faith.

Boisclair was a Pasadena City College graduate and and used to work for a a newspaper selling advertising space.

1970s

By the summer of 1971 Boisclair was executive director of the All Mission Indian Housing Authority(AMIHA) when it received a Department of Housing and Urban Development grant planning to build 50 homes across Pala, Rincon, and Soboda Reservations. The institution still exists today. That summer Boisclair was also a member of the committee to build a campground near the San Luis Rey River including work of clearing and leveling the land for use. That was also the year he joined the Bahá'í Faith.

In his position as AMIHA director he commented at a public society meeting in the winter of 1971-2 that most housing programs were waisting money. A couple weeks later an interview with Boisclair noted he had joined AMIHA to try to address the problem of housing for the poor - that 75% of the Pala Band Indian community lived in below-standard housing: "I've known people who lived in old car hulks, houses they built with chicken wire and tar paper.” AMIHA began in January 1971 with a grant from the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs. AMIHA had a program to build homes and had a number of requirements: home value had to be improved by 15% by “sweat equity” of buyers, houses were leased back to AHIMA for 50 yrs who then managed the properties and relationships with rental cost at 25% of paychecks. The bond funding all the construction would have subsidies from the government and paid for from the sale of the houses. The land always belonged to the tribe - the houses were managed and leased separately. A few days later Boisclair was again interviewed as part of an article for the San Diego Union with comments "I believe we (Indians) have survived for a reason. At this point in time, it would be nice for everyone to stop and take a look at us. I like the values my ancestors left me. … (The land) cleans my soul when I need it. Who is to say what is the best use of land? The land is the only thing we have. It's very precious and we have very little of it." However by February 1972 San Diego County Human Resources Agency named Boisclair an Indian Community Affairs Officer and former AMIHA executive director. He lived on the Pala Band Reservation, and earned a salary up to $12k/yr through a federal program and there were plans to supplemented that salary to $14k/yr with local funds, which would equate to near $90k/yr in 2020. His father died 1972.

As a Bahá'í he served in various California/San Diego assemblies. Boisclair was a speaker May 5, 1973, at a Coronado, California, Bahá'í meeting. In August 1974 he was divorced from Irmgard M. Rossman. In March 1975 he married Patricia L. Bohmfalk. In Los Angeles in early 1975 Boisclair was among the speakers at a regional conference on promoting the religion to American Indians and was named a member of the Cupa tribe.

Pioneering

In later years the couple pioneered to several locations. In May 1975 the family pioneered to Chile and in 1982 they went to Botswana. The family returned in November 1983 to the States.

1980s

Boisclair had been tribal chairman of the Pala Band in the 1980s.

In 1987 the Catholic Salesian Order, via Father Mirko Flac, ran a Pala Rey Youth Camp and intended to find a sustainable source of funding by mining the usually dry stream bed in the area. However the land was sacred land for the Pala Indians. Boisclair was tribal chief by now, was the voice of opposition for the community, and had won support of the County Board of Supervisors though the Salesians had filed an appeal. The area includes a 2000 foot high “Indian Head Rock” known to attract Indian ceremonies for centuries and used the lowlands in ceremonies and disciplines to prepare for going to the "Rock". The Camp was founded in 1967 after a land donation. The Salesians claimed they had not learned the cite was of religious importance to the Pala Indians.

An access road to the Steward Lithia Tourmaline Mine neighboring the Pala Indian lands was blocked by the Pala Indians in March 1988. Boisclair commented the troubles started 5 months earlier when the new mine owners stopped paying fees for the tours crossing Indian land to access the mine and also the Indians began to object to the impact the tours were having on the land with trash and “doing strange things, things we don’t want to deal with” having attracted “people of metaphysical bent".

In July 1988 the county government was looking for locations for a landfill. The Pala Indians objected to one of the sites proposed with Boisclair as the tribal chief and voice of opposition because it was upstream from the reservation along with concerns over groundwater pollution and affects of earthquakes as a fault went through the land, and all reasonable access roads to the landfill would go through tribal land some of which also had religious significance.

The Iranian owned Imperial Granite Company sued the Pala Indians after a gate was welded shut on an access road in early 1987. The road itself dated back to 1933 as a WPA project. In the coverage in the newspaper there was also an update on the Steward Lithia Tourmaline Mine issue with claims of changing rates of cost disputed vs issues of litter and language of visitors to the mine. In 1990 the suit was largely processed in the Appeals Court. Mining for the quarry had begun in 1955 and in 1981 the Imperial Granite Company took over the mine in a lease. The Appeals Court found that the Trial Court should have dismissed all aspects of the trial involving the Indian owned parcels with the road but the case against other aspects could proceed.

1990s

Pioneering

The Boisclair family pioneered to Czechoslovakia in 1990 and served on the first national assembly of the country as well as local assemblies of Kosice and Medzev while they were there and reached many who joined the religion in eastern Slovakia. They founded the Romany community Spiritual Assembly in Medzev, Slovakia.

Last years

Patricia developed Leukemia, the family returned to America, and she died in 1996 and Jerry then suffered two heart attacks and died January 12 1997, near San Diego. He was buried on the Indian Reservation. The Universal House of Justice sent a message of February 4, 1997, offered prayers at the Bahá'í Shrines for the couple.

Descendants and later news

Tahirih Mia Boisclair was daughter of Irmgard and Jerry, born November 1, 1973. She was buried with Catholic funeral rites January 22, 2012, and had a sister named Jackie Boisclair Withers. Jacqueline Boisclair Withers and Tahirih had been disenrolled from the Pala Indians but the federal recommendation was they be reinstated.

A right-of-way for the Tourmaline King Mine Road was approved in early 2020.