Carolyn
”
Carrie
”
Higuera, an Amah Mutsun Native American and San Juan Bautista
native, died Sunday, Nov. 17, 2002 at her home in Pacific Grove.
She was 102.
Carolyn “Carrie” Higuera died Sunday, Nov. 17, 2002 at her home in Pacific Grove. She was 102.
Mrs. Higuera was born in San Juan Bautista on Aug. 8, 1900 into the Amah Mutsun Native American tribe, from which she acquired a strong family spirit. Her grandmother, Ascencion Solorsano de Cervantes, was the last member of the local tribe to speak the Mutsun language.
She attended school at Mission San Juan Bautista and moved with her family, following the Santa Clara County grape crop. When she was 9, her father died unexpectedly, leaving her mother, Claudia, to care for five children. Grandmother Ascencion adopted the youngest and the others were raised by the Mutsun tribe “in community.”
When she was 16 she married Jose Higuera, a Mutsun, and the couple moved to Gilroy, then to Monterey during the Depression, where he worked as a butcher and she in the fish canneries on Cannery Row. Shortly after they bought a home in Pacific Grove in 1945, Mr. Higuera was killed in an auto accident and Mrs. Higuera worked as a housekeeper and in food service at hotels in Monterey to keep the home and support her four children.
She was a member of St. Angela Catholic Church in Pacific Grove and enjoyed gardening.
More than 150 people attended a celebration of her 102nd birthday last summer in Pacific Grove.
She is survived by her sons, Charlie Higuera of Pacific Grove and Lawrence Valdez of Southern California; her brother, Vince Corona of San Jose; her sister, Antonia Ketchum of Gilroy; 16 grandchildren, 16 great-grandchildren, seven great-great grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.
In addition to her husband, she was preceded in death by her children, Clarence and Joe Higuera and Dolores Pratt; and her brothers and sisters, Tony, Santos, Maggie and Sally Corona.
Visitation will be today at 6 p.m. at St. Angela Catholic Church, 146 8th St. in Pacific Grove, followed by a vigil service at 7 p.m. A Mass of the Resurrection will be celebrated Thursday at 10 a.m. at the church. Arrangements are under the direction of The Paul Mortuary in Pacific Grove.
Memorials are preferred to the Hospice Foundation, P.O. Box 1798, Monterey CA 93942.
