Statue of Indian Is Unveiled on Knoll

May 5, 1940: The 14-foot figure of an American Indian was unveiled on a rocky ledge overlooking Agoura. A Polish nobleman created the sculpture as a tribute to the Native Americans who first inhabited the Santa Monica Mountains. “The picturesque program took place on the crest of the knoll where Count Jean de Strelecki fashioned the statue with the help of townspeople,” The Times said.

But the statue of the stern-faced warrior, clad in a robe and feathered headdress, did not bear much resemblance to the Chumash, who hunted and gathered seeds in local coastal mountains for hundreds of years. Strelecki, it turns out, modeled the work on a Seminole from the East Coast. Apparently, it was an honest mistake. He had heard about a nearby resort called Seminole Hot Springs and thought that Seminoles came from the area.