Alcatraz Island’s Indigenous Thanksgiving Sunrise Gathering Has Its 50th Anniversary Thursday

The article was originally published on https://sfist.com/2025/11/25/alcatraz-islands-indigenous-thanksgiving-sunrise-gathering-has-its-50th-anniversary-thursday/It was 50 years ago this Thursday that San Francisco’s own annual ‘Unthanksgiving’ started on Alcatraz Island, and as always, this year’s sunrise ceremony will be streaming online if you can’t make it to Alcatraz at 6 am. We are reminded that this is Yelamu, Ohlone Territory on Thanksgiving morning when Alcatraz Island is the site of this Thursday’s 50th anniversary Indigenous Thanksgiving Sunrise Gathering. The first of these ceremonies was exactly 50 years ago Thursday, on Thanksgiving Day 1975 (which also happened to be on November 27 that year, too). The Indigenous Thanksgiving Sunrise Gathering was meant as a counter-celebrat