Uploaded February 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
A RADICAL THREAD
A film by Jeanne C. Finley
bullfrogfilms.com/catalog/radt.html
Seeking an alternative to America’s consumer culture, hundreds of back-to-the-land families coalesced around Poet Laureate Gary Snyder and settled on California's San Juan Ridge in the late 1960s. Repeatedly threatened by corporate Goliaths intent on clear-cutting the Sierra forests, damming the Yuba River, and polluting the Ridge with open-pit gold mining, the community organized to defend their homesteads. Their success in overcoming these seemingly impossible obstacles has created national models of sustainability. Now, they are facing their greatest threat of all: climate-driven wildfires.
A RADICAL THREAD is set against the dramatic scars of 19th century hydraulic gold mining and told through the story of the the San Juan Ridge Tapestry Project, a 17-year collaborative project stitching an 83-foot tapestry that visualizes the Ridge’s story in twelve narrative embroidered panels.
Among those appearing in the film are Shelly Covert, spokesperson for the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe, who credits the community’s activism for helping set the stage for cultural reparations; tapestry illustrator Jennifer Rain Crosby, who demonstrates how its creation embodies the ethos of the community; and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder, whose prescient archival footage about the environmental costs of fossil fuels are combined with his faith in the Ridge’s continued vitality.
A RADICAL THREAD
A film by Jeanne C. Finley
bullfrogfilms.com/catalog/radt.html
Seeking an alternative to America’s consumer culture, hundreds of back-to-the-land families coalesced around Poet Laureate Gary Snyder and settled on California's San Juan Ridge in the late 1960s. Repeatedly threatened by corporate Goliaths intent on clear-cutting the Sierra forests, damming the Yuba River, and polluting the Ridge with open-pit gold mining, the community organized to defend their homesteads. Their success in overcoming these seemingly impossible obstacles has created national models of sustainability. Now, they are facing their greatest threat of all: climate-driven wildfires.
A RADICAL THREAD is set against the dramatic scars of 19th century hydraulic gold mining and told through the story of the the San Juan Ridge Tapestry Project, a 17-year collaborative project stitching an 83-foot tapestry that visualizes the Ridge’s story in twelve narrative embroidered panels.
Among those appearing in the film are Shelly Covert, spokesperson for the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe, who credits the community’s activism for helping set the stage for cultural reparations; tapestry illustrator Jennifer Rain Crosby, who demonstrates how its creation embodies the ethos of the community; and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder, whose prescient archival footage about the environmental costs of fossil fuels are combined with his faith in the Ridge’s continued vitality.
