Reveals the life story of Native American (Ohlone/Esselen) Ella Rodriguez, who, in her seventies, still resents that she was taken from her rural California home at age thirteen and sent to an Indian boarding school. After running away from the school and becoming ensnared in the juvenile justice system, she was forced into marriage by a parole officer at eighteen, then labored as a migrant worker. In the 1970s, when Ella was 44, she protested for weeks to stop the destruction of a Native-American cemetery site and dedicated her life to preserving her heritage.