report. Many people observed that what were called "Carib" people had skin of various hues that likely reflected mixed ancestry, ranging from dark brown to lighter shades of brown, resulting in a Virgin Islands Creole, to which she may have belonged. Other sources said the mother Marie Anne Spark (as she was also known) was a mixed-race woman of African and Spanish heritage, thought to have been born in Cuba. In census records, Marie Anne Spark was classified as a free Carib Indian, but few Carib survived into the late 18th century, according to Gary Palgon's biography of Leidesdorff. Other sources document tens of thousands of Caribs, most of mixed heritage, living in the Windwards and Trinidad at the time of Leidesdorff's birth. Together the accounts describe Spark as a light-skinned woman of mixed-race ancestry, yet classified as black by the 1850s California Court System, where blacks were restricted from testifying in court. According to Sue Bailey Thurman, "With the name of William Alexander Leidesdorff, we begin the documentary history of pioneers of Negro origin in California." Today, William Alexander Leidesdorff, Jr. is recognized as the "African Founding Father of California", as noted by the California State Legislature. 2011 is the United Nations International Year for People of African Descent. As an infant, William Leidesdorff, Jr. was baptized as a Lutheran, as all the Leidesdorff children were, the adopted faith which his father and many other people of Jewish ancestry in Europe assumed to avoid conflict. In 1837 Leidesdorff, Sr. officially "adopted" all four of his own children from Anne Marie Sparks to give them legal standing by Danish Law. Career Afterward, he migrated to New Orleans, where he operated as a master of shipping vessels after he was naturalized as a United States citizen. He held posts with firms associated with his father or perhaps his mentors. Ship manifest documents show Leidesdorff's working as Ship Captain and/or Master, 1834–1840, out of the Port of New Orleans. William Alexander Leidesdorff, Jr. was thought the last black ship captain in Louisiana after strict enforcement of the Negro Seamen Acts began at the Port of New Orleans. Leidesdorff traveled to New York to become the Master of the schooner Julia Ann that sailed from New York to Yerba Buena (later San Francisco) in Alta California, then part of Mexico, in 1841. His route was via Panama, St. Croix, Brazil, Chile, the Sandwich