HUBBELL TRADING POST NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE

"WHEN I COME TO WORK, it takes me back in time,” Kathy Tabaha says. As a girl, the park ranger came with her mother to sell rugs, just as Tabaha’s great-grandmother had. Tabaha’s grandparents hauled food for Hubbell sheepherders, and her great-grandfather was a Hubbell freighter; John Lorenzo Hubbell named him Lame Jim after a wagon accident left him with a limp. Tabaha’s grandmother had a name for Hubbell: Naakaii Sání, or “Old Mexican.” Now, Tabaha cares for the trading post’s museum collection, which includes everything from archaeological artifacts and farm implements to artwork and oral histories, which Tabaha collects and transcribes. Trading continues, as it has for more than 100 years. “That makes it so special and so unique,” Tabaha says. Only today, the trader is Navajo. Tabaha expects to retire from Hubbell, as her uncle and cousin have. And with nearly 30 years at the trading post, she also has become part of its history.