The Apache

IN EAST-CENTRAL ARIZONA lies a rugged mountainous area roughly a hundred miles square constituting the San Carlos and Fort Apache Indian reservation. The Black River, a mountain stream, running east to west cuts the rectangle midway and forms a boundary between the two.

The Apache call themselves "nde" meaning "the people." Apache is believed a corruption of a Zuni word meaning enemy. The Apache language, like the Navajo to which it is similar, is classified as Athapascan. In a few large communities on the San Carlos reservation live descendants of the original San Carlos group, the Tontos, the Yavapai, and also portions of the White Mountain bands whose former homes were north of the Black River. The Arizona Apache population now numbers 6,000.

The country is not rich in resources other than grazing land. Pine timber is found on the highlands, not enough for commercial development, but enough to furnish lumber for the building of Indian houses. The mines as fast as they were discovered were chipped away from the originally much larger reservation and turned over to whites.

The original inhabitants of the region live on the Fort Apache reservation in about twenty scattered groups. They are White Mountain, and Cibecue. Their country is mountainous, with forests of enormous pine, piñon, and juniper, nearly 6,000 acres of tillable land, nearly a million acres of grazing land, and undeveloped mineral resources of coal, asbestos and iron; a livelihood for generations to come.

The Apache house, or wickiup, was in the early days built by the woman alone; nowadays perhaps with the help of her men. To build a wickiup a circle of poles, juniper, mesquite, pine, whatever grows close by, is set a few inches into the ground. This circle is about twelve feet in diameter and ten feet high. The tops are drawn together and securely lashed, completing a domed framework. This is covered with long grass or bundles of straw and over all is lashed sheets of canvas. In the north they build a little vestibule of planks with a good tight door. At San Carlos a burlap curtain is enough. The fire is built on the ground a little toward the door from the middle of thewickiup and some of the smoke goes out through the peak of the roof; the rest stays and gets in the eyes. The wickiup is neither wind nor waterproof; however, it takes but a short time to build and can be burned or abandoned without regret. The wickiup dweller feels himself a freer man than the householder. Some contain modern beds, but most of the tribe spread quilts and blankets on the floor and sleep. During the day the bedding is rolled up and piled against the walls of the wickiup or spread on the bushes.

Back in the seventies the Apache women adopted a style of white women's dress that involves a good sized investment and a huge amount of labor to produce. Of about eighteen yards of the brightest sateen or percale obtainable, either print or plain color, orange, scarlet. green, blue or purple, she makes a great full skirt, with a deep flounce and several rows of ornamental braid. Her blouse hangs to the hips from a smooth yoke, high necked, full sleeved, with more braiding and never belted. Her long well-kept hair hangs free; she dosn't pinch her feet into tight shoes, quite possibly she wears buckskin moccasins. If a widow she must wear a cape-perhaps only a generous square of the same material as her dress. Or if a young mother she will wear on her back her bright eyed baby securely sewed into a canopied baby-board, the strap crossing her forehead and the weight falling where it is most easily carried.

The men wear blue cotton shirts and blue denim pants for every day, but gorgeous creations, in all known colors, for dress up. The brightest satin shirts are the climax to date. The cowboy Stetson is standard. A few old men wear long hair bound with a bright silk scarf.

Cooking is done over the open fire and utensils are metal ware obtained from the trader's store. Almost every family owns a Dutch oven. These are ideal for cooking beans, meat and corn bread. When the family eats, a canvas is spread on the floor and they sit around the fire and hold their plates on the lap. The food is dipped from the cooking vessels on the fire. Those who do not use individual plates eat fromthe common dish, sometimes using their fingers and sometimes spoons.

In addition to their cultivated crops the Apache gather a variety of wild plants. They would still do very well if all the modern food supplies were cut off except flour, sugar and perhaps coffee, provided that they could still kill a cow now and then. Tea is made of sycamore bark and the squawberry bush furnishes a medicinal drink and material for baskets. The upper reaches of the reservation are still scoured for walnuts, acorns, piñon nuts and juniper berries. There are wild potatoes, wild onions, and the yucca fruit called "wild bananas." The mesquite and other wild beans are gathered, and there is mescal. The mescal is one of several varieties of agave, the young flower stalk when it is just beginning to shoot up makes a fine fresh food. The heart of the mescal is cooked twenty-four hours or longer in a pit dug in the ground. A favorite native dish of the Apache is made of sliced mescal heart with a generous sprinkling of chopped wild walnuts, Beef is generally roasted or boiled and is frequently used in a stew with vegetables and with corn. There are many ways of preparing corn, the most common are whole ears of green corn roasted with the husks on in a bed of hot embers, and corn ground into coarse meal on the grinding stone, is mixed with water to make a stiff batter poured into a Dutch oven containing a small amount of hot fat and quickly browned on both sides. The top is then placed on the oven and the corn bread baked over a slow fire.

Most of the meat is used while fresh, but often one sees a line of "jerky." The meat is cut in long strips and hung on a wire in the sun to dry. The drying process preserves it, and can be kept indefinitely. When it is to be eaten it is placed in a frying pan over a bed of coals, pounded with a pestle, and fried with hominy, chili, or onions.

The tortilla is the most popular form of bread. It is made of either corn meal or white flour and the grain is ground on the grinding stone. Acorns are also ground in the same manner and made into a bread.

Some of the women are excellent basket makers. Their basketry is of two techniques, twined and coiled. Twined ware is made of squawberry, sumac, and mulberry while coiled ware is almost exclusively of willow and cottonwood with designs in black from the martynia or devil's claw. Yucca also a naturally colored fiber, is used in coiled ware. Painted and dyed materials are frequently used for twined ware, but not on coiled work. The principal tools are the knife and awl. Burden baskets and water jars are twined. In twined weaving, two or more active elements pass over one or two passive elements, the active going before and behind the stiff warp element, and over and under each other alternately so that they twine about the warp and at the same time about one another.

DRAWINGS FOR ARIZONA HIGHWAYS BY ROSS SANTEE

makers. Their basketry is of two techniques, twined and coiled. Twined ware is made of squawberry, sumac, and mulberry while coiled ware is almost exclusively of willow and cottonwood with designs in black from the martynia or devil's claw. Yucca also a naturally colored fiber, is used in coiled ware. Painted and dyed materials are frequently used for twined ware, but not on coiled work. The principal tools are the knife and awl. Burden baskets and water jars are twined. In twined weaving, two or more active elements pass over one or two passive elements, the active going before and behind the stiff warp element, and over and under each other alternately so that they twine about the warp and at the same time about one another.

In constructing trays, bowls, baskets and other flat objects the close coiling technique is used. Practically all the coiling on shallow flat objects is done in an anti-clockwise direction. However, some few examples of clockwise spirals have been found.

The direction of coiling for jars is from right to left, but appears to be just the opposite and clockwise. The reason for this is these shapes are worked at from the outside, with the point of sewing on the curve next to the worker instead of away from her, as is the case with bowl forms, which are sewed from the inside.

Some of the most skillful weavers model a beautiful carrying basket the size and shape of a large waste paper basket and finished with fringe and thongs of buckskin. Occasionally colored beads are strung on the thongs.

Many of the ornamental designs are found on all the different Apache shapes. Burden baskets are generally the most simply decorated and no elements seem to be exclusively confined to them. They are decorated with checkwork, diamonds, rows of triangles and the horizontal zigzag. On the coiled ware angular patterns prevail. These are particularly diamonds, checkerwork, triangles, and diagonal, vertical or horizontal lines. Other designs are step figures, crosses, small groups of squares, a few plant forms, arrangements of long narrow horizontal blocks, generally the light and dark alternating, and human and animal representations.

Lattice work does not occur in Apache basketry but is occasionally represented on the bottom of cradle boards. These oval frames have wooden slats running crosswise lashed to them. The baby carriers have a hood of wicker. The rods forming the band are held in place by single rows of twined string or thongs placed here and there. A fringe of buckskin strung with colored beads usually hangs from the hood. The baby is laced on the cradle board with strings of buckskin which are fastened to the frame. It is difficult to procure a carrier which has been used. There is a belief that harm comes to the child if anything happens to its cradle, so when a baby is too large to be tied to its cradle board, the mother usually disposes of it.

A few toys are made, rag dolls in baby carrying baskets, bows and arrows, and some bone articles. Bead work was not a native craft of the Western Apache women, but some is done here now. The Apache is said to be the only tribe using a stringed instrument. The Apache fiddle has only one or two strings, the body is shorter than that of the violin and is cylindrical in shape, one end is pressed against the player's abdomen when it is played. The bow is short with a curved stick.

In former times the Apache were skilled dressers of buckskin; the craft has practically disappeared with the chase itself. Some skins are still dressed, from them moccasins are made. To make a pair of moccasins the one to be fitted stands erect on a piece of rawhide while some member of his family traces with a sharp knife the outlines of the sole of his foot upon the rawhide. The top or legging is made of soft buckskin, sewed to the foot and reaches almost to the knees. The rawhide sole is prolonged beyond the great toe, and turns upward in a shield which protects from cactus and stones.

In the food supply meat, corn, beans and pumpkins, are staple. Garden vegetables are fairly plentiful and are gaining popularity, particularly those easy to store. But the Apache are first and foremost cattle raisers, and their farming activities are somewhat limited. Meat was formerly obtained by hunting, but today it is from the fine herds of range cattle. In recent times of cash payments for labor, the diet has been expanded to include most of the trade's offerings.

The economic unit is the family group consisting of grandparents, married daughters, and their husbands, unmarried sons, and their daughters' children. Each family is bound together by certain rights and duties. They live in large family groups and the home of the mother is the family center.

Many activities of the Apaches require the cooperation of several men in a family group. clearing the land, gathering the crops and the annual roundup of the cattle. In the course of time since the establishment of the reservations the Apache has become a good cowman. On the San Carlos reservation 550 Indian cattle men own over 25,000 cattle valued at $1,000,000. The tribal herd of 3,500 remains as a sort of nursery, breeding fine cattle which are issued to individual Indians at cost. Almost 700 families have an average income of $731. On the Fort Apache reservation 400 Indians own nearly 20,000 head of cattle valued at over $600,000. The tribe has an annual average income of $500 per family.

The Apache Indians for many years considered the scourge of the Southwest-today are a settled industrious people looking after their affairs as well as their white neighbors.

James B. Kitch, Superintendent of the San Carlos agency said, "I do not know of any legislation passed by Congress in my twenty-four years of service which has been of such immediate, material benefit and contained greater possibilities of future opportunity than the Indian Reorganization Act." It has very satisfactorily fitted in with the organization plans of the Apaches, as it is in a sense the culmination of their work for the past ten years, giving them legal assurance and guarantee of their methods of organization which had been gradually taking form during the previous decade.

The San Carlos reservation has not been allotted, and due to the peculiar topographical conditions of the reservation with its small patches of ground suitable for farming and its scattered watering places in the grazing areas, individual allotments would never be practical. Indian organization, or participation in tribal and community interests, was started as far back as 1924 in the development of the resources of tribal and individual possibilities, which consisted of cattle interests. small gardens, and a home security or social system.

Revoking white permittee grants and using this grazing land themselves, was the first step in their development, industrially. Up until 1932 this was carried on by tribal or open meetings, and as their cattle increased, the permit holdings of white cattle concerns were occupied by the Indians. These acquisitions were based both on actual acreage requirement and the possibilty of Indian organization utilization. This plan gradually worked out from a community operation to smaller clan or family group organizations.With the growth of herds there were additional land requirements and with the organization of a Business Council in May, 1932, the Council would consider the possibility of clan organization on a certain permittee range with the Indian clan groups as interested, giving consideration to former family land occupation. Then this area, which had been previously developed as a separate range by fencing and water development, would be taken over under clan or group management with tribal recommendation. The success of this plan and assistance of the Business Council in representing tribal sanction to these moves is evidenced in the fact that there are now nine cattle groups.

The Council saw also the need for methods of self-support of an industrial program of this size. Through the efforts of the Business Council a self-supporting program was inaugurated, meetings were held by the different groups, and a grazing fee of $5.00 per head on all cattle sold established. This has permitted these people to maintain one of the largest cattle ownerships in the Indian service, as a self-supporting economic problems with no required assistance from tribal or federal funds. The selection of men who work in the roundups without pay, the selection of those who would receive reimbursable heifers from tribal funds, and conferring with the superintendent concerning the selection of new employees, was also handled by the Tribal Council. This method of procedure was a splendid background for the responsibilities finally placed upon the tribe by the Reorganization Act. They agreed to meet and discuss their problems with visiting or supervising officials, and at times setting aside required time at their meetings to hear local departments in the matter of staff meetings with the Tribal Council. This permitted a complete understanding between the Tribal Council and the heads of the different departments within the jurisdiction. With the approval of the Reorganization Act, this Council was prepared, and having been previously authorized by the Secretary of Interior to act pro tem until such a time as a Business Council could be elected under the Constitution, to render valuable assistance to the tribe in their final and complete organization. To their ability to understand the fundamentals of self-government by actual practice can be attributed the almost unanimous acceptance of the Reorganization Act itself, followed by an equally favorable vote on their Constitution. This was followed by acceptance, with some amendments as applying particularly to this tribe, of the Law and Order Regulation as approved by the Secretary of the Interior November 27, 1935, and the immediate functioning of the reservation under these new regulations. The Indian Court, working with the Indian Council claim they had been using practically these same regulations for several years, which resulted in little or no confusion in the change-over to an approved and regulated method of court procedure. The San Carlos Apache took over the responsibility and duties of this splendid piece of legislation with little change in their economic or social standards and procedure. The results have been very encouraging.

The Apache woman works hard, she has many duties. Besides her house work she does most of the planting, irrigating, cultivating, and gathering the crops. She also gathers the wood. These women can carry an astonishing load of wood in a shawl or canvas on their backs.

The Apache, from the first contact with the white man, have been divided into small groups that could quickly be organized for war or the chase. These would be the group of families living as neighbors near a spring or where there was a strip of farm land. Each local group had a chief chosen for special achievements and popularity. Local groups again fell into family groups of a half dozen or more closely related households, each having a headman, and it was this group which assumed the most importance when the tribe settled down to Americanized life under the direction of the white man.

Law infractions are dealt with by native judges and court order kept by native police. Court procedure is similar to the white man's.

All these offices are political rather than religious.

A clan system still operates cutting across the group and band. Children are born into the clan of the mother and marriage within the clan is forbidden. In this clan system all cousins are called brothers and sisters. Marriage between cousins is still tabu, and looked upon with as much horror as a brother-and-sister alliance would be by whites.

Some of the old methods of training the young have disappeared due to the fact that children enter school at an early age. However, mothers and daughters are very close together, they attend all tribal dances and celebrations, go out food gathering, and work side by side around the wickiup. To carry on tradition, the medicine man will give instructions to the younger men whenever they present themselves and request it. A youth brings a gift of pierced blue stone with an eagle feather through it. Then night after night until the young man has learned, the rhythmic beat of drums can be heard at the medicine man's wickiup. So the songs and dances are perpetuated and unwritten ceremonials are preserved through the ages.

When death occurs in a wickiup it is burned, also the personal belongings of the deceased and his name never spoken again. If the family lives in a house they move out for a period of six months or longer. Death is regarded with horror, the victim has lost in the battle with evil, however, there is not the extreme fear of a corpse felt by the Navajo.

When girls arrive at the age of puberty an elaborate ceremony is held, after which they are, of course, theoretically ready for marriage. A girl may, however, in these days return to school and it may be several years before she marries. In the old days, after a young man had made his choice, it was necessary for him to get the consent of his people. He must then make known his intentions to the girl's parents. Generally his father or uncle would do the honors for him, after which came the real proposal. The custom was offering presents to her and her family. As his wealth was counted chiefly in horses and dressed buckskin, in the night he would take one, two or more animals and tie them near the girl's wickiup. One horse was considered a poor offering.

but if they were left uncared for, it was plain he was respected.

When a suitor had been accepted a feast and celebration that lasted three days followed. During this time the betrothed couple seldom saw or spoke to each other.

Formerly when a young couple married they built their wickiup near that of the wife's mother, now it appears they live with which ever group is most convenient. "Avoidance" is the term applied to the strict fixed formality that a son-in-law should never look upon or speak to his mother-in-law. This is to be regarded as an expression of respect.

The family man loses the son upon his marriage. His obligation afterwards is to the family of his mother-in-law. He is supposed to protect and support the domestic circle into which he marries.

If a man's wife dies he is expected to remain in mourning for a year, then he can marry again. If he is well liked by the family he usually marries a sister of his former wife. In former times men were not limited to one wife. If they were able to support them they could have two or three. Choice was often limited to sisters or cousins of his first wife.

Today when a girl marries, if she belongs to a conservative family, it will be in a large measure a family arrangement. She is held to be an economic asset and gifts are expected from the prospective son-in-law and his family. Marriages are now performed according to white demands.

The Apache is a deeply religious person, his ceremonies are many and varied, in fact he has a ceremony for almost everything, for curing disease, for finding lost objects, for the puberty of girls, when the baby is put on the cradle board, and when it walks. "They even have a ceremony to influence the white man." He believes in a supreme deity, the giver of life, of no sex and no place.

But the Apache does not feel that he can approach this power directly. Power is conceived of as a mighty force pervading the universe, but it must "work through" something; as the sun, lightning, the owl, the bear, the snake, and many other agencies. They claim every person is a potential recipient of power and may expect a vision revealing the agent which will work through him. Sometimes this power inspired fear in others, particularly relatives, at other times it could be used for the benefit of others than the possessor. All his ceremonies has to do with securing the beneficent activities of his particular "Something"

and exorcising the evil ones. These ceremonies consisted of smoking, pollen-scattering, dancing and singing. Two open manifestations of this deep religious life, which doubtless persists beyond the imagining of most white men are the ceremony for the girl's arrival at maturity and the curative ceremony, each of which requires the service of a medicine man.

When engaging the service of a medicine man it is customary for the person desiring his service to make a cross of yellow pollen on the toe of his moccasin or shoe, then place money, turquoise, eagle feathers, whatever the offering may be on top of the cross. If the medicine man picks up the offering that indicates he accepts that amount and will perform the curing ceremony. It is also customary to give more than is placed on the toe of the shoe, sometimes much more if the cure is spectacular.

There is a custom too, of making a half moon of pollen in the palm of the medicine man's hand when his service is required. These customs vary in different parts of the reservation, and according to the nature of the illness.

A few of the minor ceremonies last only a short time. The larger ones are given over a period of from one to four days. Some of them have their own set of songs. Others have set prayers with words similar to songs. The songs and prayers must be used in proper sequence.

Many ceremonies have their own equipment; charms, certain plants or parts of animals. They contain power and are applied to the patient to draw out sickness, either being held against the patient's body and drawn away, or used to brush the sickness off.

Pollen is the most important ceremonial offering, and is considered the fitting and proper medium to use in religious approaches. Corn is used in some ceremonies. White shell, turquoise, black jet and catlinite are sacred and of equal importance; each having directional associations. All of these embody supernatural power, most especially white shell and turquoise. Eagle feathers also form an important part of religious equipment.

Usually rites for sickness are held for only one person, but there are a few rites that can be given in time of epidemics to ward off the disease from anyone. In addition to these there are others for the community known as holy ceremonies, taking place in the spring and summer when lightning, snakes and other poisonous forms of life are present. The purpose of these ceremonies is to protect the people in the area from snakes, scorpions, and lightning. The lightning ceremony is held for the community when some evil influence is thought to be at work and to cause rain and insure good crops.

In former times the Apaches had a birth ceremony that required the services of several medicine men.

When childbirth approached, the medicine men were always summoned to perform the medicine rites and to use the sacred pollen. A maternity belt was put on the patient.

The belt was made of the skin of the white tailed deer, the black tailed deer, the mountain lion and antelope animals that give birth to their young without trouble. The medicine men said a prayer to the spirits of these animals when a woman approaching confinement put on the belt. It was worn for a day or two only, but always during the critical period, and removed after the child was born. Prayers were said by the parents for their daughter, then by a medicine man and last by the patient to the gods and elements depicted on the maternity belt. The figures were connected with lightning lines. As each god was prayed to, sacred pollen was sprinkled.

Some thirty years ago these belts were so rare that whenever their use was required they were hired. The owner received sufficient remuneration from its use to support himself.

At the present time the expectant mother is attended by an old woman, sort of midwife, her mother and other female relatives. Outside the wickiup are medicine men rattling their guord rattles and chanting a prayer, while the father is off somewhere alone offering a prayer for the safe delivery of his child.

After the child is born the father and medicine men are called in to see the "Brave" or "Fair Maiden" as may the case be.

Several of these ceremonies have dances connected with them. In the girl's puberty ceremony she and her attendants dance, the masked impersonators, and the social dances all go on at the same time. Those who gather to see the lightning ceremony may dance, but usually four girls and four boys are the dancers. They carry ceremonial hoops and staffs in their hands and impersonate lightning youths and maidens. When the snake ceremony is given as a cure there is no dancing, but in the spring as a community ceremony there may be social dancing.

The curative ceremony may be a vigorous combination of song and dance by the masked (Continued on Page Forty-two)