Fire on the Frontier

The last of the Indian tribes in America to holler "Uncle" were the Apaches. With Geronimo's surrender to General Nelson A. Miles on September 4, 1886, at Skeleton Canyon in Mexico, about sixty-five miles south of Fort Bowie in Apache Pass, Arizona, the Indian Wars in America were ended forever.

The Apache warrior was a formidable foe and to say he went down fighting is even at this distant date the understatement of the century. For three hundred years the fire he built on the southwestern frontier burned high and brightly, and to say he was a headache to the armies of Imperial Spain, the Republic of Mexico, and the United States of America would be putting it mildly.

Scholars tell us that the first reference found to the name Apache is in an account of the 1581 Espejo Expedition in which they are called Apichi. Arizona Place Names, that learned volume to which we refer so many times, further explains: “The word Apache is derived from the Yuman apa (man), abwa (war; fight; battle), and tche, which pluralizes the combination. As a nation the Apache Indians did not exist, the term being applied comprehensively to many tribes. According to Cortez, who wrote about this matter in 1799, the Spaniards included as Apaches the Tonto Apaches, the Chiricahuas, Gilenos, Nimbrenos, Taracones, Mescaleros, Llaneros, Lipanes and the Navajos.” The Apache warrior was always a warlike man. He lived off the land, and, unlike his enemies, the Papagos, Maricopas and Pimas, he would not stoop to such an undignified task as tilling the soil. When the Spaniards brought to his land horses, he was given his greatest weapon: mobility. He roamed at will throughout the mountain areas of southern Arizona, western New Mexico and the Sierra Madres of north Mexico.

He was a fighting man, this Apache warrior of ours, a worthy and respected foe. In the cold light of reason, we must not glamorize him. He was a cunning man, rapacious, cruel, clever, crafty, but never cowardly. His greatest guilt, such as it was, was that of trying to protect his heritage, the happy hunting grounds which provided for him and the generations before him from the inexorable wave of European civilization which finally engulfed him.

He was the victim of cruel and malicious people: the unscrupulous trader who provided him with whiskey and firearms; American ranchers who bought the herds of cattle he stole in Chihuahua and Sonora, who did so to protect their own property from his marauding forays; those Mexican officials in northern Mexico who bargained with him against the interest and welfare of their neighbors; bumbling and stupid Spanish, Mexican and American officials who were sent to deal and make peace with him, but ended up betraying him.

Because of him, a great enmity occurred between the people of Sonora, Mexico, and the Territory of Arizona, an enmity which caused the editor of the Tucson Weekly Arizonian to warn (April 28, 1859): “We make treaties with the Indians to protect ourselves and at the same time to allow them to plunder our neighbors across the line, which they do to an extent almost beyond belief. The whole State of Sonora is ravaged by marauding bands of Apaches, who find safe retreat, and often a market for their booty, in Arizona Territory. It is, in fact, nothing more or less than legalized piracy upon a weak and defenseless State, encouraged and abetted by the United States government; and mark the consequences: The Mexicans retaliate upon us, and steal back their plundered stock, or its equivalent, whenever the opportunity occurs.” The Apache warrior wrote his name in history with fire and terror and destruction. Leaders of the warring tribes are legendary even today: Cochise, Geronimo, Nachez, Mangas Coloradas, Victorio and others, proud and brave, fighting for what they thought was right, fighting a losing battle for what they thought was theirs.

Their foe was white man and red man alike. From the beginning they fought against unsurmountable obstacles and they went down fighting. They asked no favors, these Apache warriors, and they gave no favors. The right or wrong of their struggle will still be discussed by scholars generations from now. R.C.

ARIZONA HIGHWAYS A VISIT TO APACHE WONDERLAND...

This month it is our pleasure and privilege to take you on a visit to the Fort Apache Indian Reservation mèd to have you most our friends, the White Mountain Apaches, whose whose domain is a vast expense of forested highlands and rolling gramlands in eastern Arizona. A large part of their reservation takes in some of the most bestri ful and remote parts of the White Mountains and icsin this area of miles of trout streams and many small lakes where the Apaches are building a vacationers and sports men's paradise.

Lumber and cattle were for years the principal source of income for the tribe. A great potencial, tribe. A great potential, the tourist, was neglected and practically ignored. Roads were primitive and large portions of the reservation were practically inaccessible. Then logging roads began to poke their way across and there in Apachelnd and more and more visitors and campers began following those roads to streams and lakes in a truly luxuriant wilderness. This Apache tronderland had everything for the summer visitor-miles of streaming water, spreading lakes, unsurpassed mounta scenery and incomparable weather. Then, too, inoderm and improved highways made the reservation easily and quickly accessible to Arizonans living in the larger coo munities in the hot lowhands of the state during summer.

Tribal leaders, with the sage advice of Indian Affades officials, decided to go into the tourist business and they did so with success. Campaires were developed and im proved, service stations and motels were built, and s warte How Dab, or "welcome," was extended to all.

Hawley Lake, so far, has been their growbust achieve ment. When work was started on the dam forming this lake, the Apaches made national headlines by defying a court order stopping them from doing so. It was their water and their land and that was that. Now Hawley Lake is a bee hive of activity throughout the summer months, and the homesits development there is, indeed, something to see and to strive. They are on their way, these fine people, making the most of what they have. We, among many others, wish then great success and we know their Apeche wonder land will become increasingly Important in the story of Arizona as a vacationland R.C.