HUBBELL TRADING POST

THE LEGEND OF HUBBELL TRADING POST

The homemade door shuts behind us with a screech worthy of yesteryear radio's Inner Sanctum, and the old wooden floor creaks and groans with every step as we cross the dusky room. "Now that's the way a trading post is supposed to sound," I tell my husband, Jerry. Although reservation trading posts are almost a thing of the past, Hubbell Trading Post in Ganado still does a lively business. Declared a National Historic Site in 1967 and purchased by the National Park Service two years later, it is a wonderful place to visit the past. Its old cast-iron stove (no longer used due to fire danger) still stands in the "bull pen," that area in the center of the store where Navajos gathered while trading and visiting. And its walls and scarred wooden counters still hold a conglomeration of products, saddles and horse collars, and much more, everything from beef jerky and summer sausage to fast-food snacks and Evian bottled water, from colorful bolts of velveteen to souvenir T-shirts. Although today Hubbell Trading Post caters to tourists as well as Navajos, it retains its old-time atmosphere and purpose. It still purchases arts and crafts from Native Americans, and they, in turn, purchase their groceries and supplies. In his "office," trader Bill Malone speaks Navajo to an elderly woman as he examines her rug. His office - consisting of an antique wooden cabinet, large rolltop desk, cash register, and counterhuddles in one corner of a jam-packed room. Baskets cover the ceiling, jewelry cases line one wall, and books and other arts and crafts take up every other inch of available space. In the rug room, hundreds of Navajo weavings hang over wooden racks and lie piled in stacks on the floor. Artifacts from a bygone era adorn the walls and ceiling, a silent memorial to John Lorenzo Hubbell, who in 1878 purchased from one William Leonard two small mud-and-wattle buildings that were the original trading post.

The rug room, where I sit on a stack of weavings worth thousands of dollars, and the adjoining jewelry room were built in 1883; six years later, the main store and warehouse were added.

In 1884 Hubbell became partners with C.N. Cotton, who began promoting Navajo products such as wool, piñon nuts, and blankets, suggesting that the latter could be used as rugs. He purchased Hubbell's share of the business, and Don Lorenzo (as Hubbell was commonly known) went on to become the Apache County sheriff. Later he served in the Territorial House of Representatives. The two men remained partners in other enterprises, and Hubbell bought back the Ganado property in 1895.

The expanding Navajo reservation eventually took in all of the property surrounding the trading post; actual ownership of the 160-acre Ganado property remained in limbo until 1889. Don Lorenzo, backed by influential men such as the Navajo agent and Arizona's governor, then petitioned the government for title to the land. Congress passed a bill "excepting lands within the extension that were claimed by actual settlers." Hubbell, the only claimant, received his patented deed in 1908. Trading posts were often the center of social life, and Don Lorenzo, Nakai Sani ("old mexican") to the Navajos, was always ready to sponsor rodeos, races, and ceremonies. More importantly, he always treated the Navajos fairly. He believed that a trader should not only care for his neighbors but encourage them to "produce that which their natural inclinations and talent best adapts them . . . and to vigilantly watch that they keep improving in the production of the same."

Don Lorenzo lived by those tenets. He brought in Hispanic smiths to teach Navajos to work iron and silver, and the Ganado area became noted for its jewelry. He encouraged weavers to improve their skills and, around the turn of the century, began introducing new designs, many of which are still popular today.

The trader who now manages Hubbell Trading Post for the Southwest Parks and Monuments Association still works with the Navajos in the old-time way. Bill Malone and his Navajo wife, Minnie, have five children and 11 grandchildren, and are very much a part of the Navajo community. Bill has spent some 40 years as a trader, the last 17 of those at Hubbell Trading Post. As he joins us in the rug room, he tosses his latest acquisition over the railing. "The help is wondering why I bought that rug," he says with a grin.

It isn't the best rug I've ever seen. Nubs of poorly carded wool dot its surface, and it is loosely woven in a few places.

"The weaver's getting old, and she doesn't do much of a job anymore," Bill explains. "But she still has her own sheep, and she cards and spins the wool the old way. She doesn't see too well, but she's still trying to support herself by weaving. Somebody's gotta take care of the grandmas."

That thought stays with me as we walk out to the old barn, where a couple of Park Service horses munch hay in an attached corral. Built in the 1890s, the barn served as headquarters for Don Lorenzo's freight lines. Both support beams and overhead beams in the massive building were made from huge pine logs hauled from miles away. A freight wagon sits on display, along with an assortment of horse collars, hames, an anvil, wooden wagon wheels, and other miscellany. Jerry focuses on the artifacts; I lie on a bale of hay, enjoying the atmosphere of the old barn and its aroma sweet perfume to one who comes from a long line of "ranch stock."

Darkness finally forces Jerry to put his cameras away, and we head for the hogan that, thanks to special dispensation from the Park Service, will be our home for a couple of days. Not the first hogan we've ever stayed in, it is by far the fanciest. Built as a guesthouse by the Hubbells in 1934, the stone structure has a small bathroom and kitchen, flagstone fireplace, and wall heater. It is snug and warm inside despite falling temperatures and a rising wind.

At the Park Service Visitors Center the next morning, Jerry photographs the jeweler and two weavers who demonstrate their skills there, and we make arrangements to visit the Hubbell home. Tours are not normally conducted during the winter,

HUBBELL TRADING POST

but Navajo ranger Geno Bahe takes us through the old adobe. Built in 1902, it was home to Hubbell, his wife, Lina Rubi, and their four children. Today it rivals some of the country's better museums with its array of Native American artifacts and turn-of-the-century Americana. Baskets dangle from the ceilings, huge Navajo rugs carpet the floors, and smaller ones drape chairs and couches amid all types of Navajo and Hopi arts and crafts. A painting of Don Lorenzo reigns above a stone fireplace in the center of the main room, and other paintings and old photographs line the walls. Bedrooms open off the main room on both sides, and across a small center courtyard sits the dining room with its unique furniture.

Shipped from Cincinnati in 1895, the custom-made hand-carved dining set cost an astronomical $10,000. A ram's head was carved on each corner of the table and on the sideboard and buffet to honor the product that allowed Hubbell to purchase the table -the wool from Navajo sheep. The primitive R carved into one corner of the tabletop by four-year-old Ramon Hubbell remains as a testimony to the lively family that once occupied the now silent rooms.

Just beyond the door of the simple turn-of-the-century kitchen sits a huge outdoor oven which once produced the weekly supply of bread for home and store from 400 to 500 loaves.

We wander by turkeys, chickens, and an accumulation of cats as we head toward the south end of the compound. Rusted hay balers, planters, plows, and other farm implements stand as though awaiting the return of the farmer. Twenty to 30 Navajo workers once tended some 120 acres of crops here, including hay, rye, alfalfa, several kinds of fruit trees, melons, beans, squash, and other vegetables.

Don Lorenzo was a gracious host to a multitude of guests, including artists, Mexican and Navajo friends, and even President Theodore Roosevelt. However, the Navajo guests usually preferred to stay in one of several traditional hogans built for their convenience.

When Don Lorenzo died in 1930, he was buried on Hubbell Hill, which rises behind the trading post. Also interred there are his wife, several family members, and his Navajo friend Many Horses.

Times were changing, and the trading post had suffered through the Depression years along with the rest of the country. The government's mandatory reduction of Navajo livestock further devastated the local economy. Ramon, the last surviving Hubbell child, and his wife, Dorothy, ran the trading post as absentee owners. Although the Hubbell family owned as many as 35 trading posts during the 1920s and '30s, the one at Ganado would be the last as it was the first. Ramon and Dorothy declared bankruptcy in 1954, losing almost everything except the Ganado property.

The 1960s brought the beginning of the end for most trading posts, and Hubbell's did not escape unscathed. The widowed Dorothy and one of Don Lorenzo's granddaughters kept things going until the property was sold to the National Park Service in 1969. The park service's goal was to operate Hubbell Trading Post "along the lines close to those that were in effect when it was an active trading post." It has succeeded remarkably well.

At least part of this success must be attributed to Bill Malone. The Navajos trust him implicitly, and tourists may do likewise. Native American art work purchased at Hubbell's is authentic and prices are reasonable.

Knowing this makes a purchase irresistible. Lying on my office floor in our Phoenix home is a new rug, not the best we own and certainly not the most costly. Nubs of poorly carded wool dot its face, and it is loosely woven in a few places. The weaver is an elderly woman with poor eyesight who still tends her own sheep and supports herself by weaving rugs from their wool. I love the coarse texture of the thick rug and the aroma of the hand-spun wool. Besides, as Bill says, "Somebody's gotta take care of the grandmas."

Photo Workshop: A stop at historic Hubbell Trading Post will be included in Friends of Arizona Highways Photo Workshop trips to Canyon de Chelly and Monument Valley in the fall and winter of this year. The trips will be led by the magazine's master contributing photographers, who provide picture takers of all skill levels with hands-on instruction to help them take photos like those in the magazine. For more information about these trips and a complete 1997 schedule, call the Friends' Travel Office, (602) 271-5904.