Best of
Native-Americans

1972

The North American Indian: The Complete Portfolios


Edward S. Curtis - 1972
    The photographs are accompanied by a selection of Curtis's texts.

Seven Arrows


Hyemeyohsts Storm - 1972
    It is the tale of the land they cherish and the lives they hold sacred, lived until the enemy can no longer be stopped, and the dead have few left to weep for them.

God Is Red: A Native View of Religion


Vine Deloria Jr. - 1972
    Celebrating three decades in publication with a special 30th-anniversary edition, this classic work reminds us to learn "that we are a part of nature, not a transcendent species with no responsibilities to the natural world." It is time again to listen to Vine Deloria Jr.'s powerful voice, telling us about religious life that is independent of Christianity and that reveres the interconnectedness of all living things.

Portraits from North American Indian Life


Edward S. Curtis - 1972
    The spirit of Native American life is covered in great depth and with remarkable sensitivity to the connections between them, but the most remarkable segments of this text are the portraits. Like no other photographer before him, Edward Curtis attempts to capture the essence of these people and shows you what it is to walk along their great land. Filled with full-page sepia tone photographs and detailed text, Portraits From North American Indian Life is a beautiful and historical reference for all to enjoy.

Wah-to-yah, and the Taos Trail; or Prairie travel and scalp dances, with a look at Los Rancheros from Muleback and the Rocky Mountain Campfire


Lewis Hector Garrard - 1972
     Beginning in what is now Kansas City he joined a caravan headed for Bent’s Fort in southeastern Colorado near the Spanish Peaks, which was known to the Native Americans as Wah-to-Yah. Just before Garrard had arrived in the southwest Charles Bent, who was the recently appointed Governor of the newly acquired New Mexico Territory, was scalped and killed by Pueblo warriors during the Taos Revolt. Garrard’s account is therefore a vivid first-hand account of the Taos Revolt and its aftermath. Through the course of Wah-to-yah and the Taos Trail Garrard explains how he came into contact with some of the most famous figures of western history, including Kit Carson, Jim Beckwourth, Ceran St. Vrain, George F. Ruxton, William Bent, and others. Scholars like Robert Gale have highlighted how the book provides “anthropologically accurate” descriptions of the Cheyenne Indians and other Native American tribes in the southwest of America. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the history of the old west, for as the Pulitzer Prize winning author A. B. Guthrie Jr. stated, it is “the genuine article” and brilliantly depicts “the Indian, the trader, the mountain man, their dress, and behavior and speech and the country and climate they lived in.” Lewis Hector Garrard was the son of a prominent family from Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1846 he set out for a ten-month trip to the southwestern United States. While in Taos, Garrard attended the trial of some of the Mexicans and Pueblos who had revolted against U.S. rule of New Mexico, newly captured in the Mexican-American War. Garrard wrote the only eye witness account of the trial and hanging of six convicted men. His book Wah-to-Yah was first published in 1850 and he passed away in 1887.

The Last War Trail: The Utes and the Settlement of Colorado


Robert Emmitt - 1972
    Saponise Cuch, Chief of the White River Utes, said to Robert Emmitt in 1948, "I am an old man now, and I am the only one left who remembers this. I have known that someone would come to tell this story; now you will write it out, as I have told it to you." Drawing upon historical documents, transcripts, and letters as well as interviews with Northern Ute elders, Emmitt describes the tragedy of United States Indian Agent Nathan Meeker's plan to "civilize" the Utes, and the resulting military intervention in which fifty Ute warriors held off the U.S. cavalry and killed Meeker, Major Thomas Thornburgh, and others. Ute warriors sought only to defend their families and their way of life, but the price for that defense was forced removal from Colorado and the loss of over twelve million acres. "The Utes Must Go" became a rallying cry for white settlers who coveted the lands of peaceful Utes.Written with the care and precision of a finely crafted novel, The Last War Trail was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize when it was first published in 1954. Long out of print and now brought back with new rare photographs and illustrations, The Last War Trail will be eagerly read by anyone trying to understand conflicts of the nineteenth century between Native American and encroaching settlers.

Mukat's People: The Cahuilla Indians of Southern California


Lowell John Bean - 1972
    Bean:An apparent dichotomy exists in scientific circles concerning the role of religion and belief systems and a similar dichotomy exists among anthropological theorists. Two assumptions seem to prevail: ritual and world view are more ecologically nonadaptive than adaptive; or ritual and world view are more ecologically adaptive than they are nonadaptive. To examine the relevancy of the opposing theoretical views I will develop hypotheses concerning a particular culture, the Cahuilla Indians of Southern California, which will be used as a test case. I will present two sets of hypotheses which logically follow from each of the assumptions. From the first assumption I suggest that the economic needs of society are impeded by ritual actions which are not only wasteful of productive goods but decrease the production of goods; they take people away from productive activities because of ritual obligations: and . from the second I suggest that the economic needs of society are impeded by normative and existential postulates (for definition see page 16o) which indicate that valuable resources are outside the realm of the economic order; these postulates are disruptive to the production of goods by encouraging people to behave in such a way that they are taken away from productive activity. From this latter viewpoint two other hypotheses follow: the ecoiwmic needs of society are facilitated by ritual action which conserves and increases the production of goods and fosters productive activity by directing personnel toward producing activities; and the economic needs of society are facilitated by normative and existential postulates which foster the use of valuable economic resources and increase the productive process by directing behavior which involves people in productive activities. The validity of the hypotheses will be tested by asking specific questions related to the hypotheses.  The questions are:Were goods wasted because of ritual action? Did ritual action take people away from productive activities or did it direct people to produce more goods? Were valuable resources placed outside the realm of economic order by existential postulates? Did normative postulates disrupt the production of goods by rewarding behavior which took people away from productive activity? Or did it reward behavior which fostered the production of goods? Additional questions are: Did ritual and world view encourage the full and rational use of the Cahuilla environment? Did ritual and world view aid in adjusting man-land ratios? Did ritual and world view support a social structure and organization which was adaptive to an environmental base? Did ritual and world view support institutions that were adaptive, such as law, property concepts, warfare, and games? Did ritual and world view have regulatory functions? Did ritual and world view stimulate or facilitate the distribution of economic goods from one part of the system to another? Did ritual and world view limit the frequency and extent of conflict over valuable resources?

The Delaware Indians: A History


C.A. Weslager - 1972
    . . the product of decades of study by a layman archeologist-historian. With a rich blend of archeology, anthropology, Indian oral traditions (he gives us one of the best accounts of the Walum Olum, the fascinating hieroglyphics depicting the tribal origins of the Delaware), and documentary research, Weslager writes for the general reader as well as the scholar."--American Historical Review In the seventeenth century white explorers and settlers encountered a tribe of Indians calling themselves Lenni Lenape along the Delaware River and its tributaries in New Jersey, Delaware, eastern Pennsylvania, and southeastern New York. Today communities of their descendants, known as Delawares, are found in Oklahoma, Kansas, Wisconsin, and Ontario, and individuals of Delaware ancestry are mingled with the white populations in many other states. The Delaware Indians is the first comprehensive account of what happened to the main body of the Delaware Nation over the past three centuries. C. A. Weslager puts into perspective the important events in United States history in which the Delawares participated and he adds new information about the Delawares. He bridges the gap between history and ethnology by analyzing the reasons why the Delawares were repeatedly victimized by the white man.

Swan Among the Indians


Lucile Saunders McDonald - 1972
    Based largely on his previously unpublished diaries. Photos. Index. 280 pages.