MILDRED HEFLIN INTERVIEW

   

   

   [BEGIN SIDE 1]

   

   This is Brad Cole from Northern Arizona University.

It's July 15, 1999.  We're visiting today with Mildred

Heflin.  We're going to talk about her experiences in

the Indian trade business.  This is an interview that's

part of the United Indian Trader Association Oral

History Project.  [Lew Steiger is running the recording

equipment, and also makes a few comments.]

   

   Cole:  Mildred, if we could start with the very

beginning, and I'll just ask you when and where you

were born.

   

   Heflin:  I was born in Farmington, New Mexico, in

1913.  Farmington, New Mexico, was a small town in

northwestern New Mexico.

   

   Cole:  Who were your parents?

   

   Heflin:  O. J. Carson and Jessie Carson.

   

   Cole:  And what are your memories of growing up in

Farmington?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I was very small.  I don't really

remember much about growing up in Farmington.  We lived

on a small ranch, and we went out to the reservation

when I was about two-and-a-half, three-and-a-half.  We

had to cross the San Juan River, because there was only

one bridge on the San Juan River at that time, and that

was way down at Shiprock, and there were no roads, just

trails.  So when we went out to the reservation, we

went up to--there were not many places where you could

cross the San Juan River at that time, because that was

before they put in the big dam, and it was quite--in

the springtime, it flooded, and it was very difficult.

You had to know where to cross it, or you'd get bogged

down in the quicksand.  And so my uncles went with us

and we went up to where we would cross the river, and

my father had a very special horse which he trusted.

So he took my sister and I--my sister was about one-and-

a-half at the time--took her in front in the saddle,

and I sat behind him, and we went across the river,

forded the river.  And then when we got across the

river....  Well, my uncle helped us get across the

river.  Then when we got across the river, we were in a

covered wagon, we had to carry our own food and all of

our supplies.  And as I recall, we had a crateload of

chickens.  That was very necessary, because there were

no places to buy eggs or anything of the sort out there

on the reservation.

   

   Anyway, in going out, unfortunately the crate of

chickens fell off and all the chickens got away.  But

we had a wonderful dog, his name was Old Billy.  He was

a bobtail shepherd of some kind.  I don't know what he

was.  But anyway, he caught all these thirteen

chickens, and (laughs) my dad was able to get 'em back

in the cage, which was very important.

   

   And so it took us three days, camping each night, to

get to Star Lake.  And that's a place in New Mexico.

Nobody ever heard of it, and right now I think....  I

don't know who the big coal mining companies are in

there now, but anyway, at that time, it was--kind of

had sort of a little valley under a hill, and you could

walk back up on top of the hill, and there would be

smoke coming out of the cracks all along.  The coal was

burning underneath.  But I understand they put out the

fires, of course, and now they're mining it and using

it for various things.  I don't know whether they have

a slurry line, like they do up on Black Mesa, or

whether they have a train, which carries the coal down

to a place between Grants and Gallup, and that's where

they pulverize it or do whatever they do with it to

make power.

   

   And let's see, what else did I jot down here?

   

   Cole:  Who were your uncles you mentioned?

   

   Heflin:  Howard Smith.  They had lived on the ranch

there near Farmington.

   

   Cole:  I should ask real quickly before I forget,

what brought your mom and dad to Farmington?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, they were raised there.  My grandfather

was an Irish Canadian, and the whole family, I imagine

they were driven out of Ireland by famine--I really

don't know, I never could find out.  But they were

driven to Canada, and they _________ Canada, and he was

very interested in mining.  And so he was up in the

Colorado Mountains and was fortunate enough to find a

gold mine, which he sold for $5,000.  That was a lot of

money in those days!  (laughs)  So he was considered a

wealthy man, and he came down to Farmington on the San

Juan River....  No, this was on the Animas River--there

are two rivers coming down there.  And he was on the

Animas and he bought a small ranch there, and that's

where they lived, and he raised his family there.  And

my grandmother, her parents had come down there in very

early days.  The only connection you had with any

civilization was Pueblo, Colorado.  My grandfather

would take the oxen team.  They'd make butter, if you

can imagine, and he would take the butter, and the

hides, or whatever they had, and cart it over the

mountain to Pueblo, Colorado.  And that took a whole

month to go over there and back, which was a long time,

but that was a long ways in those days.

   

   Cole:  And then how did your dad decide to get

involved in trading?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, in the trading post business?  Well, he

and my mother had a small ranch there at Farmington,

and they couldn't see much future in this, so my Uncle

Bob lived out on the Navajo Reservation, and he knew of

a trader--well, he was a German--who owned a small

trading post.  Goodness knows how he got that, but he

did.  Near Cuba, New Mexico.  So my Dad went out there

to work for him.  And our only connection with

civilization was....  It was thirty-five miles to Cuba,

and this was a small town, mostly Mexicans, and there

were many bootleggers down there, and that's where we

got our mail.  And we always had a Navajo carry the

mail for us.  But no matter how drunk he was, he seemed

to think that this mail was very important.  He might

stagger into the house and fall over, but he always

brought the mail (laughs) which we thought was really

great.

   

   Cole:  And that was at Star Lake?

   

   Heflin:  That was at Star Lake, uh-huh.

   

   Cole:  So how long was your family there?

   

   Heflin:  We lived there about a year-and-a-half, and

then we moved over to--my dad bought a--he met somebody

who wanted to sell their trading post over near

Farmington, New Mexico, which was what we called

Carson's now.  And it was only thirty miles out of

Farmington, so he decided that'd be a much better place

to live, because we children had to go to school

sometime, and it'd be easier to get us into school.  My

grandmother still lived in Farmington, so we could go

and live with her in the winter and go to school.  So

that's why they moved back to the trading post nearer

Farmington.

   

   I was going to tell you about my uncle who used to

travel back and forth between my Uncle Bob's place and

Star Lake.  One day he took us, we were going over to

Ojo Encino--that's where my uncle lived--to visit him.

We had a team of Navajo horses, and they were fine, as

long as you could get 'em started.  But if you ever

stopped 'em, it was just too bad.  Well, we got out

about, say, twenty miles, and it was very sandy, and it

was hot.  So he felt very sorry for the horses, so he

stopped 'em.  Well, then he couldn't get 'em started.

(laughter)  And there we sat in the sand for I don't

know how long before he finally got 'em to go again.

(laughs)  But we used to have that problem all the

time.

   

   And let's see now....

   

   I mentioned the water dogs that used to come up out

of Star Lake.  Well, whatever they were, they were

about this long, and they were very ugly little

critters.  Well, where's that thing I had here?  Oh,

it's over there, out of that funny little....

   

   Steiger:  This?

   Heflin:  Yeah.  It was something like that, only

they were black and really ugly, and they just crawled

along on the ground.  (laughs)  Anyway, it used to

frighten me to death.  I was scared to death of 'em,

whatever they were.  But anyway, they were ugly little

things.

   

   Cole:  So Star Lake, did it actually have a lake?

Or was it intermittent?

   

   Heflin:  There was water in that lake most of the

time, which was very strange, because most lakes dry up

in the summer.  But there was water there all the year

round, which I always thought was extremely

interesting.

   

   Cole:  When you were at Star Lake, how many brothers

and sisters....

   

   Heflin:  I had one sister.

   

   Cole:  What was her name?

   

   Heflin:  Josephine--Jo.

   

   Cole:  So what kinds of things would you do as a

small girl, growing up at the trading post?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, we'd walk out on the top of the hills.

Then when we moved back to Carson's, there was a

missionary lady came to live out there.  When we were

about, I guess I was eight years old--eight or nine--

she used to teach us for two hours every day.  My

sister and I would go down there, and that's where we

learned reading, writing, and 'rithmetic.  I never went

to school 'til I was twelve years old, and then I went

to Farmington--went to public school, I mean.

   

   Cole:  And then you'd live in town during the

winter, you said?

   

   Heflin:  I lived with my grandmother and

grandfather, my sister and I.  And let me see, what was

I going to say?  (pause)  I guess I've already told you

that.

   

   Cole:  I'll ask you another question while you're

scannin'.  What were the living conditions like for

your family at the trading post?  Or if you could just

kind of describe the trading post and what it was like.

   

   Heflin:  Oh! the trading post.  Well, there were

very high counters, because one reason they had the

high counters, oftentimes our customers would come to

the store very drunk, and it was easier to handle 'em

if they couldn't get over the counter.  (laughs)

Because some of 'em, when they got drunk, they'd be

very belligerent, and hard to deal with.  So anyway, we

had very high counters, and we sold flour, Arbuckle's

coffee.  You've never heard of it.  Well, it used to

come in great big wooden boxes.  Oh! they made

wonderful play houses.  And they were about in pound

packages.  You can imagine.  It was just paper

packages.  You can imagine what the flavor was.

(laughter)  And I don't know where that coffee came

from, I really don't.  But anyway, that's what we sold.

And then, of course, flour and sugar and lard.  Of

course the Indians all had their own meat.  They had

cattle and they had sheep, so actually they had a

fairly good diet, and they raised their little corn.

In certain sections out there, they could plant corn in

the summer, and they'd have these nice crops of corn,

which everybody enjoyed, and that was good.

   

   Cole:  What about your family?  Did you have any

kind of a vegetable garden?

   

   Heflin:  No.  We didn't have enough water.  We

barely had enough water....  Well, we had to haul all

our drinking water from Ojo Encino.  That was about

twenty miles away.  So you can imagine we were very

frugal with water, and we couldn't have a garden.  That

soil was actually nothing but coal dust, most of it, so

we couldn't raise anything.

   

   Cole:  That was at Star Lake?

   

   Heflin:  That was at Star Lake.

   

   Cole:  What about at Carson?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, at Carson's?  Well, we didn't have

enough water.  My dad put in a windmill down in the

arroyo, which was about a quarter of a mile from the

house, and pumped water up on the hill.  And then we

could have a small garden.  But water was a very scarce

commodity out there on the reservation.

   

   Cole:  Would your mother work in the trading post at

all?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, yes, she worked in the trading post.

My dad would freight and haul merchandise, go to town,

shop, do all that stuff--and she stayed home and ran

the trading post and took care of the kids.  (laughter)

   

   Cole:  How did she get along?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, she liked it, she didn't mind.  She

liked the Indians, see, and she visited with them and

she enjoyed that.  She was very fond of the Indians

anyway.

   

   Cole:  Did she speak Navajo then?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah, she spoke Navajo.

   

   Cole:  And did she ever get a Navajo nickname, do

you know?

   

   Heflin:  I don't think so.  I don't really know.

Can't remember now what they called her.  But

anyhow....

   

   Cole:  Overall, how would you describe the Navajo's

living conditions then at Carson?

   

   Heflin:  Well, they were very primitive.  They lived

in hogans--log and dirt, you know--round and covered

with dirt.  They were very warm in the winter and cool

in the summer, very comfortable.  And in the summertime

they would build little shelters out of brush.  And

that was nice and cool.  The air would blow through,

and they could put up their weaving looms out there and

work out there.  It was quite comfortable, so they got

along very well.  And the only bad thing about it, they

had no--at that time, I don't even think they had

anybody on the--maybe at Shiprock--any doctors or

anybody to give them any medical assistance if they

needed it.  People went untreated.  And when they had

the smallpox, a lot of people died with the smallpox.

That was about 19....  Hm....  Probably about 1918 or

1919, somewhere in there, when the World War was going

on.  And that was very bad, because they had no help

whatsoever.  They were very smart:  when anybody got

smallpox, most of the families would isolate them.

They were smart enough to do that, see.  Nobody told

'em anything, they just knew.  And they would isolate

'em from the rest of the family, so the whole family

didn't get smallpox--just one or two--which I always

thought was very intelligent.

   

   Cole:  Were your mom and dad ever called on to fill

the role as doctor?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, well, they'd come and ask them, yeah,

for whatever.  They didn't have....  How would they

know what to give them or treat them with?  But they

were always being called on to come and bury the dead,

because Navajos are very, very frightened of corpses.

Something very evil happens when you die, so they would

always come and ask my parents to come and bury the

dead for 'em, or make a box for 'em.  If we had any

lumber, then my father would make a box and go out and

help them bury the dead.

   

   And I have to tell you one of the stories that one

of the men who had the flu told us when he got well.

He crossed over and went to the other side, you see.

But on this side, they couldn't find his horse, and

they hadn't killed it, and so he couldn't go on with

the rest of the people to the other side, and he came

back, 'cause he didn't have his horse.  That was Jim

Pierce.  (laughs)  Anyway....

   

   Cole:  So then once you were in school in

Farmington, you came back to the trading post in

summers?

   

   Heflin:  We came back every weekend.  We'd come back

on the weekends--do our laundry and sometimes do a

little studying--not much--and go out and play on the

hills.  Right near the trading post there were a lot of

clay hills, and these clay hills were full of

rattlesnakes, and we used to play up there all the

time.  In the winter that was safe enough.  But one

time I remember coming up over a little rise in the

clay hill, and I looked right into what I thought were

the eyes of a rattlesnake.  So we didn't tarry very

long.  (laughing)  We took off for home!

   

   Sometimes the snakes would come up around the house.

I remember one time my mother was--we had kind of a

cellar, and she ran up to look over the top of this

cellar, put her hand on the roof, and there was a

rattlesnake right there.  (laughter)  So she didn't

tarry very long.  But anyway, nobody ever got bitten.

We think of them as being very dangerous, but Navajos

lived with 'em all the time, and so did we.  (laughs)

Got along fine.

   

   Cole:  When did your parents get any kind of light

generation at Carson?  Did they have a generator?

   

   Heflin:  Oh, well, when the mission in Farmington

decided to put a missionary up there--her name was Miss

Wilcox--and they sent her out to give out medication to

the Navajos and help them if they were poor and all

this kind of stuff--which she did.  And she's the one

who used to teach us two hours every day, 'til we got

old enough to go to Farmington.  Went to Farmington, as

I said, when I was in the sixth grade.

   

   Cole:  Do you remember what her religious

affiliation was--Miss Wilcox?

   

   Heflin:  Hm, let me see.  It was Methodist.  They

sent her out first.  And then the Episcopalians took

over and built a little chapel across the wash.  And

later on they took over the little mission there near

us.  Anyway, there weren't very many white people

around.

   

   And as I said, we didn't have any roads, there were

no highways.  But we did have about....  Let me see,

Simpsons must have been....  About twelve miles away

there was a telephone.  There was a man who lived down

at this other trading post, and I think he was English.

And what he was doing out there, goodness knows, but he

had a trading post.  And he had put in a telephone line

to Farmington.  Now, that was a big accomplishment in

those days.  We don't think anything about it anymore,

but at that time, it meant a lot.  And so about, I

guess, 1922 or 1923, my father was able to build a

telephone line and connect with Mr. Simpson's telephone

line, so we could talk to Farmington, and that was a

big deal, I want to tell you! to think we could call

people and talk to them.  Called my grandmother, and

that was great.

   

   And let's see....

   

   Cole:  Now, did you and your sister get put to work

in the trading post at all?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah, when we were all growing up we used

to help in the trading post, uh-huh.  We weren't very

helpful, though.  I don't think we did much until we

were in our teens.  We used to spend our time out

playing Navajo.  We had our long skirts and our blouses

and we'd go out and make tents and take the dogs and

(chuckles) play around in the sand.

   

   Cole:  Did you have Navajo friends?

   

   Heflin:  You know, we didn't have any Navajo

friends.  I never learned to speak real good Navajo,

'cause I never had any kids to play with.  They all

lived too far away.  We often wished we had some Navajo

kids to play with.  Some friends of ours who lived at

another trading post about twenty miles away, their

children all spoke fluent Navajo because they had a

Navajo family that lived very near them, and they could

play together.  And that's the way you pick it up,

really--the best way.  But I never had that

opportunity.

   

   Let me see, what else?

   

   Cole:  You went to school, I assume, and eventually

graduated from high school.

   

   Heflin:  Uh-huh.

   

   Cole:  And then what did you do after that?

   

   Heflin:  I went on to Fort Lewis College, a small

college near Durango, Colorado, which has now moved

into Durango.  And I went there for two years.  And

then I came back to the reservation and taught school

for about a year-and-a-half.  And then I married Reuben

Heflin, who was a schoolteacher in Farmington.  He

taught school for about, I guess, a couple of years,

then we decided to go to a trading post--or my parents

knew about a trading post that was for sale down at

Oljato, and that was way over in Utah, about 135 miles

from Farmington, which in those days was a long way

out, because there were no bridges across....  The

Chinle Wash then was a big arroyo and in the springtime

it would flood and you couldn't cross it--nobody could

cross it.  Until we got a bridge across that, we had to

go all the way around through Utah to get to

Farmington, and that would be a trip of about 200

miles.  And we had to bring most of our groceries we

got out of Farmington at that time.  Later on, when we

moved over to Shonto, which is another trading post, we

got most of our supplies out of Flagstaff, because it

was so much closer, and the roads were so much better.

But we didn't have a great deal.  As I said, we had

coffee, syrup, flour, and sugar, and saddles and

bridles.  Sometimes we sold harnesses and sometimes

wagons.  And of course we always had canned tomatoes,

canned peaches, and what else did we have in the way of

fruit?  Oh, chiles!  We always had little chiles.  The

Indians liked those chiles.  And let's see....

   

   We bought Shonto from Mr. Rorick, who was married to

a very wealthy lady, and I can't imagine how come.  I

guess she thought it'd be a big adventure to come out

and live at a trading post.  So she came out and lived

there about a year, I think, and then she got up, she

left.  (chuckles)  She wouldn't stay there any longer.

So then he decided to sell the trading post.  He didn't

want to stay there either.  He was an older man, and he

wanted to get out of it, so he sold us Shonto Trading

Post, which is down in a deep little canyon.  It's very

pretty down there.  I think I mentioned this before, we

could have a lawn down there.  And that was a great

thing, we enjoyed that very much.  And we lived there

for about ten years.  A lot of our trade came in from

Navajo Mountain, which was a very isolated place.  It

was even more isolated than Shonto.  They'd bring the

wool in on burros.  They'd bag it up and pack it on

these burros and carry it in that way.  There weren't

any wagon roads--they didn't have any wagons.  So

they'd bring the wool in, in the spring, that way.

Then my husband always had it re-sacked, because there

might be rocks in the bags of wool, you never could

tell.  And it was full of sand, so you had to shake it

all, clean it, and then re-sack it again.

   

   Cole:  Did you take chickens and stuff down there,

too, at Shonto?

   

   Heflin:  We didn't have any chickens at Shonto

because they had some kind of....  I don't know what

they were--little black mites.  And if you had

chickens, they thrived on chickens, and then they

thrived on you, and you didn't dare go to the chicken

yard (chuckles) without disinfecting your clothes or

taking a bath.  So we didn't have any chickens down at

Shonto.  We had to buy our eggs in Flagstaff.  But it

was easier to get to Flagstaff than it was to

Farmington, because at that time there was a paved road

into Tuba City--or it was paved most of the way--and

that made it much easier to get to Flagstaff.  So we

bought most of our supplies out of Flag then, from

Babbitt Brothers.  They had a big wholesale house in

those days, and they supplied everybody.

   

   And then when we moved to town to send the children

to school, I thought Arizona schools were much better

than New Mexico schools, so we moved in here to

Flagstaff and sent our kids to school.  We rented a

place at first, and a little later on, this place was

for sale, so we bought it from Mr. Houston, about 1945,

I believe it was--somewhere along in there.

   

   Cole:  And how many children do you have?

   

   Heflin:  I have three daughters.

   

   Cole:  And were they all born at Shonto?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah.  Well, they weren't born at Shonto.

I went out to Farmington or wherever.  Anyway, let's

see, one's a computer programmer for the City of

Phoenix, and the other one runs Burger Kings.  She's

got four Burger Kings she runs out on the reservation.

And my youngest daughter has a candy store in

Albuquerque, and her husband works for IBM.  So they're

all on their own and doing okay, for which I'm

thankful.

   

   Cole:  And I should ask, how did you meet your

husband?

   

   Heflin:  Oh.  Well, let me see, how did I meet him?

Oh, we went to the same high school.  I really never

knew him in high school, I met him later on through his

sister, I guess.  I used to go there with her for

parties and things, and that's where I met him.

   

   Cole:  You said he was a schoolteacher but he became

an Indian trader.  (Heflin:  Yeah.)  Did you influence

him on that?  Or was that his own decision?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I expect I influenced him quite a

bit.  (chuckles)  Anyway, I always liked the

reservation, and he grew to like it very much.  And he

was very fond of the Indians, and they all liked him,

and that was a big help.  You have to like people, or

you don't get along too well.

   

   Cole:  Describe Shonto for us, if you could.

   

   Heflin:  Well, Shonto was down in a deep canyon.

And let me see, how many rooms?  We had two bedrooms

and a small room I used for a schoolroom, and a

kitchen, and then a front room, which had a fireplace

which smoked all the time.  As I said, we had a lawn.

And then across the lawn, about, say, twenty-five feet,

he had built two bedrooms--one bedroom on either side

of a bathroom.  The bathroom was about half as big as

this room.  You can't imagine!  We heated it with a

wooden stove in the wintertime, which worked pretty

good.

   

   Cole:  Did you have a well there, or was it just

running water?

   

   Heflin:  No, we had a well.  Actually, though, they

had what they called a range rider who looked after,

watched out for the Indians and got various things for

'em and so forth.  So therefore, the government had

come in and drilled a well, and it was fairly good

water.  That was a blessing, because the water at

Oljato was not very good--very bad water, full of

alkali.

   

   Cole:  I'm a little confused.  Did you folks

actually buy Oljato, or did you just lease it?

   

   Heflin:  Yes, we bought it.  My dad helped us buy

it.  He loaned us some money so that we could make a

down payment, and then we paid him back, so we actually

bought it ourselves.  And then we just bought Shonto

from Mr. Rorick.  We were able to do that.  We sold

Oljato to one of my cousins, Fred Carson, and so he

moved out there and we moved over to Shonto and lived

there for ten years.  And then from there we moved over

to Kayenta and bought the trading post over there from

John Wetherill and his family.  I lived there about, I

guess, fifteen years.  And after we'd lived there for a

while, my husband decided to put in a small motel,

because people would come in to stay at the Wetherills,

and they didn't have room enough for them.  So he put

in a small motel of twenty rooms, up on the hill above

us, and we ran that for about ten years, I guess.  And

then he built the....  When the highway came through in

19....  I guess it was about 1960, 1961, 1962,

somewhere in there, then he built the Holiday Inn up on

the highway, which was....  I think we had, what,

eighty rooms or something like that.  The Crowleys

[phonetic spelling] had a small restaurant, and so they

ran a restaurant.  We didn't have to run that, which

was a God's blessing.  I lived out there until....

When did I come to town?  About 1974 or 1976 I moved

into Flagstaff.  Sold the whole thing and moved into

Flagstaff.

   

   Cole:  So even though you folks lived at Flagstaff,

you still had your interest __________.

   

   Heflin:  Yes, for a while, we still had the trading

post and had the motel--had that for quite a while

after we moved to Flagstaff.

   

   Cole:  What was your father doing during all this

period?  Was he still running his post at Carson?

   

   Heflin:  Well, he was running the post at Carson's,

and then he later on bought the post at Oljato and ran

that for about ten years.  Then they moved into

Farmington, lived there for a short while.

   

   Cole:  To switch gears a little bit, if you could

describe for us how--or if you were gonna describe to

somebody that was unfamiliar with trading, how the

Navajo-Anglo trade enterprise worked, could you explain

that?

   

   Heflin:  Oh.  Well, in the wintertime, a lot of the

people came in and put their jewelry and whatever--

bracelets, beads, belts--in pawn, and we gave them

credit.  They bought merchandise in exchange for that.

We had to build a cement vault, and we kept the pawn in

the vault.  Then we would keep it there for them, and

they'd come back in the springtime when they sheared

their sheep and pay it off and take it out.  Sometimes

they'd leave it all year round because they said it was

safer there.  They didn't have anyplace to put it out

in the hogan, you see--no vault or anyplace they could

lock up.  So a lot of 'em would rather leave it.  And

they'd come in and borrow it if they wanted to go to a

sing or something.  And the trustworthy ones, we let

them take their pawn out and wear it to the sing and

then bring it back.  (chuckles)

   

   Anyway, I think we're dealing with a whole different

class of Navajos now.  All they think of is how they

can get the better of people.  And the older folks I

think were more trusting.  I don't understand the

difference.  Anyway, it's a whole different group of

people living out there now, I think.  Maybe they

learned all the white man's bad habits--I don't know

what happened.  It's all changed.  Anyway, they're

great people.

   

   Cole:  Do they have a totally different view of

economics than, like, you and your husband would?

   

   Heflin:  Well, they don't....  I don't think they

can look into the future and plan--not many of 'em can

look into the future and plan for saving money or

putting groceries away or whatever.  They sort of live

on a day-to-day basis.  At least that's the way I see

it.  And I don't....  Well, maybe it's just as well.

Some few people were farsighted enough that they’d put

flour and sugar and coffee in a fairly safe place--safe

as they could make it--and sort of keep it there, so

they had an extra source of food if anything happened.

   

   And of course when they took the sheep off the

reservation, that was a terrible blow to everybody,

because a lot of the families were reduced to living on

welfare.  There was no work.  They had to do something,

so the government provided welfare, which I don't think

is very good for anybody, and I hope somehow or other

they'll work their way out of it.

   

   Cole:  When you were talking about removing the

sheep, was that the 1930 reduction?

   

   Heflin:  Let's see, we were still down at Oljato.

That was 19....  (pause)  I guess that was about 19....

Probably about 1939, somewhere in there, when they were

reducing all the sheep on the reservation because of

the big dam down here at....  What do I want to say?

   

   Cole:  Lake Mead?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah, Hoover Dam is what I'm trying to say.

All the sediment was washing and filling up Hoover Dam,

so the Navajos would have to reduce their livestock.

That was a very bad time for everybody.

   

   Cole:  So you were at Oljato when that happened?

   

   Heflin:  Yes.

   

   Cole:  What about weavers and artisans?  Did you

have....

   

   Heflin:  The weavers at Oljato weren't very good

weavers.  When we moved over to Shonto, there were many

women over there who did very fine weaving.  I think

they had learned some of that from Tuba City people.  I

don't know whether the government had sent out somebody

to help them weave better rugs or what, but anyway they

did a better type of weaving, so we got better rugs

over at Shonto than we did at Oljato.  The rugs at

Oljato were very poor quality--at that time.  I think

they've improved lately.  Well, they're not doing that

much weaving anymore--people don't have to weave.  They

can go out and get jobs, or they get welfare, and they

don't have to weave.  Weaving is hard work when you

have to wash the wool, dye it, spin it.  That's not

easy.  And then put up your looms, because you have to

have a permanent place to put your loom.  You can't

take it down every few days and move.

   

   Cole:  So when you were out in that Navajo Mountain

country, did you and your husband ever venture out onto

Navajo Mountain yourself?

   

   Heflin:  No, we actually didn't go into Navajo

Mountain, because the only way we could get in there

would be with a pack outfit, or horses, and we didn't

have any horses at that time to ride, so we didn't get

into the Navajo Mountain area very much.  It's full of

deep canyons, and unless you know your way you'd get

lost anyway.

   

   And then when uranium mining came in, they employed

some of the Navajos to mine the uranium, which was very

dangerous, people found out later, and a lot of the

Indians got very ill and died.  They've closed up all

those mines now, although I understand that the pits

are still there.  I mean, you could go and fall into it

and get lost forever, I suppose.

   

   Cole:  Was that in the 1940s they were doing that,

or the fifties?

   

   Heflin:  Probably 1950, when they were doing all

that--yeah, about 1950.

   

   Cole:  What happened, do you recall when World

War II broke out?  Did a lot of the Navajos from your

area....

   

   Heflin:  A lot of the Navajos from our area went out

to work on the railroads.  There were very few people

who spoke English well enough in the area we lived in,

to be drafted into the Army, but they were taken out to

work on the railroad.  My husband used to take 'em out

and put 'em on....  Let's see, he took 'em to Flagstaff

and put 'em on the train there, and then they'd send

'em to various places in the U.S. to work on the

railroad.  They got a lot of education, they learned a

lot, because a lot of those people had never been off

the reservation, you see.  So that was a real

experience for them.  It was good.

   

   Cole:  Did that create change in the trading post?

   

   Heflin:  Yes, it did, to some extent.  They came

back and they wanted different commodities.  Some of

the foodstuffs were different.  And I guess....  I was

trying to think about what time they began to buy cars.

My goodness!  I guess after we moved over to--probably

about 19 ... 57 or 1960, somewhere in there, they began

to buy cars.

   

   Steiger:  Up until then, it was all horse and wagon

and foot?

   

   Heflin:  Uh-huh, and foot--pack horse and wagon and

foot, uh-huh.

   

   g Cole:  When you were in Kayenta, I know that

Wetherills ran a lot of pack trips and stuff like that.

   

   Heflin:  Yes, John Wetherill did, he used to take

horseback trips.  Took Teddy Roosevelt back into the

Navajo Mountain area.  He was a very pleasant,

wonderful man, John Wetherill was.  And then we knew

Louise.  In fact, we bought Louise and Clyde Caldwell's

[phonetic spelling] place there at Kayenta.  And then

my husband built a bigger trading post and we lived

there for some time.

   

   Cole:  What was that trading post called?

   

   Heflin:  Kayenta Trading Post.

   

   Cole:  But you didn't continue taking dudes out

into....

   

   Heflin:  Oh, no.  No, no.  That took extra skill,

and you had to like it.  John Wetherill was a special

person.

   

   Steiger:  How so?

   Heflin:  Well, he was a person that inspired trust

in people.  I guess that's the only way I can put it.

And he was a very quiet, gentle man, but people trusted

him.

   

   Cole:  And then your trading post in Kayenta, was

that still a bullpen operation, or behind the counter?

   

   Heflin:  No, we made a modern trading post this

time.  My husband built a modern trading post, and

people could go help themselves off the shelves.  Then

they brought it up.  We had a little checkout stand.

So it was a modern, yes.  This one was a modern one,

not the old type with the bullpen and all that stuff.

   

   Steiger:  And what predicated that change?

   

   Heflin:  Well, my husband just felt that people

should be--we should all grow a little bit, and it

would be easier for us and better for the Navajos if

they had a modern type trading post there.  And it did.

It did increase the business a great deal, because

people felt free to come in and pick up stuff, bring it

up and have it checked out.

   

   Cole:  And so what year would that have been, when

you made that change?

   

   Heflin:  Probably in the sixties, 1962 or 1963,

somewhere in there.  I don't really remember, and I

don't have anything to look it up by.

   

   Cole:  I assume you had to have leases.

   

   Heflin:  Oh, yes.

   

   Cole:  How did that work?

   

   Heflin:  Well, you had to go to Window Rock and get

permission to put a trading post, or buy a lease.  You

couldn't just go out and buy a lease from the

Wetherills or whoever you were buying [the post] from--

you had to go to Window Rock and get permission from

the government over there, and from the Navajo Tribe,

before you ever went into the trading post business, or

ever bought the trading post.  Otherwise, you couldn't

go on the reservation.

   

   Cole:  Would you ever have any problem with that, or

was it pretty simple to do?

   

   Heflin:  I think it was pretty....  I know it was

fairly simple to do.  But they did....  I think the

reason for this, they were trying to keep—What do I

say?—thieves and robbers going out there and living on

the reservation and stealing from the Indians.  They

sort of had to know about your character, your

background, and what you'd done before you went there,

and what kind of a reputation you had--more or less.

It wasn't very detailed, but they did check it to some

extent--which I guess was good, I don't know.

   

   Cole:  What separates a good trader from a bad one?

   

   Heflin:  Well, one that's honest with the Indians--

that's the first requirement.  And they know when

they're being cheated.  They're not stupid.  And the

only reason they went to some of these trading posts, I

want to tell you, is because they could get bootleg

liquor.  And that's a very bad thing to say, but it's

the honest to goodness truth.  Not many of 'em--very

few.  There's always a few that spoil the pot, but

there were a few who did that.  But they didn't last

very long, either, and that was good.

   

   Cole:  So what would you say you learned from the

Navajo?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I learned there's very little

difference between my skin (chuckles) and their skin.

For one thing, I think I learned to be patient.

They're really very patient.  You can't believe it, but

most of 'em are very patient people.  I think I learned

to be tolerant of other people.  They may not like your

skin color, but they treat you nice, you see--or they

did when I lived out there.  The only people I ever

heard them say anything against--they don't

particularly like black people for some reason.  I

don't know why that is.  I mean, I really don't know,

because I haven't had that much experience with black

people.  I don't know.  Strange how we people are--get

prejudices for no reason.

   

   Cole:  Do you think they learned anything from you?

   

   Heflin:  No, I doubt it.  They said all white people

were crazy, didn't matter.  They looked down on us,

they think we're a bunch of renegades, most of the

time.  But that's all right.  I think the younger ones

are getting much more tolerant, because they've been

out in the world.  Many, many of them go out to

Phoenix, Los Angeles, and get good jobs.  And they live

out there.  Unfortunately, they don't ever come back to

the reservation, and the people on the reservation, I

don't think have grown very much.  If you don't get off

the reservation, I don't think you grow.

   

   Cole:  And then if you could, describe what your

husband was like.

   

   Heflin:  My husband was a short, fat man, and he

liked everybody.  He really liked the Navajos, and

because he liked them, they liked him.  He got along

fine with 'em.

   

   Cole:  Did he learn to speak Navajo?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah, he learned to speak it fairly well--

enough to get along in the trading post business.  They

called him "the fat one."  They liked him, I think,

because they felt that he gave them a fair bargain, and

he always paid the highest prices he possibly could for

their livestock--their lambs, their wool, or whatever.

He used to buy most of the wool out there at Shonto, in

that area.  People would bring it to him from Navajo

Mountain and various places, just because he paid 'em a

good price.  And he was honest with 'em, even though he

did take the bags apart to see how many rocks were in

it.  (laughter)  They appreciated that.

   

   Steiger:  We interviewed a guy named Bob Bolton, who

was a salesman, and he told us a story about your dad

gettin' a sack of wool that had a differential in it.

Do you remember that?

   

   Heflin:  I vaguely remember something about it.  I

know we got bags of wool with rocks in 'em, but I'd

forgotten he got that.

   

   Steiger:  He told this story, he said your dad got

this wool with the differential in it, and so he took

the differential out and kept it and when that same guy

came back the next spring, he put it in his seed corn.

(laughter)

   

   Heflin:  (laughing) I don't remember what he did

with it anyway.  That could have happened.  But anyway,

it's all part of life.

   

   Cole:  One thing that's kind of interested Lew and

I–we've heard different traders tell stories about

experiences they had with Navajo medicine men or mystic

experiences.  Did you have anything like that happen to

you?

   

   Heflin:  Well, they're very....  Huh, what should I

say?  Maybe superstitious isn't the word, but they do

believe in mysticism very, very much.  And all these

medicine men, they frighten people by telling 'em

stories.  And there are some strange things which

happened.  I remember one time one of our clerks in the

store, Dick Brown, came in and we were at lunch.  He

came in and he was just almost shaking.  One of the old

medicine men had come in and put a curse on him, and he

said, "I have to go right now.  I've got to go have a

sing, 'cause I don't want this thing to happen."  So of

course we let him.  He left and went out and had a

ceremony to get rid of the curse.  It's very, very

important to them.  And I do think--or at least I

gather, from what my children tell me--that all this

big change that's come about out there has made them

more superstitious than ever.  I guess wouldn't you say

because they're frightened?  I mean, we're all

frightened of change, and I think that's one of the

things that's going on right now.  So it isn't

something that's diminishing, it's something that's

increasing.  And I suppose it will, until they get more

education.

   

   [END SIDE A; BEGIN SIDE B]

   

   Cole:  This is Brad Cole from Northern Arizona

University.  It's July 15, 1999.  This is Tape 2 of an

interview with Mrs. Mildred Heflin.

   

   I was sort of curious, Mildred, if you and your

husband were ever members of the United Indian Traders

Association?

   

   Heflin:  Uh-huh.

   

   Cole:  Do you remember when you joined?

   

   Heflin:  I honestly don't remember.  I hadn't paid

that much attention.  But he used to go to the meetings

all the time in Gallup, I know that.  But when we

joined, I don't remember.

   

   Cole:  Would you ever go with him to the meetings?

   

   Heflin:  No, I stayed home and ran the trading post.

I never had time to go to Gallup.  (laughter)

   

   Cole:  Would Reuben talk about what went on at all

when he came back?

   

   Heflin:  Yeah.  They discussed what was going on out

in the world, and how it related to our situation on

the reservation and so forth, which was very important.

   

   Cole:  Do you remember any of the bigger issues the

organization dealt with?

   

   Heflin:  Isn't that awful?  I don't even remember

that.  (pause)  I do remember that they were very

concerned about the stock reduction, of course.

Everybody was concerned about that.  But I don't think

they took any active part in trying to stop it, because

it wasn't anything that anybody out here in this little

group out here in the West could do anything about.

   

   But they were concerned about people being honest

with the Indians and treating them right.  It was very

important, you know.  That much I do remember about it.

   

   Cole:  At one point in time, the Association gave

out--they called 'em hallmark numbers, where a trader

got a number that they were supposed to attach to rugs

they sold, or jewelry.  Do you know if you ever had

a....

   

   Heflin:  We left the trading post business before

that time happened.  My nephew who lives in

Albuquerque, did that, I know, because I heard him

mention it.  But that was after we had left the

reservation.

   

   Cole:  What's your nephew's name?

   

   Heflin:  Raymond Drolet.  He's a professor over at

the U of A.

   

   Cole:  Yeah, Willow's mentioned his name.

   

   Heflin:  Uh-huh.

   

   Cole:  How were the bigger trading companies, like

the Babbitts, perceived among the traders, do you know?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I don't know how some people thought

they were bad, but we always got along, we thought they

were great.  I mean, they always treated us well, and

they were fair in whatever they did.  We never had any

difficulty.  But I guess some people didn't much....

There's always somebody that complains, you know, no

matter what.  (laughter)

   

   Cole:  Do you remember any of the people at Babbitts

that you worked with?

   

   Heflin:  (pause)  Well, actually, I didn't work with

them that much.  My husband would have remembered, but

I really don't.

   

   Cole:  And then did you folks ever--was there any

animosity, or how did you perceive traders that lived

in the border towns?  Were they the same as you, or

different?

   

   Heflin:  Well, some of those traders that lived in

border towns sold liquor--they could sell liquor.  Of

course that didn't make us very happy, because we

didn't have any police protection.  I think we had one

policeman for the whole Kayenta District.  That would

be thousands of miles.  John Long was his name, and he

used to come up every now and then, ride through the

area, and let people know he was around, but actually,

I don't think we had that many problems then.  (pause)

Even though they did have bootleg liquor and people

would get drunk, and bash each other's heads in every

now and then.  I guess it was all kept very quiet.

Nobody said much about it.  They didn't bother us,

so....

   

   Cole:  How would you describe how trading has

changed over time?

   

   Heflin:  Well, the credit is the biggest thing.  The

credit and pawn is the biggest thing that has changed.

When they put in all these new regulations about pawn,

the traders just didn't put up with it, they wouldn't

take it--I mean, they couldn't afford to.  So all the

pawn went off the reservation to pawn brokers.  And of

course pawn brokers, they sell it after a little while.

So many of the good old pieces are long gone to

collectors or somebody else.  And that's one of the

biggest changes I see.

   

   And then, of course, the strange high counters and

merchandise all behind the counter--it's all out in

modern stores now, and people can help themselves like

anybody else, and take it up to the checkout counter.

Those are the biggest changes.  And I know it's for the

best.

   

   Cole:  Were you still in business when the whole

change in pawn regulation happened?

   

   Heflin:  No, we weren't in the trading post business

at that time.  But I do know from hearing from other

people that they just wouldn't take it.  They couldn't

take it under those conditions.  So a lot of it went

off the reservation.

   

   Cole:  If you had to describe your favorite memories

from the different posts you have lived at, do you have

one or two you'd like to tell us?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I think my favorite memories at

Oljato were seeing these people come in from Navajo

Mountain with their donkeys laden with bags of wool.

The poor little things were practically hidden.  They

would drive them in there, and we always had a hogan

out there where they could spend the night.  So they'd

bring their wool in, unload the donkeys.  My husband

would weigh it up.  Then they'd come in probably--

they'd buy a few groceries that night, and then the

next day they'd come in and spend the whole day

trading, because that's where they bought, sometimes,

almost a year's supply of stuff to take back to their

hogans.

   

   Cole:  Why do you think you and your husband stayed

in the trading business?

   

   Heflin:  I guess because we liked the Indians, we

felt comfortable, and liked it out there.  And we liked

the area.  Most people don't, but I did.  (laughter)

They think it's a dreadful place.

   

   Cole:  Do you have any Navajo friends that you see

now?

   Heflin:  Well, my adopted son is a full-blood

Navajo.  I see his family off and on.  I see his

mother.  You know, so many of my friends have died, I

really don't have any left anymore, which makes me very

sad, but that's the way it is when you get to be my

age.  (laughter)

   

   Cole:  What do you think the future of the trading

business is?

   

   Heflin:  Well, like anyplace else, all modern

stores, which they say is probably a very good thing.

Basha's is out there now, and they have big grocery

stores, quite modern, very nice.  And that's fine.  I

think that's very good.  I'm glad.

   

   Cole:  Do you have any other questions, Lew?  Lew

always has great questions I've never thought of.

   

   Steiger:  Well, not always!  (laughs)

   

   Cole:  Now I've put him on the spot!

   

   Steiger:  No, nothing leaps instantly to mind, but I

know you've made some notes, and you made a little list

of stuff that you thought was noteworthy that you've

been referring to.  Have we covered all of that?

   

   Heflin:  Yes, we've covered it.

   

   Steiger:  I guess the only thing I could think of to

ask is your dad seems to figure in pretty prominently

in all of this, and I know Willow has already written

this book about him, but if you wouldn't mind maybe

just describing him a little bit, just for our project,

because people mention him a lot--just what kind of guy

he was and stuff like that.

   

   Heflin:  Well, of course I'm prejudiced.  (laughter)

I see my father as a very outgoing person, he liked

everybody:  liked Indians and Mexicans, anybody.  He

just liked people.  He was Irish.  His father was

Irish.  His father came down from Canada.  Anyway, he

liked to talk, and he liked to tell stories.  We kids

used to like to hear him tell stories that his

grandfather's family told him.  And I always remember

the story he told us about my Grandfather Carson when

he was courting my grandmother, who lived on the south

side of the San Juan River, and they had to cross the

river.  Well, my great-grandfather Phelps [phonetic

spelling] would come across in a little boat and pick

these--it was my grandfather and his brother who were

going over and courting these young ladies on the other

side of the river.  Anyway, they got in a small boat,

and my grandfather stood up, and of course the boat

turned over right in the middle of the river and they

all got soaking wet.  (laughter)  And my Grandfather

Phelps didn't think much of that.  He thought that was

kind of foolish, called him "the damned puke."

(laughter)  Oh, dear.

   

   But you know, you wonder how they made a livelihood

when you see the barren country up there, and think

there were no irrigation ditches or anything.  You

wonder how they ever survived.  Guess people are tough.

   

   Cole:  They all seem like they did a lot of

different things to get by.  Now we all have one job.

   

   Heflin:  That's right.  They had to do a lot of

different things, or they couldn't survive.  Yeah,

you're right.

   

   Cole:  Well, if you could go back and change

anything about your life, would you do that?

   

   Heflin:  Well, I think the only thing I would do, I

would try to get more education.  I think that's very

important--in this day and age anyway.

   

   Cole:  Well, it looks, with all these books around

here, like you're doin' a pretty good job.

   

   Heflin:  (laughs)  Well, I wouldn't say that.

   

   Cole:  Is there anything else you'd like to add?

   

   Heflin:  I don't think there's anything I can think

of right now.

   

   Cole:  Well, thank you very much.

   

   Heflin:  You're very welcome.

   

   [END OF INTERVIEW]