Day Family Collection

PH.120.1-88

Volume:

91 black-and-white photographs, 9 negatives

Views Include:

Eastern Arizona: ranching and trading posts, ca. 1880-1945

Portrait(s):

The Day Family; Navajos

Biographic Note:

Samuel Edward Day (1845-1925) was born in Ohio. He married Anna Burbridge in 1878. Day was a civil engineer by trade and came to the southwest in 1879 surveying the first rail line to ascend Pikes Peak. In 1884 he moved to Arizona Territory, Apache County, homesteading a ranch in the area known as Cienega Amarilla, southwest of present day Window Rock. When St. Michael's Mission was established in the 1890's, Day persuaded the priests to school his children, while they, in exchange, taught the priests Navajo.

In 1900 Charles Day, the oldest son, left the ranch to begin trading at the Bill Beaver Trading Post near Chinle. In 1901 Samuel Day sold the ranch to assist Charles, then built the trading post which still stands at Canyon de Chelly.

Charles Day was appointed by the Department of the Interior in 1903 as custodian of the Canyon de Chelly and del Muerto to prevent unauthorized excavations. He served as Navajo guide, interpreter and educator to Edward S. Curtis, author and photographer of The North American, a 20 volume classic. Charles helped preserve Navajo culture by translating many important myths, chants, ceremonials and children's stories from Navajo into English. A U.S. Marshall, Day died in an automobile accident in 1918.

Samuel Day, Jr. (1889-1944), also a trader and later a Forest Service employee, was one of the first Anglos to reproduce Navajo sand paintings in a permanent form, on paper and wood using adhesives. He also served as adviser to the Fred Harvey Company on the use of Indian symbols and designs for the Harvey Hotels.

Cline Library
Special Collections and Archives Department
Northern Arizona University