LOYD FOUTZ INTERVIEW

   

   [BEGIN SIDE 1]

   

   This is Karen Underhill with Northern Arizona

University.  We're here at Beclahbeto Trading Post,

interviewing Loyd Foutz.  It is Wednesday, August 12,

[1998], at 11:35 a.m.  [Brad Cole is also present.]

   

   Underhill:  Mr. Foutz, thank you for agreeing to the

interview.  We'll try to make it a painless process

here for you.  Can we start with where and when you

were born?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I was born in Kirtland, New Mexico,

September 26, 1926.  I was born right close to the LDS

church, and I had five sisters older than I was, and

they were going to school.  The man that was laying

brick on the church--they were redoing the church there

at that time--he saw the girls and he said, "I heard

that you have a new baby brother at your home."  They

said, "Yes, we do."  He said, "Well, what did you name

him?"  And they said, "Well, they haven't named him

yet."  So he told 'em, "You go home and tell your mama

to name him Loyd."  So that's where I got my name.

   

   Underhill:  How great!

   

   Foutz:  'Til he died, he almost always called me on

my birthday.

   

   Underhill:  Oh, how nice!  And that was his name,

too?

   

   Foutz:  His name was Loyd--Loyd Taylor.  I kinda had

to live up to my name.  (laughter)  Not too well, but I

tried.

   

   Underhill:  Very good.  And who were your parents?

   

   Foutz:  Elmer Foutz was my dad.  My mother was Marie

Elizabeth Brimhall [phonetic spelling].  So I have a

Brimhall line, also a Foutz line.

   

   Underhill:  And what were your parents like?

   

   Foutz:  Well, my dad was a slim fellow.  He never

did carry a lot of weight, but he later in life was

crippled most of his life.  So he drove a truck.  And

as I remember my mother, the best about her, and the

most important things about her was during the

Depression times, we didn't even know we were poor

people.  She made everything so good, and we had it so

good, that all the neighborhood kids came in, and they

had it so good.  So they didn't even know they had a

Depression either.  So she could make…  When she

cooked, regardless of how many we had there, they all

left full.  It was amazing, and it happened all our

lives.  We could go there and have family get-togethers

and I don't care how many came late, they all went away

full.  She never ran short of food.  I think that was

really what you'd call an amazing thing about her.  She

just had a way about her that nobody else had.  We were

real proud.

   

   Underhill:  And she must have been organized, to

have a large family.

   

   Foutz:  Yeah, she was.  Laundry for ten kids--I

mean, she had ten kids.  And so we grew up, we had

things well--clean clothes.  They were ragged and

sometimes torn and patched, but they were clean.  And

our Dad's were clean.  And I can't say that about all

my neighbors.  We didn't stay with our neighbors too

often, but we tried to a time or two, and we got up and

went home, 'cause their beds were dirty.  (laughter)

So we had people at our house, we didn't go anyplace,

because we felt at home in our own home--other people's

home, we didn't.  The other neighborhood kids always

liked to be at our house because it was a good

atmosphere.

   

   Underhill:  What values do you think you got from

your parents?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, golly, I don't know.  My dad liked to

drink, as I could always recall.  We tried it at times,

when we got older, but never liked it too well.  I

could say probably the smoking habit--he had a smoking

habit--and all ten kids had the smoking habit at one

time, but every one of 'em was able to kick the habit

in later years--all but two sisters, and they died with

the habit.  The others, all were able to kick the

habit.  I believe it was a serious habit with

everybody--you know how that is.  When you get to

smokin', it's a serious habit.  I mean, it's not a good

habit.  So everybody was able to kick it but those two

sisters.  And the drinkin' habit wasn't all that much.

So it was a good life.  I mean, she always had clothes

ready for us for Sunday.  If she could get us to go, we

had clothes ready.  That's what she'd tell us every

Sunday.  "Your clothes are ready.  You get out of here

and go to church."  We didn't always do it.  We had to

walk two miles--that was a big drawback.  But we

enjoyed life there.  We had a lot to do.  We had to

milk cows and get in chores and get up at four o'clock,

build a fire in the morning.  We took turns.  Daddy

would holler, "Time to build a fire!"  My brother Jay,

and my younger brother, Bruce--he didn't ever take up

trading--Jay and my younger brother, Hank got a pawn

shop and took up trading, but Bruce never did.  But the

three of us slept together, and we'd always punch each

other when Daddy would holler.  And he wasn't one to

wait too long, so whoever was guilty jumped up pretty

quick and got the fire built.  (laughter)  We didn't

wait 'til he came to tell us it was time--we did it.

But that was good for us, we enjoyed it.  Fun life, the

way they did.

   We didn't have much when we were kids.  We got one

bicycle for Christmas one time, and that was for the

three of us.  Everything we got, it was for the three

of us--a horse or whatever.  Whatever we had, had to do

for the three of us.  We made out.  It wasn't good, but

it was fun.  So we had a good life.  Like I say, we

didn't have anything, but we didn't know we didn't have

it.  It was all right.  We went to school, and in those

days we didn't have a lot of help in school.  With ten

kids, as I recall, we didn't get much help at home,

learning in school and books and things, but we all got

by.  I probably was the one that got the worst grades

out of the whole family.

   

   Underhill:  What did you learn in school that has

been useful to you?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I don't know, maybe some of the

teachers kept telling me I got a good personality.

"You'll find something that will help you with."  So I

guess maybe that's why I've come to the reservation.

Maybe I could use that.  I didn't know it at the time,

but it's helped, I'm sure.  The people out here have

been real excellent to me, and I've enjoyed it out here

on the reservation--me and my family, my wife.  We just

have made some friends out here that just think the

world of us, and we think the world of them.  If they

have something, they invite us to it, and vice versa--

we invite them to the things we have.  So it's been a

real good relationship with most of these people.  Like

my wife says, "You can't go anyplace else and find

royalty, to where they make you feel like (with

emotion) that you're somebody."  Excuse me.

   

   Underhill:  No, that's powerful!

   

   Foutz:  And ___________.  But that's what we are

sayin'.  ____________ they put us right next to them.

The rest of the family were setting someplace else.  We

sat right next to them, so it was kind of royal

treatment.

   

   Underhill:  What did you hope to do when you were

younger?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I always respected my dad quite a

little bit.  He talked Navajo.  My dad was a trader,

and he talked a lot of Navajo, and when the Navajos

would come to the house and stuff, why, I thought,

"That'd be nice to know how to talk that language."

It's interesting and fun.  I don't know as that's what

it was, or anything else.  I don't know.  I'm like Jay,

went to the Navy.  I joined up.  That was in, I think,

1945 or something, when the war was almost dwindling

down quite a bit in different areas.  So I volunteered

and I went in the fall when I'd just turned eighteen.

I went into the Navy.  I was just a snot-nosed kid, I

know, and I'd never been out of town (chuckles) any

further than Gallup maybe you might say.  So I went to

Gallup to get on the train.  From then on I was a

changed kid, because I was no more a kid.  So when I

got in the service I enjoyed the service, I really did.

I saw a lot of the world.  I was aboard a small

aircraft carrier, one of those converted ones, and our

duty was to train pilots to land on 'em.  Then we'd

qualify 'em out of San Diego, California, and we were

gone about a month, maybe, out in the ocean to qualify

these pilots, and then we'd bring 'em back in, and then

we'd take out another squadron, and we'd do the same

with them for months and months.  Then we went down in

the South Pacific, and when the war was over, we were

in Japan.  From Japan we went to China and picked up

1,800 Marines and brought them back to the States.

   

   Underhill:  Happy Marines!

   

   Foutz:  They sure were!  And they slept on our flat

deck, all those 1,200 Marines, and it was quite

crowded, to say the least.  But they were happy to be

coming home, because that was when China was just

starting to have a lot of turmoils, and they weren't

safe, really, ________, so they were glad to see us

come and get 'em.  They decommissioned our ship up in

Bremerton, Washington.  After that, after the war was

over, [we] came on home.  I'd never had a job other

than…  Well, I take that [back].  I got home for a

week, and Russell Foutz, my cousin, called me, and

said, "I've got a job for you."  And I said, "Well, is

that right?  I'm not ready to go to work yet, I just

got home."  (laughter)  He said, "Well, I want you to

come…"  They had the Gallegos Store out where this

Navajo-Napi, where the old farm and stuff is out there.

They had some land out there, and they owned the store

out there, and they had a big sheep camp.  They owned a

lot of sheep in those days.  They changed it to cows

later and stuff, but at that time they had sheep when I

went out there.  I spent over a year out there with

'em, him and his wife.  Kathy--you probably interviewed

her--she was a baby at that time.

   

   Underhill:  This is Kathy over at Teec Nos Pos?

   

   Foutz:  At Teec Nos Pos.  She was a baby at that

time.  So I helped--the first year of her life, we were

real close--and I haven't been since!  (laughter)

That's neither here nor there.  She's a good lady.

   After I left there I went seismographin'.  We

worked, Jay and I, my kid brother.  That was when the

oil boom was just gettin' ready to get started in this

whole valley here.  There weren't any gas wells or oil

wells to speak of there at all--probably not any.  But

we went seismographing, and they drilled these holes

and put powder down in 'em and blew 'em up, and they

recorded all the things that happened.  We went all

over San Juan County, and almost to Gallup and to Cuba,

Dulce, Cortez--all over San Juan County.  It was a good

job, we enjoyed it, but we had to get up real early,

and it was a ten-hour day, five days a week.  But it

paid us good.  It was some of the better jobs, because

there weren't any jobs in there.  And after I did that

a while, I did go in the oil field business.  I worked

there about a year.  In fact, I worked on probably one

of the first drilling wells that came into San Juan

County.  We went up to Wyoming and tore it down and

moved it down here.  Went out of Bloomfield and drilled

about two wells out there before I…  Well, and then

we went to…  I don't know whether that was in San

Juan County--probably is.  I had to go up to Durango

and back down across the San Juan River there, and

drilled a well right up on the bank of the San Juan

River there.  That's probably one of the first wells

that was drilled in the industry in the country,

because there wasn't very much going on at that point.

   

   Cole:  Did they hire many Navajos in the oil

business?

   

   Foutz:  They didn't at that time.  I don't think

there were any for years and years.  But in the last

few years…  They're really not that oil-field-

minded, either.  Down at Aneth, I think, down here, on

their own reservation, I think they have a lot of

employees down there.  But as far as the drilling part,

I don't think they were as involved there as they are

now that it's drilled--roustabouts, you might say, and

well heads and taking care of that part of it.  But as

far as drilling was concerned, I don't think they were

that…  That was a hard job.  I don't know as [their]

experience and stuff…  They might have been able to

hold up, but a lot of 'em wouldn't have.  They weren't

available.  They didn't have the transportation to get

to the…  A lot of 'em, when I was out here,

transportation was a big thing.  I mean, wagons�they

used nothing but wagons.  We sold wagons, $495.  They

shipped 'em from Indiana out here, $495, brand new.  We

sold 'em at the store there at Teec Nos Pos, for years

and years.  Then all of a sudden they got to where they

got outdated transportation.  Years ago, when we first

started at Teec Nos Pos, most of our customers we

didn't see but once a month.  I mean, they came in and

bought their flour and their staple things--baking

powder, their salt, their salt pork, and potatoes--the

things that they really needed.  They had their own

meat, they didn't have to worry about that.  Most of

them had their own meat, so all they needed was the

staple items to make food.  They still, most of 'em

have to have those staple items before they can make a

meal.  To this day, they have to have their baking

powder, salt, and make their bread.  They start

basically from base.  (Underhill:  From scratch.)  Of

course a lot of 'em have other things now that they

didn't have in those days, but they made out real well,

because they had the basics, and that's what they were

used to eating.

   

   Underhill:  What year did you go to Teec Nos Pos?

   

   Foutz:  In 1949.  Got married, went out there,

within ten months I had a new boy, my only boy.  We got

in the family business real quick, which was good.

Then we had twins.  And that was another experience I

wouldn't want to go through again.  That happened in

October, the thirty-first of October.  That night, I'd

been on a big deer hunt up in Colorado and just got

home and picked up my wife in Farmington, and my mother

told [my wife], "You'd better not go to the store.

You're just too big.  That baby could come any time."

I said, "Well, it's thirty days, and I'm not going to

that store and spend thirty days by myself out there,

so she's going too, 'til that baby comes.  I'll get her

in here someway."  So she went to the store with me and

we hadn't been there I think maybe the same weekend or

the next weekend, Russell and Helen had moved out of

the store, and we were living in a little apartment

next door.  And so they moved out of the store, and so

my wife was eager to move in.  I didn't have time to

help her, I was busy in the store, and I told her, "If

you'll wait 'til after night, I'll help you."  But with

just me and one Navajo--Jay wasn't working with us

there at that time--just me and the Navajo boy--I said,

"I just don't have time to help you."  So she carried

all that stuff back and forth.  This one night she

said, "Boy, I can't hardly walk."  I said, "Well, I

understand that, but you didn't listen to me."  So we

retired pretty early that night.  About ten o'clock,

she woke me up, she said, "I think we gotta go."  I

said, "Ohhh, nooo.  I'm the only one here, and this

can't be happening."  She said, "I think so, I think

so."  So my brother was at Beclahbeto, so she got on

the phone and she called her and visited with her and

said, "I think we're in trouble over here.  I think

this baby's going to be coming tonight."  So she asked

her all the women questions and she came back in and

got me out of bed, and said, "Yeah, we're gonna leave

right now."  So I got up and got dressed.  She picked

up all the diaper bags and stuff that she had for David

and headed for the car.  She said, "I shouldn't be

carrying all this."  And I said, "Well, I don't know

why not! you moved everything from the house over here.

I don't know why you shouldn't be carrying that to the

car."  So we laughed about that, and have since, but it

wasn't too funny at the time, because she was gonna

deliver.  So that was about ten-something.

   We got to Shiprock and we told the guys we were

going to stop at Shiprock Hospital, which was a public

health hospital, but it wasn't really called that.  It

was an Indian hospital at that time.  So we stopped

there and went up and asked the ladies there if my wife

was gonna have that baby, and they said, "Well, we

can't enter her here without the doctor saying so."  So

they told us where the doctor lived, and I went up and

got him out of bed.  This was about eleven o'clock.

Got him out of bed and said, "I don't know doctor,

whether we can make Farmington or not.  [Her] water has

broken and she's having contractions and all the things

that go along with that.  I don't think we can make

it."  And he said, "Well, you go back down to the

hospital, you tell them that I said…"  So we did.

We got back down there, and they still weren't too

happy to see us, but they did let her in and got her

ready, and the doctor came and checked her.  I took off

onto some little ol' room there.  They led me off

there, just one chair and what have you.  Four walls,

but a chair right in the middle of it.  It wasn't very

big.  I sat there for quite a little while.  He came in

and said, "Well, I'm sorry to tell you, but this is as

far as you're goin' tonight."  So I went back outside.

It was raining cats and dogs out there, and I'd left my

little son out there on the floorboard.  So I went out

and checked on him, he was just sleepin' good.  So I

went back in and waited.  I didn't have too long to

wait.  About ten after twelve, the doctor come in and

said, "Got one!  A little girl."  I said, "A little

girl?!  She's too big to have a little girl."  He went

back and said, "Well, that's what we got so far."  He

went back in.  About fifteen minutes later he came back

and said, "You got another one."  So that's the first

time we'd even thought about havin' twins.  It was just

a surprise to us.  So I called my mother and told her

I'd be up to pick her up.  So I went and picked her up,

she came down, and we called a Farmington ambulance.

She knew the [Kolb?] Mortuary or the guy that worked

there that owned the mortuary, the ambulance service.

When he come, she was real close friends with him, so

_____ came down, "Hey, what are you doing here?!"  So

he picked her up, and Mother and I picked up the twins

and we carried the twins with us in my car, and took

them to the hospital that night at Farmington.

   I called my doctor, and he was out at the country

club, and he said, "Well, there's nothing I can do

tonight.  Just bring 'em to the hospital, I'll check

'em out in the morning."  He was having a big party, I

could tell, on the other end of the phone.  He was

enjoying himself that night.  So that's what we did.

We just took 'em up to the hospital there and they

checked 'em, and everything was hunky-dory.  It was

fun.  It was quite a night.  I went back to the store

the next day.

   

   Underhill:  And what is your wife's name?

   

   Foutz:  Bernie.  Well, her name's Beulah, but she

don't want to be called…  That's another story.

It'd take an hour to tell you about that one, too.  I

won't go into that now.  She likes to be called Bernie,

so we do.

   

   Underhill:  When you first came to Teec Nos Pos,

what did it look like then?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I was just kind of a kid.  Of course,

like I say, I've been around the Indians a little bit,

and I've learned a little Navajo, so I could get by.

And they nicknamed me right off, (in Navajo)

___________.  That means "slim boy."  That was when I

had the smokin' habit, and I weighed 135 pounds if I

was soakin' wet, so I was a slim boy then, to them.  I

outgrew that name, and they've had several since.  But

anyway, that's what they called me _______________.  I

got along real well with everybody there, I really did.

I tried and tried.  You know, you gotta try.  And you

have to take a lot of guff sometimes to make everything

work, you have to.  When I went there, I guess I was

too good, and I opened up the credit.  That was

probably the worst part of the whole situation.  I

opened up the credit to the Navajos there, and that was

probably the downfall, because when Russell got ready

to settle up with his partner, Kenneth Washburn, the

first year out, he told him there wasn't any money, no

split that year.  Kenneth Washburn said, "Oh, no!  This

ain't gonna be!"  So that's when they had to try to

find a way out.  Russell had to buy Kenneth out,

because he was so upset about not gettin' paid that

year for his part of the store.  So I said, "That was a

downfall.  I may have caused a lot of problem."  It's

been a bad thing with us ever since.  I guess the

credit has been our downfall, we've been too good to a

lot of people.  And it's been good for them--and us

too, I guess--but it's been a way of life.  I kind of

wish I hadn't been so easy, because they talk you out

of a lot more than they would if you…  So that's

been part of the downfall.  But that's why I guess I

like 'em so well.  That's why I stay, I guess, is

because I think I'm gonna get even with 'em.  But I'm

never gonna make it.  I keep thinkin' that one of these

days they're gonna come in and pay their bills.  They

pay all of 'em, but they don't like to pay 'em up.

Some guy the other day, he only owed a fifty-dollar

bill.  He said, "I want to pay forty-five dollars."  I

said, "How come you just want to pay forty-five

dollars?"  And he said, "Well, if I pay you all of it,

you probably won't let me have any more credit."  And I

said, "That's just the opposite of the way I operate!

I want you to pay it all up, and then it's open for

you.  If you owe me five, then I wonder why you didn't

pay it all up."  He said, "Is that right?!  I thought

that was different than that way."  "You learned

somethin' today."  I think we've had a lot of

disconceptions that way too.  But, you know, they

really didn't understand what you expect of them, and

vice versa.  We didn't communicate a lot with that kind

of…

   

   Underhill:  How would you describe the Navajo

approach to money?

   

   Foutz:  To money?

   

   Underhill:  And credit.

   

   Foutz:  Well, money's important to 'em, but it

doen't last long.  If you don't get it the first day,

forget it, you're not gonna get it.  If they miss you

on the first of the month, 9 times out of 10, or 99

times out of 100, you're not gonna get it that month--

you'd just as well forget about it--'cause they had a

reason for it, and they're not gonna pay you that

month.  But if you're kinda forgiving and whatever, if

you believe the story that they have, and they can make

it good enough, you go on and you do ____________.

   

   Underhill:  _______________.

   Foutz:  If they make the story good enough, chances

are they go home with something.  That's 99 times out

of 100, too, that they talk you out…

   

   Underhill:  What's a good story?  Do you remember a

good story?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I don't know as it's…  Most of the

time it's that they've had a problem with the family.

The family needed money for a medicine man, or school

kids.  They really do have excuses for it.  Most of the

time they do, but the bad part of it is, that I've been

experienced with, is when they did, if you let 'em have

an extra fifty, they still owed you for the next fifty

the next month.  They didn't worry about that fifty,

they worried about what they'd done the month before.

They paid what they regularly paid, but they didn't

want to pay the fifty--that was there, that stuck there

from now on.  So that was the bad part of saying, "Yes,

I'll go ahead and let you have the groceries today."

But they had forgotten that they used the money and

they wanted to pay it back next month--that didn't

matter, they needed what they ordinarily needed anyway.

They needed it and you had to take it, you had to go

with it, or else you had a fight, and who wants a

fight?  Or an argument, not a fight--an argument,

really--you'd have an argument with 'em.  And they

usually won!  That's been my experience.  They went

home madder than a hornet sometimes, but the next day

they come back and we worked out the problems they had.

I've heard 'em say, "Boy, you're goin' to the devil!

We're gonna kick you out of here!"  And even the

councilmen at times, the one that went to Window Rock

and did all the good things that you was supposed to do

for you, he'd tell you, "We're gonna get rid of you,"

if you didn't do what he wanted you to do.  So

sometimes you didn't sleep good that night 'cause you

had an argument with somebody that was kinda high up,

and you didn't do what he wanted you to do.  Maybe you

could have done without so much friction and stuff, but

a day or two later it would all work its way out.

   I have kind of a philosophy:  hang it on the shelf

and put it up there and don't take it down for a few

days.  Chances are, it's gonna work its way out.  Most

of the time it has.  You just have to kind of forget

about it for a few days and it'll work its way back.

First thing you know, it's back into the circle, and

you never know you had the problem.  So I guess

probably that's…  The good thing about it, that's

what they tell me all the time.  "Well, sure, I didn't

pay you this month, but where you goin'?  I'm not goin'

anywhere, I'm gonna be here.  Where you goin'?  What's

your hurry?"  So that's basically their philosophy,

"I'll be back.  Where you goin'?  If you're leavin',

then that's too bad."  So far, I haven't left.  I might

someday, I don't know.  After almost fifty years, it's

about time I do something, I think.  But I enjoy this.

My wife likes it.  She doesn't come out all that much,

but she does come out, and they make her feel good when

she does.  She really goes back home sayin', "I just

really was blessed today to go out there and 'get them

hugs,'" she calls it.

   

   Underhill:  At Teec Nos Pos in the early years, did

you have a bull pen?

   

   Foutz:  Yeah, we had the bull pen that came in the

front door, and we had a wooden gate in the back, a

swinging gate there.  And the bull pen went around both

sides.  We had dry goods all one side, and then the

groceries and stuff all on the other side.  Then we had

a big wareroom in the back.  Yeah, there was a great

big ol' bull pen.  They stood out in there.  It was

round, kind of like a horseshoe.  We had the old

kerosene sprinkler can.  We'd go around there every

morning, sweeping the floors--an old cement floor--and

we'd keep the dust down.  We'd kind of dust it down

with a little kerosene and sweep all around that.  The

main thing that I kept my wife--my wife would have

liked to work in the store.  Of course, she had those

three kids under nineteen months.  She didn't have much

time to help me.  She wanted me to help her.  But TB

was running rampant at that time--I mean bad.  Just a

lot of these people died with that, right in that area.

A lot of 'em were in sanitariums.  And so it was bad,

so I didn't want her to work in the store.  If I caught

it, I felt like I was strong enough, maybe I could get

rid of it.  But her, raising a family, exposing the

kids to it, I just felt like it wasn't the right thing

to do, so she didn't work in the store.  She'd come in

the store, get what she needed, and right back out.

   

   Cole:  Were there traders you knew that contracted

TB?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I had it.  I took some pills a year

one time.  They gave me that test on my arm.  I didn't

know I had any symptoms or anything of it, but I took

some pills for a year and got whatever it was out of my

system.  That was after things had probably got a lot

better--cleanliness--and a lot of things had changed

for the better.  And so yeah.  But I didn't have any

cough.  I didn't know I had anything.  I wouldn't have

known I had it, if I would have had it.  I never did

contract it, and it didn't go to any of the others.

That's as far as it went--nobody else in the family

ever tested or anything for it.  But it was bad, it was

bad news.  Real bad.  A lot of people died with it.

Some of 'em would go to Phoenix, and Albuquerque, and

all over, where they had the sanitariums.  Spent lots

of time there.  Some of 'em come back _______.  Good

treatment there, good treatment.

   

   Underhill:  Were many folks trying to cure it with a

medicine man and not go _________.

   

   Foutz:  Oh, they all did that.  I mean, I used to

get so mad at 'em!  They'd come in, and you'd see that

they were so sick that they shouldn't have been in the

store, they should have been in the hospital to start

with.  They'd come in and get me off to the side there

and tell me, "I've just gotta have one more little

sing.  I'm going to the doc."  They knew I was gonna

tell him, "You'd better get to the doctor!"  But they'd

come in, they'd say, "I gotta have one more sing

tonight.  Tomorrow we'll go to the doctor.  Gotta have

this medicine basket and a little cloth."  You know,

the things that the medicine man used.  They make them

buy that, to have the ceremony, and then that belongs--

the basket and the buckskin or whatever they use, the

cloth--that all goes to the medicine man, and then he'd

bring it back to the store.  I'd buy it back from him,

and the next day or two, I'd sell it back to somebody

else.  So it kind of was a vicious circle.  This basket

may heal half a dozen people in a year's time.  But I

kept 'em there all the time, and I'd buy 'em right

back.  Of course in those days, they only cost $8 to

$15, and now they cost $50 to $150.

   

   Underhill:  Who made the baskets?

   

   Foutz:  Well, I'm not sure exactly where…

(chuckles)  The Utes over in…  But the Navajos made

quite a few of 'em too.  They learned how.  But they

used to call 'em Ute medicine baskets, so the Utes made

quite a few of 'em.  Then the buckskins, they tanned

themselves.  They had to have the ears and the horns

and the tail and everything, and the less holes it had

in it, the better the medicine.  If it didn't have a

bullet hole in it, that had a lot stronger medicine

than one that had several holes in it.  They liked the

ones that didn't have holes--stronger medicine.  They

got healed quicker, I guess.  (chuckles)  But they

believed it.  I mean, I believe it too, because I

really saw it work on a lot of people.  I felt like at

times some of 'em were too sick to wait that long to

have…  I thought they were gonna die before they got

there, because they were that sick, and I could tell

they were that sick.  But they needed to have that

medicine man's approval, and do that first, and then

they could go.  It worked on a lot of 'em, it really

did.  The hospitals got to where they even told them

after they treated 'em with medicine, "You go ahead and

go back home and have this ceremony.  Go ahead and have

it, it won't hurt a thing, you go do it."  And they

did, a lot of 'em still do, even to this day.  They

still go home and have a ceremony after they've been to

the doctor.  They say, "That doctor didn't do me no

good."  But the medicine man did all the good.  So I'll

agree with it.  But the doctors didn't heal 'em, it was

the medicine man.  That's all right too, that's good.

   

   Underhill:  What other kinds of things did you do

for people?  You were part doctor?

   

   Foutz:  I used to do about everything.  I used to

read their letters for 'em.  Kids would be gone

someplace, they'd bring their letters in, and I'd read

the letters for 'em.  I'd write letters for 'em.  I

took care of a lot of business for 'em throughout the

years.  And they still like my judgement a lot.

They'll come by and they'll say, "I got this letter.  I

want you to read it.  Tell me what I should do, or what

it's all about."  I still do that.  I guess they still

have that trust in me and like me.  That's why I say

there's no place to call it quits.  I don't know, it's

tough.  And I like them as much as my own family.  Most

of 'em come by, and when they come by, they want a hug

from me.  Then they come by, these kids, been gone for

a certain time.  Hey, try to shake their hand, "No, no,

no, I don't want to shake your hand.  I want a hug!"

(laughs)  That's changed.  That's been a big change

with them because they were so bashful.  When I first

came out here, they were bashful.  I mean, they'd get

behind their mom's skirt and they'd peak around at you.

That's all!  I mean, they wouldn't say anything, do

anything.  When the mama started to walk toward the

door, they'd change positions, they went to the front

side of her, instead of the back side.  When she was

tradin', they'd hang onto that skirt.  I mean, they'd

get ahold of that, and they wouldn't turn loose.  They

were so bashful, you can't believe it.  But they've

changed so much now, these little ol' kids are so cute.

They come in smilin' and so glad to come in and see you

and stuff.  It's different.  But it's still the same, a

lot of it, too.

   A lot of it's still the same.  We enjoy each other

about the same.  They need something, why, here they

come!  I'd like to have 'em, some of 'em, to be able to

handle their own affairs, but they don't want the other

part of the family to do it for 'em.  I'll tell 'em,

"Hey, here's your son and daughter over here.  College

graduates and high school graduates!  They can help

you."  No, they don't want 'em to know about it.  Maybe

they think they'll make fun of 'em or something.

   

   Underhill:  How would you describe the Navajo people

in general?

   

   Foutz:  Well, they're really a happy people.  Their

language is kind of happy.  I think that's why a lot of

people, they hear it and they'll see people react to

what's said or goin' on.  It's kind of a reaction that

people get from their language, it makes 'em happy.

They smile and they laugh.  Mostly, that's what it's

all about to them, is laughing and having a good time--

making a joke or something, out of anything.  They like

to pull each other into it, if they know 'em.  If you

get a bunch of 'em in the store, talkin', and you're

talkin' about some subject or somethin'.  Well, they're

not strangers, they don't like strangers.  They won't

shake hands with a stranger, really, unless they're

introduced.  They're really funny that way.  Years ago,

when I first went out there, you didn't blare their

name out.  I mean, if you hollered…  We'd ask 'em,

even, we wanted to write their name down on their book,

and you forgot their name or something.  They wanted

you to whisper it, "What is your name?"  And they'd

lean over the counter, then they'd tell it back to you

real quiet-like.  They didn't want everybody to hear

their name.  I don't know what--their superstitious

with it.  I think it was a superstition, that they

didn't like their name blared out.  Somebody didn't

want 'em to know 'em or somethin'.  Superstitious with

it.

   

   Underhill:  You mentioned the social aspect of

coming into the post.  In the early years, when people

traveled by wagon to Teec Nos Pos, did you have a place

for people to stay?

   

   Foutz:  We sure did.  We had a big ol' rock hogan

just across the street there.  We had a fryin' pan, a

coffee [pot], and we kept coffee in it; and cookware,

you might say, just out of a big box there.  We had the

staples--baking powder, salt, and all of that--right in

this box.  They had to buy their other food--sometimes

we furnished it too, if they were just gonna be

there…  I had some of 'em come and want to spend a

week there, because it was so nice and I waited on 'em

so much and pampered 'em and stuff.  (laughter)  That's

a fact, they'd come with their family.  Not only that,

but he got special treatment.  He'd come in the store

early, him and I were usually the only ones there to do

business, and they liked that one-on-one.  They liked

that, staying over there.  They'd bring their wives,

and some of 'em stayed down in the canyon under a big

ol' cottonwood tree there, and they'd spend two or

three days down there, just living there.  Water was

handy and everything was nice there.  It was shady.

They just loved it.  In fact, I'd jog around the store

area there in mornings, gettin' my exercise, and

sometimes I'd have to jog right through camp (laughter)

to make my trip around there.

   We used to butcher our own sheep, mutton.  The

ladies would come in every day wanting to know if we

didn't need meat, because they liked to butcher the

sheep right there.  They took everything but the meat,

and they liked that.  I mean, they got all the goodies

out of it, you might say, that they liked.  They got a

week's eating out of it, for just butchering the sheep.

My son would go down there and help 'em.  I've got

pictures of him going down there, helping the ladies.

He's an expert butcher now.  He [can do] elk and deer

and sheep and stuff.  He still knows how to do all the

butchering.  Most everybody else, when they do it,

they'll call him over to do their animals for 'em,

because he's an expert.  But he learned it right there

from those ladies, going down and butchering those

sheep.

   

   Underhill:  Who did most of the trading in those

early days--the women or the men?

   

   Foutz:  The women.  The women did it, they really

did.  The men didn't want to say that they weren't the

boss.  There was no way you were gonna tell 'em that

the ladies were the boss, that wasn't so.  But they did

let the ladies do most of the trading.  Most

especially, if I did a little credit against rugs and

stuff like that, they had their separate accounts, and

they had their regular accounts for livestock.  The

women had the regular accounts for their rugs, and they

knew what their limits were, and the men knew what

their limits were--more or less, 'til something

happened, and then they'd get over and out.  Most of

'em knew what their limits were, and they tried to stay

within it.  Like I say, there were times when they got

out of hand, [and I] had to talk to 'em a little bit,

but you hated to, because they took it a little bad,

you know.  It's like scolding your kids.  They didn't

like to be scolded.  Like I say, they'd go home

sometimes and tell you that you were naughty and bad,

but they'd come back in a few days, and everything was

a whole different ball game, you might say--that day

was a different round.  So they forgave just like we

did--maybe better.  But they've got good dispositions--

most of 'em did.  I got along real good with 'em.  But

like I say, it took sometimes two or three days to work

it out.  I think all of 'em, even though they owe me

money still, they'll stop in and say, "Loyd, I owe you

money, but I'm gonna pay you!"  I say, "Yeah, I'm

waitin'."  But they are gonna pay me, I guess.  But I'm

still waitin'.  But they know what they owe, and they

know they owe it.  They just haven't gotten around to

doing it.  That's why I have a credit balance all the

time.  They mean well, but it just hasn't come around.

   

   Underhill:  How much credit would you have extended

in an average year?

   

   Foutz:  I've probably got a half-million dollars in

there that I haven't been able to collect.  And I've

probably got $100,000 or so that I work on all the

time, that I call active maybe.  But we do quite a lot

of business every month, through the credit system.  We

cash a lot of checks and do a lot of business with 'em.

They know what they're gonna pay every month, and

there's really no questions asked.  If they owe a

little more than that, you say, "Would you like to pay

this?"  "No, we don't want to pay that."  So you just

go right off to the next with it.  And you hope, well,

maybe next month they didn't need as much as they did

this month.  It very seldom happens, but it works.  We

work with 'em on it.  When they die, I guess most of

'em I still got their name on credit.  The family

doesn't want to pay it, so I don't push anybody for it,

never ask anybody for it.  There are a few once in a

while that the kids will come in and say, "I know you

did my parents well.  I want to pay $50 or $100 on

their credit."  Or some of 'em come in and pay the

whole thing up for 'em.  But that's a few.  That's why

I'm sayin' there's a few that have done it, but that's

few and far between--but they do, some of 'em.

   

   Underhill:  So how did you make a living when you

got that kind of credit extended?

   

   Foutz:  Didn't get paid that month!  There's been

months I've had to put my payday off.  They wouldn't

believe that.  A lot of 'em don't even know that I get

paid.  (laughter)  They think they're haulin' it all

home.  They don't even know I get paid.  A lot of 'em

really are surprised when I say, "Well, I gotta get

paid."  They look at you like, "You get paid?!  You've

got a store here!  What do you get paid for?"  They

really look at it in that respect.  "You got a store,

you don't need payin'."  That's the way it is.

   

   Underhill:  What were the wool and lamb seasons like

for you?

   Foutz:  Very, very busy times--very busy times.

Wool season was a heavy-duty time because you had to do

a lot of work then--it required work.  You had to go

out and you had to weigh all that wool.  Most of the

time, we had to resack it.  We had Indian boys to do

that.  We'd help 'em, and then a lot of times we'd have

to move those sacks and stack 'em, or move 'em to the

barns.  When we got a load, we'd have to load them on

those big trucks, or on a small truck and haul it to

storage or wherever ________.  Those wool bags weighed

a couple hundred, 250 pounds.  Mohair weighs 250 on up

to 350.  You take two people, there's two ears on each

bag, and you try to throw 250 pounds up into a truck--

hey, you gotta have muscles!

   

   Underhill:  How's your back?

   

   Foutz:  Still all right.  We used to roll 'em a

little bit, but you still had a lot of work, pullin'

_______.  That was work.  And then lamb season, it

wasn't so much work, but it was fun.  I remember you

liked to look up on the side of the hill there or

somethin', and here come a little band of lambs comin'

off the hill down to the corral to be weighed--twenty

or thirty at a time.  You had the scales set out to the

corral, and I think Jay said something about the number

two tub that we had out there set on the scales, and we

had 'em balanced to where we knew how much the tub

weighed--I think three pounds, as I recall.  And we'd

weigh the lambs and write their name down and an

amount.  When you got all done, you took the tub weight

off.  They sometimes didn't understand that tub weight.

   

   Underhill:  (laughs)  Did people fill 'em up with

water before they came in?

   

   Foutz:  Well, they did that.  They'd grunt when--

most __________--when you put 'em in that tub upside

down, they'd start gruntin' pretty bad.  We've had some

of 'em that done it so bad that they'd die on the way

to the store in their pickups and stuff, and that's

bad, when they do that.  I've had some of 'em lose half

their lambs comin' to the store, just because they

brought 'em right off that water hole, and the bottom

of their pickup would get so wet and so messy and so

slippery that they'd get down, and then the others

would get on top of 'em.  Sheep don't have any will

power, you might say.  They'll let one fall right on

top of him, and he'll die right there.  He won't make

an effort to get up, hardly.  Maybe right when it first

happens, they'll make a few efforts to get up, but most

of 'em don't worry about it, they just smother.  And

that's what happens to a lot of 'em.

   

   Underhill:  When you were doing wool, did people

bring it to you already bagged?  Or did they do any

shearing there?

   

   Foutz:  No, we didn't do any shearing right there.

Most of 'em did it before they got to the store.  We'd

try to tell 'em to keep it clean, but that's why we

really had to resack it.  They wouldn't listen--try to

get a little extra weight here, or a little extra

weight there.  Either way, you couldn't blame 'em.  We

don't ever blame 'em.  We tried a lot of different ways

to get 'em to not do that.  We'd try, if we knew who it

was, we'd take it and put it in a sack or a box or

something and set it up on the counter, and write their

name on it or somethin'.  (laughter)  Ohhh, you don't

want to do that!  That creates a problem right quick,

try to label one of 'em for what they done, because

that's a no-no more or less, you don't do that.  That's

not too good a way to label somebody that tried to

cheat you.  You'd rather say, "Well, next year I'll try

to remember who he is."  I'll try to maybe dump his

wool next year, or do something to get even with him,

or show him why you're doing it to him.  "Well, last

year I remember you did this, you put a big gob of this

or that in there, you tried to wet it down, or

whatever.  You tried to get extra weight.  I remember

that, and I don't want you to do that, because somebody

else suffers from that.  I suffer and some of my other

customers suffer from that, because when I get ready to

sell that wool, they look at that and they say, 'Boy,

that Loyd Foutz cheated me there, too,' because that

went on to them if I didn't see it.  They say, 'Hey,

that trader tried to cheat me too!'  But I don't have

any idea who it was, so I can't say, 'Well, I guess

that belonged to this guy or that guy,' so I have to

take the blame for it.  So therefore, I gotta dump this

out and look at it and make sure you didn't try to

cheat me.  Then I won't have to worry that I tried to

cheat somebody else."  So it works, and you learn.  But

some of 'em never learn.  They'll try to do it year in

and year out.  But we know who they are, and get by.

   

   Underhill:  How did the pawn system work at Teec Nos

Pos and here?

   

   Foutz:  Well, when that store burned down over

there, I had to set down with every one of those

Indians and make a settlement--their jewelry, their

accounts.  I guess I was probably the only one that

could have ever done it.  They didn't know 'em well

enough, or didn't have that kind of a rapport with 'em

that I had, that I could take each individual in there

and take a book, write his name down and say, "Yeah,

you're account was $325 or $300 or $250.  Yeah, and I

remember your wife had some red beads in there.  Yeah,

and they had $150 on 'em."  Well, I wrote that down,

"red beads, $150."  Or she had two big cluster

bracelets.  I wrote it down.  She owed me so much money

on this rug.  So then I wrote down "cluster bracelets,"

or whatever, "row bracelet" or whatever type.

"Turquoise beads and a jack_________."  I wrote all

that down on their name.  So then I said, "Okay."  We

opened the store next door in my brother's house there.

Two-by-fours and two-by-twelves, we made some counters

and had the groceries boxed underneath, and we set up

business the next day, or two days later.  And so we

had staple items.  So then I had one little room off to

the side there, and that's where I went in and

interviewed 'em, and wrote all this down.  Took the

book accounts, a lot of 'em that got checked and

whatever they got, or a failed wool accounts or sheep

accounts or whatever.  We had it all on record.  So

then actually, in a way, we were back in business in

that respect, because all we had to do was go find

jewelry that matched about what they had, value-wise,

and I'd say, "Okay, this cost me $500, but you had $150

owed on it, so when you get $150, you come and get this

back.  Your book account was such-and-such, you can

trade on that, as soon as you can pay it, or whatever.

But that's what we're gonna start with.  This is base,

right here.  You can go up, and then you can go down,

or vice versa, but this is basically what we're gonna

start with."  I had to get 'em to sign it and

everything.

   

   [END SIDE 1, BEGIN SIDE 2]

   

   Underhill:  This is Karen Underhill with Northern

Arizona University.  This is Part 2 of an interview

with Loyd Foutz--Loyd with one "L"--and it is now about

12:40 on Wednesday, August 12, and we're here at

Beclahbeto Trading Post.

   Loyd, you were telling us a little bit about the

fire.  Maybe you can tell us the year and what

happened.

   

   Foutz:  Well, you talk about the year--that slipped

me.  I think it was about 1958 or 1959--in the spring,

anyway.  We were just gettin' ready for a busy wool

season that year, and we had ordered a lot of extra

blankets and cloth and everything in, that would sell

while they had money.  We kind of teased 'em a little

bit and tried to get 'em to spend their money at home.

We had lots of new items.  We had that in the wareroom,

we'd never opened the boxes.  It was on a weekend, and

they'd just gotten in.  I lived in Farmington at that

time.  My kids had started to school, and I drove back

and forth, and I spent two or three nights at the

store, and then I'd go to town and spend a night and

then come on back, 'til the weekend.  We always locked

our store up on the weekends so we had somebody there

to watch the store.  And this particular weekend, why,

we had this fellow there, young fellow, him and his

wife, to watch the store.  Oh, golly, I think it was

one Sunday afternoon I got a call, and I don't know

whether I was in church or at home, but said our store

was on fire at Teec Nos Pos.  And I said, "Oh, my God,

I can't believe that!"  So my wife and I jumped in the

car and I don't think we took our kids, I don't

remember, but we headed for the store, and sure enough,

when we got there, there was nothing but walls there.

It burned the house down and everything that we had

owned, that we used while we spent weekends there at

the store.  It just devastated us--rugs and jewelry,

pawn, and just book accounts--everything that [had to

do with] the business just went up.  It just devastated

us, we just didn't know what we were going to do.  And

I think I've told, in another segment of this, what

kind of went on as I settled with each individual, to

get back in business so that we could operate.

   At that time, there was some talk about the Four

Corners area.  They were building this new highway from

Shiprock to Flagstaff.  All the way through, they were

gonna build this road.  So far, they had only just

started, I think, probably part-way between Beclahbeto

and Teec Nos Pos they had finished.  But anyway, when

this had all happened, we decided, well, maybe instead

of rebuilding it right there on the spot--because it

was all devastated, it was all burned up, there wasn't

anything left--we decided maybe we'd go to Window Rock

and get a new lease over on the highway there

someplace.  So we scampered around while all this other

business…  Oh, I was so busy doing other things,

trying to put something together.  We did find a spot

that the store is now built on, and the Navajos that

owned that land gave us permission to build it there.

So we took that to Window Rock, and a survey, and got

that.  This one councilman there, he kept telling

Russell he didn't want him to build it back.  So some

of these--Howard Gorman [phonetic spelling] or some of

the other big officials there said, "Hey, what's the

matter with you?  Don't you like those Indians?  The

Indians like you.  You'd better give this man a lease

so he can go back and help those people."  They all

laughed about it, but they did, they went ahead and

gave us a lease up on the highway.  That's where we

rebuilt the store.  But we operated out of that house

there maybe six months or maybe almost a year.  Went

ahead and bought wool and everything out of that little

house.

   

   Underhill:  Who owned the building?  Did you own the

building, or…

   

   Foutz:  The tribe owned the building.  We were in

partners with Russell.  That's another story, too.

When Russell decided to go back out to the res there,

the chance to buy Teec Nos Pos from Kenneth Washburn,

his wife and I and Russell kind of lived together for a

year, out there on this Gallegos.  And I helped her

with the baby and did a lot of dishes and helped her a

lot there.  So she told Russell that the only way she'd

go back to Teec Nos Pos was if she could get me to go.

Well, here I was a single guy working in the oil field

business, making good money.  So Russell approached me

and he said, "Loyd, I'm gonna buy all of Teec Nos Pos

and I'll cut you in on that when it's all done and

everything.  If you'll come out and do a good job for

me, I'll cut you in on part of it.  But my wife says

you gotta get a wife first."  So I was dating Bernie

then, so maybe the next date or whenever it was, I had

to do some proposin'.  Maybe I wasn't quite ready, but

I still…  (laughs)  Maybe she was just lucky

(laughs) and I approached her to get married.  And she

said she would.  So I told her where we were goin' and

what was gonna happen, and she accepted it, so we got

married, and that was our honeymoon home.

   

   Underhill:  And what did she think of it then?

   

   Foutz:  Well, it was hard to get used to, because

she had lived in town.  All of a sudden she's withdrawn

from all that, a month at a time.  She didn't know how

to drive a car at that time.  She'd never driven a car.

So I had an old used car, and it was kind of a clunker,

but it was a pretty good car.  It was an old De Soto.

I told her well, she was welcome to take that old car

and go to town.  At first she said, "Well, I gotta

learn how to drive first."  She never did drive that

car, but we bought a new 1950 Chevrolet, two-door car,

over in Albuquerque, paid $1,800 for it.  And I gave

Russell $300 and he went and bought it for me and

brought it home.  We didn't have time to go get it, so

he brought it home to us and we paid it off.  He signed

all the papers and I signed it off.  Maybe that's my

first year on financing, because I gave him that $300

and he brought that paperwork home and said I still

owed $1,500.  I almost owed $1,800 for two years or

however long.  They included the payments back into it.

It run to $1,800, but I looked at that paper and said,

"What did you do with my $300?  I still owe $1,800!"

(laughter)  He said, "Go ahead and read on.  That's

with the finances and all that, that you owed 'em."  I

thought he'd run off with my $300.  I wasn't gonna let

that happen!  But that was my first experience in

financing, too, so I learned a lot then.

   

   Underhill:  How did Jay come to be a partner in the

business?

   

   Foutz:  Well, that was kind of funny, too.  I almost

went to Beclahbeto by myself.  My uncle, Hugh Foutz,

owned it.  At that time it was a pretty good little

store.  A lot of my customers were working in the

uranium, because uranium had just got started.  A lot

of Red Rock workers.  Red Rock Valley over here had

opened the uranium.  A lot of customers were working

over there, and they had to pass right by Beclahbeto,

so I thought, "Well, shoot, I'll just branch off and go

over there by myself."  But when I talked to my uncle,

he kind of thought I ought to buy it with Russell,

because Russell had more means, maybe, and was quite a

bit older than I was, and had more experience with the

trading business.  So he talked to Russell, and all of

us bought these stores together.  That's when Jay came

out there.  And then we worked out an agreement to

where we all split it up.  Then one day later on, about

ten to fifteen years later--ten years, whatever it was--

Russell decided he'd like to have it all.  So he came

up with the idea that we'd take Beclahbeto and some

money.  He was gonna give me Beclahbeto, and Jay was

gonna take money, 'cause there wasn't much business

here then.  We didn't have much goin', and it wasn't a

very good store, you might say--just run by somebody

else, somebody who didn't know what they were doin'.

So we did, we split it up.

   …

   

   Underhill:  Now, what did Beclahbeto look like when

you first came?

   

   Foutz:  Well, the old store burned down, see, and it

had burned down, too, previous to all this.  I don't

think Jay even told you that.  But it had burned down

previous to that.  And so we had to move it too, and we

decided to move it over onto the highway, instead of

rebuilding it where it was.  So we moved it over here.

So actually it was a little better store, but we still

didn't do any business, and the highway hadn't helped

all that much and what have you.  But it was a bigger

store and it had living quarters and the business.

More of a station.  We kind of had a service station

type thing.  We had a place where we could grease cars

and do all this, 'cause the wagon age had gone, and the

pickup age was comin' in.  So we were gettin' ready for

that too.

   

   Underhill:  When you built it here, did you have a

bull pen, or different arrangement?

   

   Foutz:  Yeah, it started out with a bull pen--just a

small one.  We had a little caf� in one corner of it.

My wife made a lot of pies.  The guys on the highway,

we did a lot of business with them, with her pie-

making.  She learned to make a pretty good pie--still

knows how.  We got pretty close with a lot of those

people that worked on the highway.  Good friends.

   Yeah, it was a bull pen type, but not quite like the

old store was at Teec and the old store at Beclahbeto.

It was dark, the old store was dark.  As I recall, I

don't know whether they had a light plant there at

Beclahbeto as I recall.  We had a light plant at Teec

Nos Pos, but I think they had the old gas lamps at

Beclahbeto.  I don't think they had electricity.  You

had to carry the water up from down below the big rim,

that big rock, just a little trail down there.  You had

to carry water all the way up.  So he and his family

had it a little rougher.

   

   Cole:  Who was that?

   

   Foutz:  Jay did, at Beclahbeto, before he came to

Teec.  He had it a little rougher than I did.  We had a

spring at Teec Nos Pos that furnished our water.  It

was piped down from the spring on the side of the hill

over there.

   I had an experience there one night.  My wife and I

were sleeping and had our window open, it was spring,

woke us up about one o'clock, hearin' all this clangin'

and bangin' and what have you.  This Indian had come

from workin' in the mines down here at Dinnehotso and

back in those big mines back there in that area.  He

left there real early in the morning, he'd just got off

shift, and he went to sleep just as he hit the top of

the rim there, and he came off that hill and came down

into my corral and everything, and I could hear wire

squeakin' and everything.  And I told Bernie, "I'm not

even gonna get up and go out there.  I'm scared to go

out there and see what's goin' on!"  So the guy tore

down some of the corral--that was why the fence was

squeakin', because he tore down the corral.  And his

pickup landed up on its wheels.  So he went through one

gate and tore part of a corral down.  But that

afternoon he come back and bought some gas from me.  It

was one of these stake-bodied pickups and I picked up

out of the corral a part of the stake out of his

sideboard.  He had a fifty-gallon drum in the back end

of his pickup.  He bought fifty gallons of gas from me,

and during the conversation, I asked him, "Did you

wreck in my corral down there last night?"  And he

said, "Yes, I did.  I went to sleep up on that hill.  I

turned over twice and I landed on my wheels down in

that corral.  Nothing wrong with me, and the pickup was

still runnin' good, so I just found my way out, went on

to Farmington and came back."  He gave me $300 to

repair my corral.  He was working in the mines and had

a lot of money, and he tore that corral up pretty good,

so he gave me $300 to fix the corral.  That's all that

was ever said about it.  And he and I were good

friends.  His last name was Sloan.  I never will forget

him.  Quite a guy.  In fact, he built a store down

there close to the mine one time.  Quite a man.

   

   Underhill:  Tell us what you remember about the FTC

hearings.

   

   Foutz:  Well, you know, I was just a flunky at that

time.  I was doin' all the work and lettin' these other

guys do all the thinkin' and all the doin'.  Most of

that I just--second-hand, you know.  I let Jay and

Russell and them get involved with that.  So yeah, I

was involved with it, but yet I wasn't, directly.  Jay

and them went over and sat in on those.  Somebody had

to keep store, so I'd stay home and let them do that.

Most of mine is just hearsay, but I know that it was a

bad deal.  The conversations and everything, I think it

was one of those government coverup…  I don't know

for [what reason] or why the DNA or whoever they were

that was involved with this investigation and stuff,

why they wanted to get rid of pawn, because the trader

was the best friend the Indians had.  I mean, they came

and got everything they wanted, whenever they wanted.

You didn't sell their pawn, you kept it.  Sure, they

didn't take it out when they were supposed to and

you're hollerin' at 'em and all, but their pawn was in

good hands.  So when they did away with all of that,

they took out all their good pawn from us, in time.

But either they or their families, some of the kids or

some of the family, usually took all that good jewelry

and borrowed it, took it and pawned it.  Those people

weren't so nice to 'em.  I mean, they had limits and

time, and they had paperwork to tell 'em, "Hey, this is

dead pawn," or whatever.  For a small amount of money,

some of 'em lost their treasures--for a small amount of

money.  And I don't know whether those guys--I don't

think they really tried to do it that way, but it just

happened that way.  And a lot of 'em were traders.  I

mean, they had been traders on the reservation, saw an

opportunity to deal, to do good, and they did it.  So

it was bad for us, too, in a lot of ways.  It was a way

for us to make extra money--and secure money.  In other

words, they weren't open accounts, they were secure.

You knew [they weren't] gonna pay for it maybe today or

tomorrow or in a month or two--but they were gonna pay

for it [eventually].

   

   Underhill:  And if not, you had something.

   

   Foutz:  We had something.  But most of the time, we

didn't have to go to that end.  I mean, they found a

way to get it.  These other ways, they didn't, they

lost it.  Had to go back, and there was just nothing

they could do.  They had contracts and paperwork.  A

lot of 'em [off-reservation pawn shops] saw a chance to

make some extra bucks.  They moved it on out and nobody

was the wiser, you might say.  I'm not knockin' those

people--hey, they're legitimate, a lot of 'em are my

friends and relations, my brother!  (laughter)  It's

the way it is.  But he's good, he takes care of it like

I do.  We talk about it a lot among ourselves--me and

the Indians will talk about it.  They say, "Oh, Hank's

your brother?"  "Oh, yeah."  "It's all right then."

   

   Underhill:  Well, what do you think separates a good

trader from a bad trader?

   

   Foutz:  For what they come from, or for what they

come for.  A few come for only money--that's bad.  I

don't know, I think most of the traders had people with

people.  We realize that.  The traders realize they're

with people, they're your friends, they were your

family, almost, 'cause you were out there with 'em day

in and day out.  They were your family, and their

problems were our problems, and we made it our

problems, and I think that made the difference in the

traders.  A lot of 'em didn't ever like…  Well,

"like" is [not] a good word.  They didn't have the

rapport with the Indians that a lot of us had.  A lot

of old traders, they learned their language.  A lot of

people have been out here all their lives and never

learned their language.  That's the ones that I think

that maybe had other ideas on what they were there for.

They were there to make bucks, and a lot of 'em did.

And I think a lot of 'em cheated, I really do.  I

wouldn't want to mention any names, I don't know

whether I know any names or not, but I'm sure there

were, because I've heard of it.  I've heard stories

that I don't think Indians themselves would have told

me that "he cheated me," unless he had it done.  I

really believe that sometimes they were cheated.  But,

I mean, everybody can't…  There's two sides to every

story, you know.  So I believed them more than I did

some of the traders.  They did cheat people.

   

   Underhill:  Now, in your opinion, who were traders

you respected, or good traders?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, the McGees--there were a lot of McGees.

And the Lees--there were a lot of Lees.  And Tanners, a

lot of Tanner boys were just as good as gold to 'em.  I

mean, Buddy Tanner.  I don't know names.  There's one

guy that came out there when I was tradin', and he

wanted to buy some rugs from me one day, and I was so

busy, I didn't have time to go sell him any rugs, and

he went back in, he said, "If you ever need a job, come

and see me.  I've never seen anybody work a crowd out

of a store like you did there.  If you need a job, you

come and see me."  But I never needed a job, so I never

went to see him.  But he was impressed with the way I

handled the customers.  So he thought, "Hey, maybe I

got me a trader here," but it never did happen.

   

   Underhill:  When did you become a member of the

United Indian Traders Association?

   

   Foutz:  Well, that was along with Jay and Russell

and them.  I think we joined after I came out there.

But the United Indian [Traders] Association was

available probably in the late thirties, when it was

started.  I think it was started over in Gallup with

Springers.  I can't remember just the names--prominent

traders over there, I might say, who were trading over

on that…  We traders on this side of Gallup, we felt

like we weren't recognized as much as those over around

Gallup, for some reason.  I guess that was kind of the

highway, [Route] 66.  May have had a lot to do with the

jewelry and rugs--the things that the traders could

take to Gallup and dispose of, sell.  I think that's

probably what caused them to start this Association,

and then they made it available to everybody.  But we

traders on this side thought we was downed a little bit

by them, because they all had the president's job and

this, that, and the other.  But it turned around, and

it worked out all right.  We finally got our

recognition, and everybody was very happy with

everything that went on.  We had a good time, we'd go

over and dance and have a big meal and spend the night

and act like we were somebody.  You know, you spent the

time on the reservation, had a good time, wives all

dressed up in their best, their jewelry and all this,

and we had a good time--and the Association paid for

it, because it was a meeting time, and we all looked

forward to it, once a year, go over there, and hey,

boy, we hobnobbed with the best!  (laughter)  It was

fun.

   

   Underhill:  How many people would usually come to

the dance and dinner?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, golly, they had a pretty good number--

I'd say forty and fifty maybe--double that, with your

wives.  The meeting sometimes wasn't as important as

the meal and the dance and the party.  We had bankers,

they even belonged to the Association, and they let

them have [membership].  So they would come, and they'd

bring their wives.  So it wasn't just us as traders,

there were others.  They had just jewelry shops and

different things, that belonged to the Association.  At

times, they'd dwindle out, they wouldn't pay their

dues, and so it would dwindle out, and more would come

on, and it'd take on new…  But it wasn't just the

same ones all the time--there were others.  The

Babbitts were there all the time, Bruce Babbitt--you

know, well-known people were there.  Like I say, you

hob[nobbed] with some pretty good brass, you know, at

times, so it made you feel good.  They had 'em in

Flagstaff, they had 'em different areas…  They just

had 'em in Gallup for years, but they did relinquish a

little and start havin' 'em in different areas.  They

did have some in Flagstaff.  That was a long ways for

us, but we enjoyed 'em, had a good time.

   

   Underhill:  What were some of the big issues for the

Association, that you recall?

   

   Foutz:  Well, election was probably the biggest

thing that they brought out there.  And sometimes some

of the traders would have an issue, problems that they

might have with the tribe or wherever.  And they would

maybe discuss it and try to help 'em to either go to

Window Rock and go to bat for 'em, or find out what it

was about, and they solved a lot of problems--I think

the Association did.  And I think they had a lot of

pull with the tribe.  I mean, they invited the tribe to

their parties, and members of the tribe.  They always

had somebody there representing the tribe, to the

parties and meetings or whatever they wanted to attend.

Mostly the social was most of the time that they

[attended].  A lot of times they didn't stay for the

meetings and stuff, but they were there for the social

and enjoyed themselves.  Everybody made 'em feel good.

It made us feel good hob[nobbin'] with 'em, knowing who

they were, and got acquainted.  It's good to know who

your bosses are sometimes.  (laughter)

   

   Underhill:  Speaking of which, how much were you

impacted, during these almost fifty years, by tribal

politics?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, everyone has a little different.  Every

one has had its own.  They'd always ask me which one

would I vote for, and I'd tell 'em, "Well, that's

politics, I wouldn't want to get into that."  But I

might sometimes tell 'em that I liked such-and-such a

man, I like the way he presents himself, or knowledge.

   MacDonald was a good one for a long time.  I still

think he was a good man, but he just got off doing the

wrong things.  I think he couldn't get back out of it,

once he started, and it was hard.  He made some

mistakes.  That's easy--more especially after you're

there as long as he was, why, you make mistakes.  That

was some of the mistakes he made.  But I think he's a

good man.  I kind of wish they'd open the door and

(Underhill:  Let him out.) let him out.  I think he's

served long enough for what he's done.  And those other

people, the ones that were in the riot, I know all of

'em.  I know practically every one of those that were

in that riot.  They're not mean, they're not that kind

of people.  They just thought they were doin' a good

job.  In their own minds, they were doin' what they

thought was right.  And hey, justice said seven years,

or whatever it said.  I think they ought to be returned

home, I really do.  The people would (with emotion)

heal better.  The whole thing might just go away.  And

I think the tribe knows that too.  They just can't seem

to get it to click.  But I feel bad about it.  I

knew…  Good friends.  (with emotion)  I hated to see

that happen.  Excuse me.  'Scuse the emotions, but

that's the way I felt about it.  I'm not too much of a

politician either, but I felt bad about that part of

it.  I know MacDonald and his wife Wanda.  ______ his

family here.  I knew his mother.  Didn't know his dad,

but I knew his mother.  Good people.  It happens, but I

think he's paid.

   Let's go to something else.

   

   Underhill:  How do you think trading, from your

perspective, has changed over time?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, there's no comparison.  I think the only

reason we haven't changed is because we haven't changed

hands.  That's the only reason this store has stayed

like it has, is because it hasn't changed hands.  If it

changes hands, it's gonna change.  People will sell

this out or that out, they'll close this out, they'll

close that out, they'll find out that it's not payin',

it's not the popular thing or something, they'll close

it out.  And yet we get people coming in every day,

"Oh! this is like an old store!"  Even white people

come in, "Hey, I haven't seen something like this since

I was a kid!  You have everything in here!"  And I say,

"Yeah.  Not everything, but we try."  So I don't think

there's anybody that'd ever go back to the old system.

Wal-Mart's and them have got it all, and they can buy

it cheaper, and people have the money to go spend

there.  It's changed.  They don't have just the

livestock to live on anymore, and welfare.  A lot of

'em are working, they can draw on their Social

Security.  There's a lot of other ways that they live

now, than they used to.  They didn't used to have all

that.  They didn't have anything, they didn't get a

check every month.  When I first came out here, all

they lived on was what they could make out of their own

hands--they didn't have the government.  The government

didn't take care of 'em, didn't do anything for 'em,

didn't give 'em a dime.  That's all changed.  So

there's no comparison to what it was back in those

days--no comparison.  They couldn't compare it.  Those

people I guess deserve whatever they're gettin'.  If

they're gettin' somethin', they deserve it, because

they didn't get it.  And I think welfare has ruined

'em.  I've talked to Indians, the Navajos, and all of

'em.  They came out here, they built their schools,

educated 'em, but they didn't do one thing to get 'em a

job.  An education without a job, whatcha got?

Nothin'.  You got a bum.  I shouldn't say bum, but

they've got a lot of smarts but they don't know what to

do with it.  They can't do anything with it, they don't

have a job, and so they turn to liquor and other things

to pass time.  And that causes people to not want to do

anything.  They don't want…  It gets [to be] a way

of life with them, they don't want anything any better.

They don't want to go out, they don't want to leave

home, and that's bad.  They're even smart people,

they're qualified, they can do good jobs, they have the

talents and the trades, but a lot of it, if they leave

here, they go get drunk.  The systems just didn't work

together:  BIA didn't…  They thought the education

might do it, but they didn't realize that that wasn't

the only thing.  And I kept telling some of the

politicians in my area, "Yeah, you built these schools

out here, but how about the jobs?  Have you seen any

jobs comin' from 'em?"  "No."  "Well," I said, "you

watch.  Their livestock permits and stuff are going to

come to a day when it won't feed very many of your

family."  And all this.  I tried to give 'em a little

wisdom that I thought I had, but (laughs) nobody asked

me about it, and Washington didn't come and ask me

about it.  They should have, I could have probably

helped 'em a lot.  I could have probably saved a lot of

lives and probably saved a lot of money.  These people

would be self-sufficient, and it wouldn't have cost the

taxpayers a dollar extra, because the money that they

issued [through] welfare is still going on, and it's

gonna have to go on, because they still haven't built

up industry to help these people find jobs and have

jobs.  That's a problem.  That's a terrible, terrible

thing.

   

   Underhill:  And where do you think it's headed?

   

   Foutz:  That's what I'm scared to even think about,

where it's headed, because they don't own the land,

they can't do anything without that bureaucrat over

there.  They're as bad as I am.  I'm tryin' to get a

new lease.  These people are as bad as I am, they can't

do anything either.  They give a ninety-nine-year

homesite lease.  Well, ninety-nine years, on their own

land, they've lived there all their lives.  Hey, what

good is that?  It gives 'em a plot of ground that they

can call their own for ninety-nine years.  That's still

not right.  I mean, you own the house, you own it.  You

buy a house, you own it.  These people don't, they

never will.  It's a reservation.  That's what they're

not thinkin' about, I guess, is where [will] they go

and what's gonna happen?  They're doin' it easy to

pacify year to year to year.  They're tryin' to pacify

a big problem.

   And that was the same way with the [stock] reduction

back in John Collier's day.  They came out and tried to

reduce their livestock down so that the sheep could

eat, the range would hold everything.  But that just

caused 'em to starve a little more, and they didn't

make any efforts to right that wrong, of tryin' to help

'em get self-sufficient.  That's what they need.  They

gotta be self-sufficient, and they're not.  And they

never will be unless…  That's bad.  They get the

education, they're still educatin' 'em, and they're

spendin' all this money on schools, but there's no way

for 'em…  Industry and stuff--there's none.

   

   Underhill:  And how is your livestock business these

days?

   

   Foutz:  Well, cattle, it's gone from sheep to cows.

We buy quite a few cows now.  They don't have any

sheepherders, the sheepherders have gone to school.

They don't want to go back and herd sheep.  Hey, that's

not fun, herding sheep every day, seven days a week.

The old-timers are having to do that--the guys eighty,

ninety years old; the grandmas eighty, ninety years

old.  They're the sheepherders now.  They're the ones

holding the glue together.  When they're gone, what's

happening?  The kids are fighting over these permits

and cattle and the livestock and stuff, which is a drop

in the bucket.  It wouldn't sustain 'em.  If they tried

to live on it all by itself, it wouldn't sustain 'em.

   I'm blowin' off my mouth, but it's the truth.

That's what's happening, and it's bad.  It's bad for

BIA to dump 'em like they do, and with the budget that

they got, and the school systems and stuff, it's bad.

It's bad.  They need to refocus their whole outfit.

They got public schools, go for it!  Put the public

schools in, withdraw all the BIA.  Use that money to

encourage industry to come, give these people the way

of life that they deserve, because they're beautiful

people, they're smart, they're intelligent, they can do

anything.

   

   Underhill:  We were talking this morning about a

proposal to bring liquor on the reservation.  What do

you think of that?

   

   Foutz:  They can't handle liquor.  I mean, that's a

known fact.  I hate to see 'em go off and do it off the

reservation, but what…  I'd hate to see it out here.

I mean, I really would.  In some ways, they're talking

about the revenues and stuff that it would save the

tribe with these people.  But that's like gambling.

Neither one of 'em are any good.  So they got two

problems here.  I mean, they're wantin' to go gamblin'.

The Utes up there, they're probably makin' a lot of

money, but what else do those Utes know?  I mean, what

else do they do?  One of these days they're going to

have money.  Hey, money's not everything--it'll ruin

ya'.  It'd ruin me!  If I had money, I probably

wouldn't be here!  (laughter)  I wouldn't be here

workin'.  I'd probably be off havin' a good time, or

traveling or something.  But money's not the only

thing.  You can't take it with you.  Your friends,

hey…  They're gonna miss you and you're gonna miss

them, probably.  That's all we get out of this.  That's

why I guess I like to stay.  I'm seventy-two years old,

still goin' strong.  I probably hope for another ten

years or whatever.

   I love these people.  If I wanted to get a petition,

I could probably take a bookful of it over to Window

Rock.  I tell my chapter over here, I do more for these

people than you guys do, or Window Rock does for these

people.  Why am I havin' a hard time gettin' a lease?

For my hard work, what am I…  Shoot, I oughta leave!

I do more for 'em than you guys do, and they [Window

Rock] does.  I see that they got daily food and their

everyday things are taken care of, their problems are

taken care of.  They don't come bother you.  Who do

they come to?  Me!  Hey, I'd better go, I'm tired of

it.  (chuckles)  But that's the truth, layin' it out.

That's the situation.  There's no more traders.  That's

why they come from Kayenta, they come from all over the

Rez--Grand Canyon and all over up here--to visit and

ask me about cow prices.  They may not bring me any,

but they ask about it.  And sheep, cattle, wool prices--

because I'm about the only one left here, and they know

I talk Navajo.  They like to talk [to me], so I like to

talk to them.  So that's about where it's at, I guess.

If I went home and talked to white people, I'd miss it.

I guess that's why I don't go--'cause I can't afford to

go, really.  I don't have that much money.  But money's

not it.

   

   Underhill:  What are some of your favorite memories

from over the years?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, gee, I guess this guy Tom John, he had a

fiftieth wedding anniversary.  This has been probably

ten or fifteen years ago or something, and he came in

and the family invited my wife and I to go to that.  We

were living in Cortez, so we got up real early one

morning and went to that.  And I could tell early on

that if anybody could make you feel like a king and a

queen, why, they can when you go to somethin' like

that, 'cause they put you right up with them, in front,

set you right there.  Weddings, we've been to weddings

where they put us right on the spot, right there,

nobody any better.  You're there, you're their friends.

And so that's it, I think.  They invited us to that

anniversary, and we spent the whole day--I mean, from

morning--we got home after dark.  The whole

celebration, whatever they did, we were there with the

family.  We knew all the family too, or most of 'em,

and the people who came to visit, the people who were

invited.  But it was just a little ol' happy family is

what it was, and I mean they couldn't thank us enough

for coming, and we couldn't thank them enough for

inviting us.  So you know, it was just one of those…

   And early on, at the old store there, they used to

invite me to their peyote meetings and stuff.  They

thought that was just an okay thing, that peyote

meeting.  And so they wanted me (chuckles) to come to

that.  I probably would have gone if I'd been by

myself, a single man or something.  I probably would

have gone.  But a family man, I didn't feel like I had

any business goin' off and spendin' the night over

_______.  I don't know what-all they do, they eat the

peyote, they illusionize, and they do all these things--

like I wanted to try that!  (laughter)  But I don't

think it would have been good, so I never did.  Jay and

I got some buttons one time and tried 'em, and I don't

know how they eat it.  They're bitter as all out!  I

mean, you'd have to…  I don't know how they eat it.

What little bit I nibbled off that, it didn't do

anything.  I didn't eat enough of it, I just tried it.

But that little ol' button is hard.  But anyway, I

never did go, and I never have gone.  But I was

invited, and I think they would have probably treated

me just like they did at the fiftieth wedding

anniversary.  I would have been right there.

   

   Underhill:  Did you go to dances?

   

   Foutz:  We went to the squaw dances quite a bit.

Russell and Helen and Bernie, right after we went to

Teec Nos Pos, we went to a squaw dance one night.

Nothing but wagons, we were the only car there.  And my

wife will tell you to this day, she was scared to death

over that.  (laughter)  And I can understand--the drums

and the people mingling, and not knowing what was going

on, not understanding a word, this, that, and the other

thing.  But just watching, and seein' 'em dance and do

their things.  She was scared to death!  She said, "I

was petrified."  I didn't know that, really, 'til after

we got back home that night, 'cause I'd been to the

dances, and knew all the Indians there--or quite a few.

But it was pretty new to me, too, that right there,

because I didn't know all of them.

   When we were kids, we'd cross that San Juan River.

We lived right across, and the reservation's on the

other side.  We used to, as kids, hear about a squaw

dance being over at such-and-such a place.  Why, we'd

wander over there and spend half or three-quarters of

the night watching them.  And they were good to us, put

up with us.  We weren't really all that naughty, but

probably naughtier than we should have been.  But they

did put up with us, 'cause they liked us.

   

   Underhill:  Were you involved with burials at all?

   

   Foutz:  I buried two.  I sure did.  That was a

terrible situation.  In fact, I hadn't been at Teec Nos

Pos…  Russell got in on one, so he sent the next one

to me.  But Russell had to bury one of 'em.  I don't

know whether he told you in his deal that he did, but

he went over and buried one over at Sweetwater, in that

area.  Mine was an old fellow by the name of Frank

Pete.  The boys were all gone on the railroad, and

there was one boy at home.  His name was John Pete.  He

came rappin' on my window about four o'clock in the

morning and said his dad was dying.  So I tried to send

him over to Russell.  Russell was living there in the

store part--we were living in this little apartment.

So I tried to send him over there, and he went over

there, and Russell didn't get up or wouldn't get up, or

he didn't know which window to rap on, I guess.

   Anyway, I got up and got around, and by the time

Russell got up and around, he appointed me to do that.

We kept a little good lumber, some good pine lumber,

some two-by-fours and stuff, 'cause that's all you had

to make a box out of to bury 'em in.  We got it ready

and we set off, it must have been nine o'clock in the

morning, summertime, hot, dry, hadn't rained all

summer.  We drove over to his place, and we couldn't

get up this mountainside to his house.  We got about

half-way up that, and the trail gave out.  It was just

a wagon trail, and the trail had been washed out and I

couldn't get any farther with that pickup, because I

was afraid of rollin' it off.  So he said, "Well, stop

right here, and I'll walk to the camp, see if I can

find some horses or somethin'."  So I thought he'd

abandoned me, he was gone so long.  He finally came

back with a burro.  I said, "What are we gonna do with

that burro?!"  "Horses are all gone, there's no wagon."

I did have a little wire on that pickup, so we put that

lumber all together, we wired it up and we stuck it in

the ground and we led the donkey under it, and we put a

blanket on him so that the boards wouldn't rub his back

too hard and make him buck.  We put that blanket on

there, and I walked along and balanced the lumber.  It

was about three miles, after we got on top of that

hill, to the camp where the old man had died.  We

finally got the lumber there.  It was gettin' almost

noon then.  And so I asked him, "Where are you going to

bury him?"  "You're here, you know about this.  You're

the guy."  I said, "No, not me!  I'm not gonna pick the

spot.  If we get him in that box, who's gonna carry him

over to the grave?  We gotta get close to the hogan

here, I can't carry that box with that man in it for a

mile or two."

   So we went back over just a little hump there from

the hogan and there was a little spot that I thought

looked like it was soft, but boy, you got about that

far down and you hit that hard caliche and everything.

But him and I dug on that 'til _______ grave.  We got

it down pretty deep, probably five foot deep.  The bad

part of the whole thing was that we didn't measure the

box and the grave.  And so we thought we had plenty of

room--in the top, we did.  The first four foot down, we

had plenty of room.  But we didn't know this until

after he and I…  And we didn't have any other help

to get that box in there.  And how are you gonna get a

box…  These morticians have all this equipment to

lower them down into that grave.  And so we got it, oh,

about four foot down below maybe the top--or three

foot--and it wouldn't go no more.  We jumped on that

box, we did everything to get it to go on down, but it

just wouldn't go.  I said, "Hey, we can't get it out,

and it's gettin' dark.  I got to get home."  I'd had

nothing to eat all day, barely a drink of water.  "I

gotta go."  He said, "Okay."  So we shoveled it up.  He

brought the saddle and killed the old horse right

there.  Before I got up over the hill, he set the hogan

on fire, burned everything up, anything that belonged

to the old man was all history right there.  But I

buried him.

   And then I buried one other guy down by the San Juan

River, down close to the Four Corners.  The same thing

happened there.  But that's the same thing happened

there.  His bro--this one man was helping.  I think we

did a little better job then, I had a little

experience.  (laughter)  I think I did a little better

job the second time.  I had lots of offers, but about

that time, they started using the mortuaries.  Thank

the Lord that they started using other sources, instead

of the trader.  So it did help, and I'm glad they did,

because that wasn't my favorite part of the trading

business.  (laughter)  But I got some experience.

   

   Underhill:  Are there any humorous episodes that

you'd like to share?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, golly, I don't know as there's any of

those.  Well, this one Indian was being interviewed for

his welfare check, and he was about eighty-five or

almost ninety years old.  Great big tall Indian.  He

showed his age, he was ________, he was drawn up.  He

wore dark glasses, or you could have seen plumb through

him--his eyes were set back in his head so far that if

he hadn't worn the dark glasses, you'd have been able

to see all the way through.  But this welfare lady was

interviewing him one day, and he had all these little

kids out there and she was asking him about this kid

and that kid.  "Yours?"  "Yes."  Standing there, and

she said, "I don't believe this, but if you say so,

we're writin' 'em down."  And he was claiming these

kids.  "At your age!"  (laughter)  So that was kind of

humorous.  I really thought that was kind of funny.

She was really having a big time out of that, those

little kids.  The woman was claiming he's the dad.  "If

you say so, that's all right."

   

   Underhill:  He's in the Guiness Book now, huh?

   

   Foutz:  I'm sure of that.  He was old.

   

   Underhill:  Well, if there's anything that you could

go back and change, would you?  Is there anything you

would do differently?

   

   Foutz:  Oh, I can't think of anything really right

off hand that would really change my life that much.

I've enjoyed life.  I haven't done much, or I haven't

earned much, or I don't have much, but who needs it?

Material things don't make you happy all the time.  I

mean, you know, you can have all those things.  But I'm

glad of my health.  I'm really glad I've got good

health.  Doin� all this, I don't know whether bein' a

trader…  The Indians ask me what I eat, what I

drink, to keep me so young.  (chuckles)  I tell 'em, "I

couldn't tell you that--I'd give my secret up."

(Underhill laughs)  No, I don't think it's…  It's

time to retire, but I just can't find a place.  That's

the problem.  I'm kinda ready, and yet I'm not.  We

have some friends there in Cortez.  We have a little

home, what we call the [Hyde?] family home evening

group.  Every Monday night we meet, and all of us have

a little refreshment and we study the scriptures and

talk and just have a good time.  And they're all about

our age.  My wife and I look about twenty years younger

than they do, so they're kinda jealous of us.

(laughter)  In fact, one of 'em just the other day

asked my wife, "When are you gonna start colorin' your

hair?"  Bernie said, "When I get good and ready!  When

I feel like I need to.  Right now I don't feel like I

want to look that old.  I get compliments on how I

look.  I'm goin' with the compliments.  I don't want

'em to say, 'that old lady over there…'"  She wants

'em to say "that young lady over there."

   So I don't know, I have good health.  I have a lot

better health than my brother.  He has arthritis and

stuff, and he hangs in there.  I'd like to get him out

of here more than anything, but I don't know what I'd

do without him, and he doesn't know what he'd do

without me.  But it's been good, trading.  We're proud

of what we've done, I guess.  About all we've got, I

guess, is all we can say, is it's been good to us in a

lot of ways, but we don't have a lot of material

things.  But we're happy with what we've got.  Well,

our friends--lots of friends.  I mean, they've moved

off, and they're still our friends.  They see you in

the grocery store or in town, hey, boy, they want a

hug.  And if they saw you yesterday, they're so glad to

see you in town, or see you in the store, recognize

you.  You recognize them, they're just as happy as I am

to see them, I guess.  Even though I don't want the

competition to know that, but I'm happy to see 'em,

wherever.

   

   Underhill:  Well, I'd like to thank you very much

for taking time out of your day to chat with us.

   

   Foutz:  Well, it's been fun to visit with you.  I've

been wantin' to tell this.  My grandson wants to do

this, and maybe now that I've done it once, maybe I'll

know how.

   

   Underhill:  Do some more, you bet!  (laughs)

   

   Foutz:  Maybe you might have to listen to that.  I

might tell things there that you don't know.

   

   Underhill:  Absolutely.  Thank you.

   

   Foutz:  Might tell some secrets.

   

   Underhill:  We'd like that, too!

   [END OF INTERVIEW]