Navajo Long Walk

Navajo Long Walk is the story of Kee, a young boy who traveled this long, arduous route with his mother, grandmother, sister and what few domestic animals they could bring. Over the four-year period, Kee learns to adapt to his inhospitable surroundings. Ultimately, Kee realizes the frailty of his people in the presence of the white soldiers and that to survive, they must find a way to get along with the white man. Ages 9-12

Shedding fresh light on a tragic chapter of American history, this book documents a shameful episode in the 1860s, when U.S. soldiers forced thousands of Navajo to march 400 miles from their homeland to a desolate reservation. Full color.

In 1863, the Dine (Navajo) faced transformations to their way of life with the Americans' determination to first subjugate and then remove them to a reservation in order to begin their assimilation to American culture. This book exposes the series of events that facilitated the Navajo's removal from their homeland, their experiences during the Long Walk, their time at the Bosque Redondo reservation, their return home, and the ways in which they remember the Long Walk and the Bosque Redondo.

From bookcover: "More than one hundred years ago commenced one of the most pathetic and tragic episodes in the history of Anglo-Indian relations. Under the ruthless direction of General James H. Carleton and Christopher "Kit" Carson the Navajo Indian of New Mexico were rounded-up and driven to a disease ridden reservation on the banks of the Rio Pecos in east-central New Mexico--the infamous Bosque Redondo. The Long Walk, however, does not merely explore the Navajo roundup and the horrors of their internment at Fort Sumner. It offers instead the first truly detailed study of the Navajo Wars, their causes and aftermaths ... The insiduous slave raids, the encroachment of New Mexico sheepmen, the stupid and careless administration of Indian and military affairs, as well as the Navajos' innate desire for status through the acquisition of livestock, are clearly probed and documented."

Will Evans's writings should find a special niche in the small but significant body of literature from and about traders to the Navajos. Evans was the proprietor of the Shiprock Trading Company. Probably more than most of his fellow traders, he had a strong interest in Navajo culture. The effort he made to record and share what he learned certainly was unusual. He published in the Farmington and New Mexico newspapers and other periodicals, compiling many of his pieces into a book manuscript. His subjects were Navajos he knew and traded with, their stories of historic events such as the Long Walk, and descriptions of their culture as he, an outsider without academic training, understood it. Evans's writings were colored by his fondness for, uncommon access to, and friendships with Navajos, and by who he was: a trader, folk artist, and Mormon. He accurately portrayed the operations of a trading post and knew both the material and artistic value of Navajo crafts. His art was mainly inspired by Navajo sandpainting. He appropriated and, no doubt, sometimes misappropriated that sacred art to paint surfaces and objects of all kinds. As a Mormon, he had particular views of who the Navajos were and what they believed and was representative of a large class of often-overlooked traders. Much of the Navajo trade in the Four Corners region and farther west was operated by Mormons. They had a significant historical role as intermediaries, or brokers, between Native and European American peoples in this part of the West. Well connected at the center of that world, Evans was a good spokesperson.

An account of Bighorse's life recalled by his daughter Tiana, providing glimpses into Navajo life and values of a century ago.