Name/Title
StereographEntry/Object ID
2023.055.3.0398Description
A black and white stereograph. Image is of a lean to constructed with several large logs and some vegitation in the center of a desert, three people are sitting at the entrance whle a horse stand behind the structure. Above the image "53" is printed, below the image "V23204 - At Breakfast - Typical Desert home of Navao Reservation, Arizona." is printed, to the left of the image "Keystone View Company Ccopyrighted, Underwood & Underwood Manufacturers MADE IN U.S.A. Publishers" is printed, to the right of the image "Meadville, Pa., New York, N. Y., Portland, Oregon, London, Eng., Sydney, Aus." is printed. On the reverse the following is printed:
V23204
TYPICAL HOME OF NAVAHO INDIANS, ARIZONA
Just when the Navanos (pronunciation) came to Arizona is not known. They were here when the Spaniards first arrived in the middle of the fifteenth century. They were a semi-nomatic tribe having now villages, no strong central government. For years the Navaho was known as the "Islamel of the Desert: - every man's hand against him and his agaisnt them." In 1864 they learned the power of the United States, and since then have been friendly and have prospered wonderfully in material things. It is estimated that they make annually about a million dollars worth of blankets, and that they ship hundrds of thousands of wool pelts and hides.
We see in this picutre a typical desert home of this Indian tribe. They encamp in hogans like this near some gully where there is a spring of water. Those poplar poles that form the frame of the hogan were brought perhaps twenty miles across the desert from a distant canyon. The thatch is of course grass and sage brush. Within the hogan you can see the vertical warp threads of the blanket loom which is found in every home. It seems alost impossible, but these Navaho Indians actually raise beans and even corn of a dwarf species in the sand near their hogans. When the scanty pasturage fails it is no serious undertaking to pull the hogan to pieces and move across the desert to a new location.
This is a summer hogan. The winter home is similar, but it is made warmer by hollowing out the sand so as to form a cellar, and the poles are more than half their length below the surface. An extra thatch of brushery given to the roof, and this is plastered over with a coat of mud (adobe). It is thus made storm-proof, but it is not so healthful as the summer camp.
Copyright by The Keystone View CompanyCollection
Photograph Collection