--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Beckwith, Frank collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 30 number: 12 published: 1927-10 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Frank Beckwith, “Why Is the Indian Taciturn?,” *Improvement Era* 30, no. 12 (October 1927): 1088–1092." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera30012unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera30012unse start_page: 1088 end_page: 1092 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1927-10) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera30012unse publication_year: 1927 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1927, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Why Is the Indian Taciturn? WHY IS THE INDIAN TACITURN? A Pictograph in Clear Creek Canyon Answers That Query in a Manner as Novel as Charming By Frank Beckwith Why is the brown man of the wilds taciturn? Why so silent? What lesson instilled this into his being ineradicably deep? The answer is told in a pictograph carved on the walls of Clear Creek Canyon, a photograph of which is presented in this article. Interpreting that pictograph, one begins at the bottom and reads up. The first object thus encountered is th: round, "spider web"- looking design, which is the ideagraph of a basket "in the making." The radial arms are laid, and the weaving of the wythes in and out has been begun. The true Basket Maker preceded the Cliff Dweller. The earliest Basket Maker had no pottery; they did not know the use of bow and arrow, but flung a dart from a kind of "throwing stick." They fashioned many baskets, for divers purposes, varying all the way in the wide range from the small plaque to the large mortuary basket, used as a covering for the corpse in their burial custom. Some of their best basket work was of so fine a weave that it held water; museum collections contain specimens showing fine execution of skilled workmanship. The First Loom in Utah My interpretation of the next object, reading upward, may bring about my ears a veritable hornet's nest of controversy: — Salt Lake City has a treasured relic in a museum labelled, "The First Loom in Utah." That statement I wish to refute. Here is a drawing on the walls of Clear Creek Canyon of the first loom in Utah, antedating that of Salt Lake City by a score of centuries. See the long cords of the warp; note the compact woof already woven and patterned, shown to the right. Loose strings of the woof stick out from the loom; a couple of balls of twine are shown; and to the left is a detail drawing of the method of winding .the yarn, even denoting the source of supply from which the bobbin is wound (using our terms as no- menclature) . In fact, everything is done in this drawing to make the meaning clear. In fancy one can reconstruct the scene of an ancient Indian woman sitting upon the ground, one end of this horizontal loom fast to her belt, and a rope running from the other end to a near-by tree. In such a small loom are woven girdles, garters, head-carrying bands and the smaller articles used. WHY IS THE INDIAN TACITURN? 1089 To the right of the loom is seen a deer, with its hide stripped off and pegged down on the ground, ready for the tanning operations. The Tale of the Turkey Gobbler In the position of highest honor, accorded to the most im- portant subject in the presentation, is the figure of a turkey gobbler, with beard hanging down from his chest — a bird sacred to the ancient Indian. This fowl was domesticated by the aborigines centuries Copyright, 19 '2 6, by Frank Beckwith. A pictograph in Clear Creek Canyon which shows, (reading from the bottom up) an unfinished basket, a drawing of a loom; and the topmost figure the Turkey Gobbler, which taught the Indian to be silent. I 1090 IMPROVEMENT ERA before Columbus; he was housed in honor; his feathers furnished symbols dear to the Indian heart; his bones provided awls, and his meat furnished food. In rooms in which h: was kept archaeologists have found the accumulated droppings of centuries, many inches thick. With so great economic worth, no wonder 'he was regarded as important to their welfare. In addition to all this, however, he gave a life-lesson to the Indian, for which the pictograph honors him with topmost position. The ancient Indian pictograph is sometimes largely mnemonic; that is, a single, simple sign aided, or was intended to aid, memory. The sight of the drawing brings to mind the associated ideas, and thus conveys the subject matter by a mental process of re-collection of the component parts. The subject matter in its entirety is taught by the elders of the tribe to the young Indian by "word of mouth." The youths, eager to obtain this lore, assemble before the aged story teller, and each "learns letter perfect" the legend of myth being related. The aged men are adepts in the art of story telling, and the brown eyes of attentive hearers glisten as each salient point is sunk home. Each tale is learned exactly as given, unvaried in delivery, as a change is looked upon as a sacrilege. The elderly persons, honored and respected, take upon themselves the task of telling the stories which keep alive the myths, legends, and folk-lore of the tribe. The tale of how the Turkey Gobbler is a living object lesson to the Indian to be silent unfolds thus: "In the days of the new," as is the Indian idiom for saying "in the long, long ago," men and animals, and likewise fowls and birds of the air, lived together, and spoke a common tongue. You white men whose senses are dulled with luxuries, and clouded with artificiality, see nothing, and hear nothing when Nature delivers a message; but we Indians, with acute sense perceptions, and trained to the wild, hear God and see him in everything. The whisper came through the tree tops (which the obtuse whites would have said was merely the "soughing of the wind through the trees"), saying gently to us: "Take to the uplands. To the mesa heights for safety! There is going to be a flood." So all that lived (save one) repaired to the high plateaus. One remained — the Turkey Gobbler and his hens. He alone of all that lived disobeyed the divine mandate. He clung steadfast to his accustomed feeding grounds. As the waters rose on his bare shanks he became angry; his neck and wattles reddened with the choleric blood of rage; he strutted in vain glory; he scolded; he vociferated his incessant GOBBLE! GOBBLE! GOBBLE! Advanc- ing into the rising flood, he swelled himself up big with menace, and gobbled a torrent of abuse at the invading flood. But to no avail. Soon the waters reached his body feathers. "Leave not, hens," he screamed to his flock, seeing them edge WHY IS THE INDIAN TACITURN? 1091 ever to the higher ground; "stay with me. Have I not always scared everything else with my menace" (and here he blew himself up BIG! BIG!") — hasn't everything else that lives given place to me? Even the waters will I turn back." Vain boast. The deluge continued to rise, despite his loudest scoldings. Grow- ing angrier and angrier, his face and neck wattles purpled with the heat of passion. He blew himself up to his very utmost — now listen, O unobserving whites! When the turkey gobbler blows himself up to his biggest, when he reaches that moment of near-bursting, watch very closely. He drops his wing tips stiffly to the ground, and at the same moment struts two tiny steps, making his wing tips strum out on the -ground for him the words BIG! BIG! Listen for it the next time you see one strut. Thus did he blow himself up big, yea, even to his very biggest, purple with wrath, and vent his anger at the intruder with his GOBBLE! GOBBLE! GOBBLE! All that lived looked on. Here was one who obeyed not the gods. Intently all observed to see what his dire end would be. Expectancy filled the air. In the hush, a whisper floated over the mesa top from Those above, saying: "Observe, O ye Indians! For you are about to learn a life-lesson." Just then "The Makers of the Paths of Men" hurled a huge wave at him with terrific force, and dashed the bird against the cliff, a wet and crumpled mass, with the life spark all but extinguished. "Run to that bird," shouted the Medicine Men; "save his life! For he will be for all time a living lesson to the Indian not to strut in vain-glorious pride; not to become angered; and above all, never to GOBBLE! GOBBLE! GOBBLE!" The Indians of the pueblos are great impersonators; in their sacred dramas, seemingly everything that lives is represented. This next photograph is from the Smithsonian Institution, drawn for them by a native Indian artist in New Mexico, to illustrate the impersonation of the Indian actor who represents himself to be the Turkey Gobbler to re-enact the lesson; for he struts about before the spectators, scolding, menacing, and gobbling at all, just as we have been relating, purposely making a very nuisance of himself. His especial duty it is to swell up "big to burst" and, planting himself squarely b fore the most im- portant personage in the assembly, revile that man with his incessant GOBBLE! GOBBLE! GOBBLE! thus instilling into the Indian mind the necessity of behaving just the opposite — whence arose the charac- teristic taciturnity of the Indian. This is the pictograph in beloved Clear Creek Canyon interpreted. The tale is adapted from one current at the Mesa Verde, and 1092 IMPROVEMENT ERA delivered by the guides to th: tourists as they are conducted through the ruins, its lesson applied to the pictograph several hundred miles away. Drawing by a Hopi Indian artist for the Smithsonian Institution, portrayirt, the impersonator of the Turkey Gobbler, and who impresses by his noisy excesses the opposite lesson — "Be silent!" Reflection While sitting in the solitude of evening. Watching the shadows creep along the ground — The light, that fain would stay, is slowly leaving. And shades are gently low'ring all around — 'Tis then my thoughts revert to days of childhood, And scenes of long ago to me unfold; My fancy takes me rambling through the wildwood And o'er the hills where I have often strolled. I s£e the crystal brook by which I sported When life ran, like its waters, smooth and free; Upon its soft green banks in youth I loitered And listened to the songs it sang to me. O would that I were like the limped water Remaining pure and sweet my whole life long. And, like the brook, in duty 'never falter, But do life's work in gladness and in song. Logan, Utah. SAMUEL B. MlTTON.