rne' ·I" A HISTORY OF THE NAVAJOS Peter Iverson Featuring photographs by Monty Roessel University ()f New Mexico Press Albuquerque assume important positions. Navajo studies were featured at the heart of the curriculum, with Kenneth Begay (silversmithing), Mike Mitchell (his­ tory and culture), William Morgan (language), Mabel Myers (weaving), Ruth Roessel (director, history and culture), and Atah Chee Yellowhair (basketry) among the instructors. Teddy Draper, Mike Etsitty, Nathan Silversmith, and Erwin Wayne taught in adult basic education. Other initial Navajo faculty members included Elouise Jackson (English), Grace McNeley (English), Priscilla Mowrer (sociology), Paul Platero (sciences), and Rudy Sells (mathematics). Key Navajo staff members included Tommy Begay (comptroller), Margaret Etsitty (counselor), Dean Jackson (federal programs), Jack Jackson (dean of students and basketball coach), and Agatha Yazzie (registrar). The college achieved noteworthy successes on several fronts, but its nonacademic environment limited its ability to attract and keep students. Those who lived on campus were sentenced to reside in Dormitory Nine, with no rugs on the floor, no carpeting in the hallways, harsh overhead lighting, and paper-thin walls. The high school furnished the cook, the food, and high school students whose presence extended the lines in the cafeteria. The cook obviously regarded pepper as a dangerous spice and his concoctions lacked imagination, variety, or taste.,Students com­ plained constantly about the food. One expressed his unhappiness in the student newspaper: "My socks have absorbed so much starch they walk by themselves!" Those enrolled at the college played basketball in a high school gym, saw movies in a high school auditorium, checked books out of a high school library, and attended class in high school classrooms. It is not surprising that they wondered about whether they were attending "a real college." Many Farms' centrally isolated location did not aid those who needed a change of scenery.16 In sum, by the early 1970S, the future well-being of the Navajos' own college remained very much in doubt, despite the need for a Dine institution of higher education. IMPACT OF THE OFFICE OF NAVAJO ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY AND THE DNA LEGAL SERVICES PROGRAM The ONEO was not a Navajo idea. The office emerged because of money available through the federal government's "War on Poverty" during the 196os. The Navajo Nation brushed aside the BIA's request to administer a local program sponsored through the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) and decided to run the program itself. An initial grant of $920,000 from the OEO in January 1965 launched ONEO. By May 1965, Peter MacDonald had become executive director of ONEO. He remained at the helm until he resigned to run for chairman.1 7 In one way or another, different ONEO programs soon affected the lives of most Dine. The Legal Services, Home Improvement Training, the Navajo Culture Center, the Neighborhood Youth Corps, Local Community 236 Chapter 7 Development, Alcoholism, Head Start, Migrant and Agricultural Place­ ment, Recreation and Physical Fitness, and Operation Medicare Alert programs soon engaged many Dine. By 1967, 23,382 people had been served by the ONEQ.l8 The federal government's generous funding of the ONEO made pos,. sible a wide-ranging program. The Navajos once again found a way to take an idea from the outside and make it work ,within their society. Nearly all of its top administrators were members of the Navajo "Nation and the benefits of the program resonated throughout the reservation, with residents of more distant communities. seeing immediate benefits through new employment or help for young children. The Local Community Development (LCD) and Child Development (CD) programs exemplified the ONEO' s value. LCD projects often resulted from ONEO partnering with other government agencies for funding and assistance. This program enabled residents of Aneth, Utah, to conStruct a much-needed medical clinic, members of the Teec Nos Pos chapter to improve a local road and expedite the delivery of water for irrigation, Red Mesa residents to construct a utility building, and Nenanez;;td chapter members to build a hay shed. By early 1970, the CD program furnished preschool activities for mor~ than two thousand children. Through this initiative, many children gained medical and dental care to which they otherwise might not have had access. Hundreds of children received physical examinations, skin tests, immunizations, dental treatments, heaf­ ing screening, and other tests. These initiatives gave the ONEO a kind of concrete reality that Window Rock- or Washington-based innovations often lacked. The ONEO combined adequate funding, local involvement and support, and visible and viable programs that mattered.l9 Little controversy attended most components ofONEO, with one nota­ ble exception: Dine Bee'iina Nahiilnah Bee Agha'diit'aahii (or "Attorneys Who Contribute to the Economic Revitalization of ·the People") Legal Services, soon shorthanded to DNA Legal Services, attracted opposition and animosity from the outset, even as it also demonstrated its value to thousands of Dine. Debate over the program, soon to split off from the ON?O, began in the waning days of 1966 when DNA's board decided to hire Theodore ("Ted") Mitchell as its executiv~ director. A 1964 graduate of Harvard law school, Mitchell had grown up in Phoenix, and had also attended Phoenix College and Brigham Young University. He had worked as an attorney for the Navajo Tribal Legal Aid Service from January 1965 to March 1966. At the time of his appointment to head DNA, he was work-:­ ing as legal services director for an OEO regional office in Austin, Texas.20 Not all of the Dine welcomed Mitchell's return. The brash, outspoken young lawyer had displeased some powerful Navajo politicians, includ­ ing Sam Billison and Annie W auneka, because of his disagreement with Littell. They protested his· appointment. Their opposition also reflected their antagonism toward Nakai. Mitchell expressed pleasure at his 238 Chapter 7 appointment and declared, "[T]he prime objective of the program will be to provide justice for the Navajo who cannot afford to hire a private attorney to advise and represent him."21 DNA hired attorneys from leading law schools and set up offices in Chinle, Crownpoint, Shiprock; Tuba City, and Window Rock Thousands of Dine flocked to its offices to seek assistance on 'a variety of matters, including sales contracts, grazing rights, misdemeanors, pawn, and state and local welfare. This list indicated that DNA had to deal with key institutions and influences in the Navajo area. By defending individual Navajo rights, DNA began to ta~ke on vested interests and long-standing concerns, as the following example demonstrates. A Navajo man travels from Newcomb to Farmington in order to buy a used pickup truck He visits Farmington Vehicles .and a fast-hilling sales­ man sells him the least desirable vehicle on the lot. The customer wonders how such an old-lookingtruck can have such limited mileage on it,but he speaks only limited English and does not feel comfortable asking about it. The salesman pressures him into signing the papers, including one that calls for 25 percent interest. The new owner starts toward Newcomb. He doesn't like how the truck sounds, but drives west out of Farmington hoping for the best. Then he turns off the main highway and heads down toward the river in order to pay a brief visit to the Hatch Brothers trad­ ing post in Fruitland. As he begins to drive away from Hatch's, the truck begins to go into some kind of nervous shock It shakes, shudders, and dies. He is furious about being sold this lemon. What can he do? He calms down,: walks back to the trading post and asks Stewart Hatch to call the DNA office in Shiprock. Eventually, he gets his money back and some additional compensation, given how he has been treated. He becomes a booster of DNA legal services. Farmington Vehicles does not. This fictional but representative example helps to illustrate why a vari­ ety of businesses resisted this challenge to their customary way of doing business and why DNA became so popular. The Tribal Council's general counsel, Harold Mott, concluded that the DNA attorneys made his life more complicated and difficult. He viewed the young lawyers with dis­ dain and they tended to return the favor. One named his two dogs after the ge~eral counsel and his wife, christening them Harold and Louise Mutt. ANNIEWAUNEKA RESPONDS TO TED MITCHELL'S LAUGH In Gallup, DNA attorneys tackled conditions in the local jail, abuses of the pawn system, and poor working conditions. Mitchell called jail condi­ tions "so i:rtolerable that even for a man to spend one day there is inde­ fensible." The Gallup city manager called DNA's critique "a last dying gasp at obtaining a little publicity." Gallup residents complained about DNA's criticism hurting the image of the community. A suit against con­ temporary pawn practices received the following headline in the Gallup "We Stand Together": 1962-1982 239 newspaper: "DNA Complaint May End Indians' Pawn Privileges." The owner of Virgie's Cafe, Virgie Chavez, responded unhappily to a DNA attorney's complaint concerning her payment of low wages and Jack of overtime pay. She said such criticism demonstrated"this agency's gross incompetence and disregard for ethics" and labeled DNA lawyers "long­ haired, irresponsible and ill-manner[ed] clerks'~ and an "inferior group of rabble