Southwest Books

Someone should definately read this book, or it will be gone without a trace, resembling thi Ancient Ones, or Anasazi

Well-researched and gorgeously illustrated, this book manages to convey its author's enthusiasm for the Southwest's remarkable ruins without sacrificing scientific detail and even skepticism. He takes a well-known subject, Mesa Verde, and let's us see it with new eyes, while illuminating some of the least-well-known and most intriguing sites in the region. Few scholars and fewer tourists venture beyond Mesa Verde intothe obscure corners of the San Juan River valley, but William Ferguson shows how rewarding the trip could be. Above all, it is refreshing to read an enthusiast's book that does not indulge in unsupported speculation about the lives and beliefs of the prehistoric people of the Southwest.

This calendar reflects many of the ancient places I've traveled over the years and brings back great memories. The photography is splendid.

Mesa Verde, Chaco Canyon, and Wuptaki are three of the best known of the Indian ruins that dot the landscape in the high desert country of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah. To this day it is difficult to comprehend how these Indians thrived in a region of short hot summers, little rain, and poor soil -- and not only fed themselves but left behind spectacular monumental buildings. Adding to the mystery is their sudden abandonment of their major sites in the 1100s and 1200s.

The author surveys the knowledge and theories about the ancient peoples who became the modern day Pueblo Indians. He follows the development of the Anasazi and Mogollon traditions from their beginnings thousands of years ago until the 1700s, after the arrival of the Spaniards. The book is illustrated with more than 100 photos, maps, and charts and 25 sidebars that take up interesting topics such as cannibalism, construction methods, domestic animals, ballcourts, burials, and leadership. The emphasis is on thoroughness as the author briefly describes the findings and gives a hearing to the theories of hundreds of archaeologists and other scholars. The bibliography runs to more than 30 pages.

There is much of environmental determinism here for in the climate of the Southwest small changes in the weather made all the difference in the lives of the inhabitants. Scholars have meticulously reconstructed temperature and precipitation records for the last 2,000 years and the author attempts to correlate the rise and fall of Indian cultures with precipitation and temperature averages.

"Ancient Puebloan Southwest" is probably a bit too dense for the casual reader, but offers those interested in archaeology and the Southwest a thorough and up-to-date account of the Anasazi the Mogollon and the proto-historic Zuni, Hopi, and Rio Grande Pueblos.

Smallchief

I WILL LOVE ANYTHING ABOUT DOMINIC WEST SO, THEREFORE, THIS BOOK IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!

This book is a collection of over 40 columns that began appearing in the NMASM Newsletter in 1988. They are stories about different surveys the author has been involved in as well as stories of historical figures who were surveyors. Most of these stories take place in New Mexico and the Southwest

When missionaries came to colonize California, it was to Baja California "Antigua California" that they came. This is the story of the Jesuits who persevered in a barren, waterless, resource poor place. But the really great thing about the book is that it is the whole story of the pioneer mission period: it is also the story of the aboriginal peoples who were the targets of the Jesuits, and of the people (mostly Mexican) whom the Jesuits hired and brought along to handle and create daily life-soldiers, sailors, artisans, laborers. For once, a comprehensive history truly is. Using original eighteenth century materials (church records, diaries, letters, reports) the author has tracked down the movement of individuals, their genealogies, their careers, their contributions. More than most, it is a book of portraits of real people, pieced together sympathetically from scattered and scanty records. For a scholar, the book is eminently useful: full of maps, chronological tables of people and places, explanations of systems and bureaucracies. For the history buff, it is a dream of readability and detail. Highly recommended.

I was fortunate enough to snag a copy of the University of Nebraska Bison printing of this classic book back in 1987. But, must admit to some surprise the University doesn't have this classic yet in print.

This "crackling, swift moving narrative" not only offers chronicle of the pursuit of the Apache marauders "across southern Arizona (Territory) and New Mexico to the Sierra Madre in Mexico in 1883", but will offer also historical reading enjoyment to any interested reader opening its pages. The book was written by General George Crook's aide-de-camp, staff officer of 16 years, John Gregory Bourke. Both this book and ON THE BORDER WITH CROOK, also penned by Captain Bourke are to be considered classics of both the frontier and Indian Wars era in the 19th century.

Captain Bourke was very much an empathetic ethnologist, having interest and great understanding of the native Americans of that time, and his writings offer great insight into the Chiricahua Apaches and others caught up in this conflict of U.S. Army cavalry and the various Apache tribes.

The towns, landscapes, people, and activities of this 1883 campaign are all written about in these pages by one who observed them first-hand. No better factual reading exits of this time, especially coming as it does from a primary source, one who both viewed and lived it. Several histories on this campaign exist but Captain Bourke's is second to none.

Semper Fi.

The Ballantine Western in my library shows a publishing date of April, 1974, with a very nice front cover painting of an Apache astride a gray horse by Frank McCarthy. The book has a $1.25 cover price. Ah, those were the days of much more inexpensive paperbacks.

Essentially this book from the 1930s offers up writing from a master of the Southwest with an intended purpose of giving "the true story of hidden treasure in the Southwest". In doing so Mr. Dobie gives record of both greed and violence "of the fabulous wealth jealously guarded by blood-hungry Indians: the hidden canyon of gold, the rich silvermines-real stories of men who have sought the Lost Adams Diggings, the legendary Tayopa Mine, and other fabled bonanzas of the Southwest".

With the Lost Adams Mine taking up 74 pages of a 180 page book, that mine receives the most attention. The mine I have most affinity for is the Lost Padre and it unfortunately receives no attention. Other than that caveat, this is a very readable book, but as one reviewer points out, it does show its age of 70 some years, and there now exist other more complete books.

Still and all, if one is deeply interested in gold and silver of the area, then this classic of sorts should still be read. Another book from that same time period of the 1970s which shot up the bestseller list is LOST BONANZAS by Harry Sinclair Drago. So it appears a couple books on this subject will find the reader's interest if they are so inclined.

Mr. Dobie is now dead by many years, but his written works live on and are still profitable reads.

Semper Fi.

This is the fascinating and absorbing life story of a Mescalero/Chiracahua Apache man -- one who, when he was just a small child, knew Geronimo. Told in his own words, the story is annotated by a white ethnologist, Opler, who made a study of the Apache people over several decades and knew this man very well (the first section of the book explains the culture and historical context), so that all references made by the speaker can be understood by any reader. As he recalls events of his life, he draws the reader deeper into his experience: from his respect and love of the old Apache ways, to the stress and anxiety created by tribal and family disruption caused by government interference. He speaks often and at length about the uses of spiritual power as found in plants, animals, and the earth. This book was apparently written as a textbook for cultural anthropology at Stanford University, but it also deserves our attention for its humanity and for the intriguing story it tells.