50 Years Ago: Burros, camels and the Navajo George Washington

Everyone – and the Navajo Times was serious about that – had a grand time at the Miss Navajo Chinle pageant held this week in Chinle.

It ended with Miss Marie Ann Burbank being selected Miss Chinle 1965, winning over Misses Cecilia Attson, Lilly Friday, Sarah Johnson and Winney Henry.

One portion of the event got a lot of notice in the press – the selling of the “Navajo bean burrors.” Apparently vendors who were selling it couldn’t make enough to keep up with the demand.

According to the details that were published, the burror was introduced earlier in the year at a rodeo in the Chinle area and caught on “as fast as a cowboy’s rope.” It sold for 30 cents (although there were reports that some vendors were selling it for 50 cents and getting away with it).

The recipe was simple, according to the Times. “A Navajo Bean Burror is basically chili beans wrapped snuggly in a piece of hot, fresh, Navajo fry bread.”

If this sounds something like a Navajo taco, it could be viewed as a distant cousin since the Navajo taco was still a couple of years from being invented by a Greek restaurant manager in Window Rock.

There are some distinct differences, according to the information provided by the Times. The burror was probably only about a third or half the size of a Navajo taco, which consisted of a whole piece of fry bread with beans, lettuce and other ingredients piled on it.

The burror was, as its name implied, more like a Navajo version of a burrito, and it would continue to gain in popularity throughout 1965 and 1966 until the Navajo taco was created and it lost its appeal.

Another thing that got a lot of notice at the Miss Chinle event was a banner created by the Navajo Police Department, which was put over the stage; “Through These Doors Walks the Future Miss Navajo.”

The Times reports that people are still seeing camels roaming throughout parts of the Navajo Reservation. Is this, perhaps, the Navajo version of the sightings of Bigfoot.

Well, the paper reports, there are camels on the reservation, mostly around Ramah.

It turns out that back in 1856, a road was being built from Albuquerque up to Colorado, headed by frontiersman Edward Fitzgerald Beale. He decided to bring with him 25 camels to see how if they were better suited to this area.

Much to everyone’s surprise, the camels proved to be a big success and for years thereafter, the army would use camels on occasion at their various forts in New Mexico and Arizona and in this area as well.

In that 1856 experiment, P. Gilmar Breckenridge took several camels as he trekked to California and found they arrived in California in much better condition than the expedition’s horses and mules. And their diet consisted of cactus and sagebrush, both easy to find in this area.

If you were around during those days and had the occasion to hear Navajo Tribal Chairman Raymond Nakai give a speech, you would notice that in many of his speeches – better than half – he would make mention of the fact that the Navajo Tribe was the biggest of all tribes.

At that time, tribal membership was more than 90,000 and no one cared about how many Cherokees there were, so the Navajos could lay claim to having the biggest membership.

And while he didn’t brag about it, more than 95 percent of those members lived on the reservation or in one of the several border communities around the reservation.

Unemployment was high – close to 75 percent in some areas of the reservation – but Navajos made millions of dollars though the underground industries on the Navajo Reservation – making Indian jewelry or blankets and selling things at fairs or other events.

Pinon picking was especially good that year – so much that pinon picking became a family activity because of traders on the reservation willing to pay top dollar due to the demand off the reservation.

A year prior, the Gallup Independent published an article that got a lot of attention in some circles on the Navajo Reservation and the paper decided to republish it again in 1965 as part of its Ceremonial coverage.

It was about a man who had been ignored of late by the Navajo Times – Paul Jones, who left office about two years prior but was still beloved by many Navajos.

“Future generations may very well look to Paul Jones as the George Washington of Navajoland and a leader through his diplomacy, friendship with the leaders and people of the non-Indian culture, founded a new nation dedicated to realization of the inevitable coming of the assimilation of the Navajo culture with the culture of the surrounding non-Navajos,” the paper said.

In 2015, we are now in the second generation after Jones, and no one seems to be referring to him as the Navajo George Washington. In fact, if anyone is being called the Navajo George Washington, it’s probably Chee Dodge who was the first chairman of the tribe much like Washington was the first president.

As for Jones, I wonder how many Navajos between 18 and 30 would even recognize his name?

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