50 years ago: Liquor licenses denied; Shine’s light goes out

As 1966 drew to a close, Navajo tribal officials got some good news from Joe Armijo, the liquor director for the state of New Mexico.

He told tribal officials that several companies had applied to set up liquor stores near the reservation border in McKinley and San Juan counties and all had been denied.

Ever since a liquor license had been approved a couple of miles west of Yah-Ta-Hey in 1965 and dealers had learned how much that was making, it seemed everyone wanted to set up their own operation between Window Rock and Gallup and between Shiprock and Farmington.

“But the state turned all of them down, the governor has an agreement with the Indian Council not to issue any more licenses over there,” Armijo said.

In fact, tribal leaders had bitterly opposed the one that was granted in 1965, causing that one to be delayed for several months while a legal battle went on. A battle that the Navajos eventually lost, but not the war because one of the agreements that was put in place was that no more licenses would be granted in that area.

By this time, there were two liquor licenses approved between Gallup and Window Rock, both on State Highway 264.

The two establishments now licensed just off the reservation boundary, he said, were the Navajo Inn, owned by Emmett Garcia and the Sagebrush Inn, owned by Dorothy Thompson. Both licenses were to expire on June 30, 1967 but state law allowed the owners to renew them if they so desired.

“The reservation people don’t want any more,” said Armijo.

That may not have actually been true.

In their applications for their own liquor licenses, applicants quoted several dozen tribal members who said they supported having more liquor stores along the border because it would save them the problem of having to go all the way into Gallup to buy liquor on a two-lane highway that was already becoming known for all of its fatal accidents caused by drunk drivers returning to the reservation after a night of drinking in Gallup bars.

Armijo said he placed between 25 and 30 applications into the department’s dead file.

There was some tragic news as the year ended for residents of the Tuba City area as just before Christmas, a man who brought joy to hundreds of Navajo young people each year died.

Reporters couldn’t pin down how long Hugh D. Smith had been giving Christmas parties for Navajo children because people they interviewed said, “it was as long as they could remember.”

But Smith, who was known by the nickname “Shine,” and was referred to in articles as “The Cowboy Preacher of Arizona,” had spent almost 50 years as a missionary to the Navajo people.

He continued preaching to the Navajos from 1917 until he retired in 1964. During that time, he reportedly claimed that he could count almost 1,000 members of the tribe as friends. He had moved into a Winslow rest home a month before his death.

His closest Navajo friends were in charge of his funeral, according to media reports at that time. One of the coordinators for his funeral said the Navajo people were going to abide by his wishes and bury him in the Tuba City area “in a plain, unadorned pine box.”

And to close out the year, let’s leave it to the tribe’s chairman at that time, Raymond Nakai, to have the final say.

And that final word is a strongly worded criticism of the Albuquerque Journal for publishing an article that stated that he planned to push for a tribal constitution in 1967.

“That’s not true,” said Nakai. “I have no such plans.”

So where did the Journal get that idea?

From statements made by Nakai during his campaign for re-election.

He said in June, July, August, and September that if he were re-elected, one of his first priorities would be to push for the tribe to approve a constitution.

Now the reasoning behind this at the time was obvious.

The opposition controlled the tribal council and had passed several resolutions over the past couple of years limiting his power – he didn’t even have the right to hire or fire people working for the tribal government.

So he wanted a tribal constitution to get back those powers that had been taken away from him. But it turned out he didn’t need a constitution because a lot of those council delegates who opposed him had not been re-elected.

Now if he had said that, everyone would have understood. Instead, he said he had never said he was going to push for a constitution.

“I am not in favor of a tribal constitution,” he said, adding that if one were to be written, it would have to come from the Navajo people themselves.

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