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Interview with Forrest Cuch Executive Director, Utah Division of Indian Affairs

Ken Verdoia: Forrest, let’s begin with that day when you first find out about the announcement of Range Creek and what might be in play there.  Tell me how you learned about it, how you first became aware of this extraordinary place.

Forrest Cuch: Unfortunately, I learned about it the same time everyone else did…in the newspaper.  And I distinctly remembered cutting out the article, bringing it to the office, copying it and faxing out to the Tribes with a notation that I discovered this in the paper the same time everyone else did.  You know, to call attention to this matter and I faxed it out.  Then I went on vacation for about a month, three weeks to a month.

Ken Verdoia : What is the reaction of the Tribal leaders when they received your fax?

Forrest Cuch: To my dismay, while I was on vacation I received numerous calls saying the tribes are upset that you didn’t let them know, and I said I told them that I did not know about this matter.  I faxed them that message before I left for vacation, and to my surprise there had been a couple of meetings held in which I was criticized for not being on top of this.  And it was really amusing to me that one of my sole defenders was Dr. Melvin Brewster, who was representing the Skull Valley tribe on the committee I was working on, the Native American Remains Review Committee.  Prior to this time, Dr. Brewster was a pain in the butt, so to speak.  He was always giving me a hard time, and here he was defending me while my back was turned, while I was on vacation.  Look, he was probably saying “Forrest is a pain in the butt too, but there’s one thing I can say is that if he knew about this, you would know.”  And so he defended me.  I have always been grateful to him for that.  I miss working with him.  He was a very colorful, fun fellow to work with, so, hope he comes back someday.

Ken Verdoia: This transaction with the state actually taking title of Range Creek was four years in the making, and you were left out of the decision-making process. What’s your reaction to that?

Forrest Cuch: Well, it did ruffle some feathers; it did harm our relationship for a while.  I’m not going to criticize my state colleagues because I also know that they were concerned about alarmists creating a reaction from people and having swarms of people come into that area and creating unmanageable situations.  So, I’m sensitive of that.  I would’ve appreciated being let in on that situation, so that I could’ve discussed the best strategy for making that information public.  I think the tribes would’ve appreciated being let in on that in advance.  I have confidence they could’ve kept it quiet and confidential until the right time. 

Ken Verdoia: Archaeologists are looking at Range Creek as an open-air laboratory, an extraordinary opportunity to probe the ancient history of Utah and the people who live here.  How do you look at Range Creek?

Forrest Cuch: Well, that scientific community needs to pursue that in consultation with American Indian people.  Especially of Utah and I would include the Hopi and Pueblo people in that process.  We don’t know all the answers, but coming together at the table we ought to be able to sort it out and get a better idea of what took place in that area.  I understand there’re grain or corn granaries at different elevations, some a thousand feet high is what I’ve heard.  That would suggest to me that the area was being visited by invaders or intruders and as we know the Athabascan nations were moving into this area about 1300 years ago and so that could account for some of that, but all of this can be solved if we all sit down and discuss it, because I know there are lots or oral histories among the Indian tribes. 

For instance, the Shoshone, Ute, Piute and Goshute claim that the Fremont people are their ancestors and that the Hopi people consider the Pre-Puebloan people, unpopularly and incorrectly referred to as the Anasazi..  The Hopi claim to be the descendants of those people and most of the tribes recognize that.  I’ve been with the Hopi people.  I’ve watched them interpret the rock writings in certain areas of Utah.--most recently Boulder.  And the Hopi will say that we’re all related in this area, all the Utah Aztecan language families, which include the Ute, Shoshone, Piute, Goshute, that we’re all related and that we all had different clans and symbols at one time.  Over time those symbols had been lost.  I watched them interpret a rock writing down in Boulder, Utah where they were interpreting a deer symbol, a man with antlers, and the guy said, “See the one with the real long antlers, that one is Tohono O’odham.”  The message was the Papago Indian people were in this area, Southern Utah at one time.  That’s their interpretation, that’s their understanding of what took place.  So you have all the Southwest groups visiting Utah at one time or another. 

I really do agree there is a mystery here regarding the Ute, Shoshone or Utah Aztecan people.  There is the possibility that our people lived in this area thousands of years ago, as long ago as 10-14 thousand years ago.  May have migrated down into Mexico or may have migrated up from Mexico.  I have seen maps from various archeologists and anthropologists showing the different waves of the Piute, the Ute, the Shoshone language migration into this area from,  , Southwest California coming across Nevada and into Utah,  , that included the, the Comanche nation,  , there are legends that the Comanche people lived in this area and that these other groups, especially my people, the Ute’s, may have pushed them out of the mountain areas into the plains.  Now you have different oral histories like that that need to be explored and that would be the beauty of Range Creek, is if we all utilized this concept I learned about from Dr. Chuck Harris at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, landscape design.  He educated me about this term called “Charette,” which is “little table [cart]” in French, where you get people around a table and you compare notes and that’s how you solve problems.  I think that would be a good way to approach Range Creek.

Ken Verdoia: From the scientific standpoint, it appears, at times, that there are different agendas--that a spiritual or cultural agenda is inconsistent with the scientific agenda.  You seem to be saying they can be one and the same.

Forrest Cuch: I was telling you a little bit earlier about an example where I learned about this exchange that occurred between a scientist and a shaman.  There was a symbol on a rock that looked very much like a snake and the scientist said, “Oh, snake.”  And the Shaman said, “No, spirit.”  He didn’t exactly say, no.  He just said spirit and so, later in the discussion, the Shaman was able to express that rather than a snake that symbol represented movement or unexplained energy and so you had two people having a completely different interpretation of something.  I think that perhaps they’re both right in some ways, and that’s what would happen if you had those two groups.  It would insure that the spiritual interpretation was not excluded and had a purely scientific interpretation.  There needs to be a blending of the two.  That’s why I’m an Einstein fan.  I think he did that. 

Ken Verdoia: Where people live, people die, and where people gather, they have shared beliefs.  Some people have said to us, “Range Creek should be approached as a spiritual place and it should also be approached in effect as a cemetery, where people are in their final rest.”  Does this produce special concerns for you that we recognize and respect this place as the place of those who once lived and now have passed?

Forrest Cuch: Certainly.  But I think the biggest contribution of that thinking would be that if we treat that area as sacred, and as a unique wonderful place.  Perhaps that will flow over to the next valleys and encompass this entire state, because that’s really what Indian people are saying, is that this land is sacred.  We have to treat this land in a respectful manner.  We can no longer harm our earth, our Mother Earth, so to speak.  We have got to retain our spiritual connection to the earth and in our lives and if we continue to do harm and destruction to the earth, we will pay consequences, dire consequences. 

Now, I think that’s what’s behind my end prophecy, which says there are going to be major changes in the year 2012.  Possibly a polar shift, but I’ve heard the most recent interpretation, a fellow that has been working with the Mayan elders, Carlos Barrios.  My understanding is that the elders have told him that man has to do two things.  The first thing we have to do is stop killing one another and the second thing is we have to stop harming the earth.  If we do those two things, it will affect the level of consciousness throughout the world and could slow down some of those destructive processes that are currently in force.  My response to that is that it wouldn’t hurt to adopt that kind of thinking.  I mean you could probably adopt that kind of thinking without becoming fanatical or a spaced-out lunatic.  I think you could probably say that’s a reasonable concept, construct.  We ought to follow it. 

Ken Verdoia: I am intrigued by the fact that the acquisition of Range Creek started out not as means to preserving the past, but actually as a concerted effort by a group of sportsman to preserve prime, blue-ribbon hunting habitat.  Range Creek might not have gone to a Bureau of Land Management inventory and the history of that region might have been ignored.  Did we come close to a disaster?

Forrest Cuch: I think we did.  I think we came very close to a disaster and, but I also think that sometimes that’s the way of the world, you know, that’s really how things happen.  Sometimes you know we’re at the point of a disaster and then something beautiful happens.  I mean it’s almost like the Chaos Theory were learning about more recently and so sometimes it’s comforting and sometimes it’s just as frightening as be.

Ken Verdoia: If this is an untouched window on the past, on the people who lived in this area a thousand years ago, what do you hope we will do with this unique opportunity?  What will make you most proud?

Forrest Cuch: What will make me most proud is that the area and how we manage it will contribute to greater understanding and it will reflect on the contribution on the part of the ancient people to educating modern man, promoting better understanding and our cultural understanding, international understanding, and better understanding of humanity in general.  What I have found through my public life and working for tribes and State of Utah is that the more I learn about the differences of our people, our different cultures, the more I also learn about our commonalities and I also learn ultimately about our own humanity.  All of our humanity.  So anything that is educational that comes out of Range Creek is going to benefit all of mankind in my view.

Ken Verdoia: We talked about the best case scenario.  What would be those things that might concern you, that you fear, unchecked, might happen that would not be the most constructive use of the landscape?

Forrest Cuch: Oh, of course, the number one is desecration of the sacred sites and especially the illegal removal of human remains and desecration of said remains.  That’s the thing American Indians worry about the most, disrespect shown toward the ancient people and their remains and of course next would come any harm to or theft to artifacts found in the area, willful destruction of some of the granaries and some of the pit houses and some of the other structures.  I mean that would just be horrible.  Also, sloppy or a failed management, lack of law enforcement…all the above.  Lack of appropriate expenditures to maintain the area, security, as well as physical maintenance…things like that.

Ken Verdoia: Do museums serve as the best repository for the legacies of the ancient people?

Forrest Cuch: No.  They don’t as long as American Indians and other groups are not serving on the boards, the governing boards of those organizations and as long as they do not have a say in the determinations with regard to display and financing, as far as how to make this information public, how to educate people, how to present information in a meaningful way.  As long as Indian people are not part of that decision making process, I would say no. 

I will give you an example.  We had some artifacts that were donated, dropped off here as part of the 90 day amnesty program that was initiated by the U.S. Attorney’s office in the four states of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona and our office was a drop off point.  We still have those artifacts, and what’s happened is a million people have approached me, one of them, Dr. Brewster.  And he suggested that we not turn them over to a repository, but that we make them available to an Indian controlled organization that would work towards establishment of their own educational facility, cultural facility, to own and display these items as deemed appropriate.  That’s something we’re working on with the U.S. Attorney’s office.  I hope we can turn those artifacts over to an Indian organization.  One that has representation from all of the tribes and one in which we can facilitate for that Indian voice in these matters.

Ken Verdoia: One hundred years ago, the artifacts, the human remains of native people were ransacked as part of a pioneer spirit.  If there is a pot on the land, whether it was my land or not, if I found the pot, I took the pot.  If I found the skull, I took the skull.   Sometimes that work was even done in the name of museums from the east coming out in and looking for trinkets in the American West.   I would dare say that we’re in a better era now.  Are we not?  Are we in the best possible era?

Forrest Cuch: I think we’re learning.   I think we have a long way to go.  I think our consciousness has risen, but I’m worried a little bit that it’s starting to drop a little bit.  I don’t think we’re doing enough in that area.  I don’t think we understand that treating human remains with utmost respect also applies to all living things--the earth in general.  That knowledge, that philosophy, that spiritual awareness is vast, and we’re just touching the tip of the iceberg there.  We have so much more to learn about this world, and the more we learn about this world, we’ll learn that it’s a spiritual world as well.  I was told by a medicine man who I loved and respected very much, his name was Jensen Jack.  He was our Sundance Chief for the Ute people.  Jensen Jack lived the life of a shaman, a Sundance Chief.  He was a very moral man.  He prayed.  He was meditating constantly.  He told me one time, he said,  “Grandson, there’s a world more real than this one, that’s beneath this one.”  And he laughed at me and walked off and I thought, “What’s he talking about?”  But you know I’ve heard many Shamans say the same thing, that in many ways this is not really the real world, there’s another one that is more real, beneath this one.