Shirley Clark interview

Interviewer
Shirley why don't you start out by giving me your name and where you're from and then tell me your father's Long Walk story.

Shirley Clark
My name is Shirley Clark.  My maiden name is Shirley Woody.  I am from Rehoboth, New Mexico.  My father's stories of the Long Walk are very few because the old folks didn't speak of the Long Walk like we do with other stories.  Perhaps because it was more sensitive and they had memories of their loved ones suffering. And they didn't want to dwell on it or bring it back to mind because it's too close to their hearts.  My father tells me of my grandmother, my great, great grandmother, who was captured and followed the soldiers, and they were forced actually to join the trail of people going to Fort Sumner.  She was out tending her chores when she was captured and forced to join the group that was walking to Fort Sumner.  She didn't say goodbye, or her family didn't know where she went... she just disappeared.  And so for two years she was gone and she looked for her family at the camp in Fort Sumner.  When she could… she was a slave--she was a slave to weave rugs--and what little she could, she helped others because she was a strong young woman.  While she was a slave she met an Apache, Mescalero--Apache young woman about her age--and they worked together and taught each other each of their languages to communicate.  Most of the times they had to just whisper, and so as they whispered one evening, the Apache Mescalero young woman asked my great, great grandmother if she would join them because there was a plan to escape, and my grandmother felt very sad because she didn't want to leave some of her people that she was nursing or little children she was taking care of.  Her heart was torn to leave or to stay.  But she left with the Mescalero group that left in the evening one night, and they traveled and traveled.  It seemed like they ran and ran for several days.  And quite sometime later they met with a camp, another Mescalero Apache camp, and from there their group was a lot larger and got larger and larger, and they traveled all of the time, they said.  And they didn't go back to the Navajo reservation because she was traveling with her friend, her new friend, and for two years they traveled.  But she thought of her family often, and she knew exactly, and in which direction the Navajo reservation was.  She speaks of passing through groups of Spanish communities. And once she was going to be given up for a slave but her friend and some other elderly people, they helped her escape that.  And so later, two years after she escaped from Fort Sumner, she still had a heart to go home, and by this time she was expecting.  She was pregnant and even though she knew it was going to be hard, the Mescalero Apache group were moving further West, and so she had about four or five months of walking time back to her homeland.  And she left even though there would be hard times.  She lived off of the land and moved mostly in the nights, and several months passed and she reached Standing Rock--that's where her family lived.  The family--whatever was left of them--were so surprised to see her. And there was a baby boy born, and he was called Mescalero Apache, the son of a Mescalero Apache.  He's one of my ancestors.  That's one of the stories I recall having my dad speak of. 

Interviewer
Why don't you go ahead Shirley and tell me your mother's story.

Shirley Clark
My mother told me a few stories about the Long Walk.  They lived... my mother's family lived near Fort Wingate, New Mexico. And in the early days, of one of my great, great grandmother, she was just eight years old and her little brother was six, and I think the people knew that there was going to be trouble and that there was killing. And so even before the Long Walk there was raidings, and there was killings going on inflicting the families, and so I think that the Spanish or, they just called them the enemies.  They could have just been the plains people who came among the Navajo, among my family, and they would kill them or take them off as slaves.  And there was a place called "The Trail of the Slaves," and that trail my grandmother said, when she was young, she could see the wagon wheels the trail left in the sandstone near my home, and there were trails left there from the slaves that were captured there.  At one point some of them escaped and they went there a ways, and a lot of them were plains people held captive there by the Spaniards.  And the stories go way back before the Long Walk.  But my grandmother tells me when she was a little girl her great grandmother told her that her six year old brother and her were wandering in the woods south of Fort Wingate in the tall pine trees.  They were left out there by their family because they wanted the two little children at least to survive when the soldiers came by to collect all of the Navajos for the Fort Sumner trip.  And the boy and the little girl wandered for days. And they were gathering berries when this Mexican guy came upon them and pleaded with them to turn themselves into Fort Wingate site where the other Navajos were being gathered.  The little girl and her little brother were sad that they were seen by someone because they were suppose to be hiding.  The Mexican guy was very nice and he took them to Fort Wingate.  There the family was found. And several days went by and the little girl and the little boy were shown how to escape by their families, and they escaped from there again to go back to their home.  The summer before, their families had prepared this big log.  They had planted a big log into the ground, and the hole was dug in it and dirt was covered over the log.  And so that's where they were supposed to spend the winters, and they stored their food there.  There are several places where in the caves their food was stored, and this reminds me of Anasazi stories, you know, where you find corn--these stashes of different places; dried cactus, corn, all kinds of... even dried meat.  And so they survived two years.  The little girl was eight, and the little boy who was six years old.  They wandered in the night and they were to only build a fire when it was, you know, a dire time, when it was cold, but they ate birds and they ate a lot of rabbits. And when two years came the family had returned and there was a garden planted of corn, and it was by the little girl and the little boy.  They're my ancestors. And as we were growing up, my parents, my mother especially, she always told us "Don't eat everything off of your plate at one meal, save some for tomorrow."  Or, "Leave your shoes by your bed in case you have to escape."  These are some of the teachings that they taught us and they told us to be active and be strong so that we can survive whatever you are escaping from.  And I have other stories of my great grandmother.  She learned how to eat, prepare skin... sheep hide and take the wool off of it and clean it and wash it and scrape it like you would tan a hide, and I think would cut it in strips and cook it over charcoal.  And she said it tasted like pig skin--pig hide--how it's cooked.  And she spoke of that and she also spoke of many berries that she was not familiar with that she learned how to eat, as they were little.  Today I would be scared to eat any berries because sometimes they tell us they're dangerous.  But I don't know how those little two children survived, and I'm proud of them and proud that they have stories that they can share with us to keep us strong.  You know when my parents talk to us about the Long Walk, they were not in a hateful... they didn't teach hate.  They taught of the experience and what the positive outcome of it.  They didn't dwell on it either.  And it was a teaching experience whenever they shared their stories with us. 

Interviewer
How did they tell you they were treated on the Long Walk?  How did the soldiers treat them?

Shirley Clark
Oh my grandma who was captured, she did not have any blankets or any extra clothes--it was just what she was wearing.  She wore that all the way and just mended it over and over again.  By the time they got to Fort Sumner they didn't have any shoes, and they were not, it was not just moving along.  People were dying.  People were crying, and just people tried to escape but there was no escape.  In the night sometimes, you know, there were people who did escape, but then found later and returned again.  There were other Pueblo Indians along the way who would mistreat the Navajos who did escape, and turn them in or brought them back to the Long Walk.  And there was no water along the way, and it was just... if you had water it was not good.  It was rainwater, or you had to drink the ditches or whatever they did, and they let the people do that.  It was not... no one brought water.  It was just... that was the main thing I think that was the hardest, that my father remembers her grandmother telling... the grandmother that water was the most precious thing that they missed.  Everyone was... if there was no water everyone was starving.  You couldn't, I mean you could go without food, but water was the main thing that they remembered that was hardest to go without. 

Interviewer
What kind of conditions did they find when they got to Fort Sumner and Bosque Redondo?

Shirley Clark
At Fort Sumner there were no buildings to move into or no hardly anything there, and there were a few tents but after a while those were worn and people just lived out in the open.  Most of the time there were little safe places in the ground and whatever rocks they can find they would put over them and hold two or maybe three people at a time. 

Interviewer
How do you feel now about your ancestors who were on The Long Walk?

Shirley Clark
I really... I don't know if I would have survived if it were me, but I really am thankful that they were strong to survive. And I think their prayers and their belief that they wanted to live, and that they wanted their families to be together--I think that held them and really helped them just to stay alive.  And my grandmother who was all alone, she said they tell that she often wanted to just not live. But her friend, the Mescalero Apache friend, I think that was a good thing that happened, and they were close because they were not allowed to just wander and play at her age.  She was nearly 15, and they would just work all of the time, whatever it was.  They had to dig holes or they had to just do with what they could with their hands, and a lot of the time there was no equipment to help them.  And her weaving... a lot of the time she said she had to undo other rugs brought in from different places, and they weren't woven like the Navajo wove their rugs, which was kind of thick and warm.  So they had to redo those and if they weren't done by a certain time, they were not allowed to eat.  So food was very precious.  You had to save half of what you had, what you were served so you could have, because the next day you might not have any.  I assumed that no one was overly fed.  Everybody was just very slim, and very thin and frail. 

Interviewer
What did you think the Long Walk did to the Navajos sense of identity?

Shirley Clark
The Navajos were always, through the stories of their legends, they always had this identity of being brave, of being good--trying to find the good in things and being peaceful and accomplishing working hard.  That's kind of the background that the Navajos were accustomed to through their origin stories and through their traditional teachings.  I would say that they were a prayerful people.  And so when this Long Walk occurred, they relied on their prayers.  They relied on brighter days, some day, and they did make what good of it, you know, they could along the way helping each other and not giving up.  They knew that they had not done, as a group, done wrong, and I think that if you know you hadn't done wrong, you have this identity that is strong and you know that you're going to overcome--and I think that's what was in each individual who were there.  Although, sometimes my dad spoke of tribal leaders who were not to be trusted;  in those days my great, great grandfather knew of people, and Navajo leaders, who would try to con and provoke raids and have the Navajo men join them, and if you refused to join them they would whip you.  And so my dad always taught us that--you don't put your full trust in leaders who might lead you astray.

Interviewer
Shirley tell me about your boarding school experience... where it was at and what happened?

Shirley Clark
My parents drove to Fort Wingate boarding school.  As we drove into the schoolyard my mother told me (Navajo), which meant that in school you'd be known as Shirley. (Navajo) My grandfather had given me that name.  It means "tumbleweed" or (Navajo) "plant or flower."  And at school I just couldn't get the hang of just answering to Shirley, but I was given a number. My bed was B24, and so when B24 was called out I was supposed to say "here!" Every time we always lined up for everything, and B24 was my identity.  My clothes--the smell of permanent marker was on everything.  My clothes were marked with B24.  And eventually I think I learned how to write my name Shirley.  And at home we're called by our Navajo names.  At school everyone seemed like they were Betty, Irene or Marie.  It was kind of humorous, but I remember one time everyone had to stand by their beds, just before bedtime, and we were suppose to recite "Now I lay me down to sleep, if I should die before I wake..." I could not finish the story, whatever it was, because it seemed like I was being doomed or something bad might happen in the night, and I would feel fear or loneliness for my family.  And that smell of permanent marker, to this day it always reminds me of boarding school.  A lot of the time it was happy times because my sister was there with me.  We shared one bunk bed and she slept towards my feet and I slept the other way. And sometimes I could hear her crying, and then I would start to cry or visa versa because we were missing my mom and dad.  We didn't live very far--maybe 25 to 30 miles away.  There was no bus.  That's why my parents took us there.  I'm sure they wanted us to go to school and learn English.  My mother always told me, "Don't be like us... we don't know how to read.  We don't know how to talk to people when we go to trading posts."  Or when they were buying a vehicle they couldn't converse in English, and so that was their way of encouraging us to be in school.  At school one year my father said to me, "We will put you in Fort Wingate Boarding School."  For the third time, I think it was... this is what he said, "This is my daughter's fourth year of school."  But it was my third year.  I tried to tell my dad, but he just kept telling the registrar that this was my fourth year of school--kindergarten, first grade, second grade, and it was suppose to be third grade, but my dad kept saying the fourth grade, the fourth year.  So the next morning I was wearing my nametag and some children came up to me and said, "You're in fourth grade?"  And I think it was because I was short.  In those days I think they placed the students by their height, not by what they knew.  I was in fourth grade and I was so afraid because I might get retained because I knew fourth grade was harder than third grade.  And for that whole year I would hide.  I would hide from my kindergarten teacher because she knew that I was in her kindergarten class three years previous.  So when there was a knock on the classroom door I would just crawl under the table or hide down in my chair for fear that they would retain me to third grade now that I was in fourth grade.  I knew that I had to learn my times table.  I didn't know it was the times table. I thought it was just numbers with X's in between, but I caught up.  I remember being in the lowest reading group one time, and I thought what am I doing here? Being the lowest reading group.  So I tried hard and hard, very hard and I caught up with my grade level at the end of that year, and I am glad that my father always supported me in the things I did at school.  I always thought I went to school to please my parents.  I would not run away.  The dorm leaders would caution us if we ran away that we would freeze or get lost or maybe be killed by bears, and that would really scare me, but the only reason why I stayed in school was to please my parents.  And sometimes the boarding school days weren't as fun.  Like the swings were always just a few swings, and there were hundreds and hundreds of children, and so some of us, most of us would just play in the dirt, so the one time a couple of my friends they came over and said oh eat this shiny black thing and it will turn into gum.  And so we chewed and chewed and chewed.  Later I found out it was lead off of the building--the tar that seals the ceilings so water won't drip.  I didn't know it was that, but we chewed and chewed.  And then there were times when there were the bigger girls or boys and they would pick on the younger children, and I think that's what made my boarding school most miserable--is because our own boarding school peers would pick on us, and they would, you know, herd us or they would just take things from us like our toothpaste or our dresses or whatever we had that they wanted.  And so a lot of time we were not happy in those days, during those days.  Other times it was just something that we had to do.  I was glad that I went to boarding school.  My parents saw the need for education and that's the only way I could get it because there were no buses that came our way.  Still no buses go to where I live now; just maybe ten miles from where I live. That's where it stops. 

Interviewer
What do you feel boarding schools did to you identity?  Were you encouraged to be Navajo--dress Navajo and speak Navajo and practice your own religion?

Shirley Clark
The religion at the boarding school--we were to be assigned whatever religion our parents said that we belonged to.  If our parents didn't state a religion, then the boarding school chose which religion we were supposed to go to.  Everyone was supposed to go to some kind of Christian church.  First I went to Catholic, and then I became a member of a different church called Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. And it was not because I didn't want to go; I did go because my parents signed me up to go to that religion.  My father had, when he was just a little boy, his father took him to school and the nuns stole him back--took him through the window of a school where his father enrolled him, and so he really didn't want me going as a Catholic member.  I'm not sure, he probably had his reasons and so sometime later I realized that I was a prayerful person even though I didn't know English.  My father helped me to pray in Navajo and so when I learned about the Christian churches; it was just a different language to pray in, so it was not very different.  I deemed certain things to be sacred and certain things to be observed in reverence, and so that's how I was brought up so when I learned about Christianity, it was not a big change for me. 

Interviewer
 Were you encouraged to speak your own Navajo language at school?

Shirley Clark
I was encouraged to speak English all of the time in the classroom and in the dorms.  Whatever we said we whispered and that was going to be in Navajo, and so I was a quiet child.  I did not speak very good English, so in the classroom I was a quiet student and on the playground, you know, we spoke Navajo or didn't speak because we couldn't speak English.  But we... when I went there to the boarding school, we weren't like punished or abused in any other way because we were speaking Navajo, but we were taught to speak English, not Navajo.