EXCERPT FROM DANNY QUINTANA'S HUNTING AND GATHERING: AN URBAN YOUTH SURVIVAL GUIDE

CHAPTER ONE: ONCE, THREE LIFETIMES AGO

The more we can kill this year, the less will have to be killed in the next war, for the more I see of these Indians the more convinced I am that they all have to be killed or be maintained as a species of paupers. Their attempts at civilization are simply ridiculous.
--General William T. Sherman
September 23, 1868

Once, three lifetimes ago, in the area of this very small planet we now call Utah, preceding Brigham Young and the massive migration of Mormons, for over one thousand years, a small group of people, the Goshutes, controlled the land mass from what is now Brigham City, Utah in the north to Delta, Utah in the south. From the Salt Lake valley in the east, to Ely, Nevada in the west, Utah valley and Heber valley were on some days held by the Goshutes. On other days, these areas were Ute territory. The Goshutes were a prosperous nation.

The Goshutes and their Shoshone relatives in Idaho and Nevada were once fluent in a Shoshone-based Athrobaskin language. The fierce Comanches of the plains are their cousins. The Utes controlled what is now Colorado and a small part of Eastern Utah. The Paiutes controlled what we presently call Southern Utah and Nevada. The formidable Dine, (Navajos) held present-day Northern Arizona and Western New Mexico. Their cousins, the battle-hardened Apaches, held all of Southern Arizona, most of New Mexico, and a good chunk of old Mexico. Various Pueblo tribes of Northern and Central New Mexico, who lived in apartment-like buildings, with help of the Comanches, fought off the Apaches. Then came the Spanish invaders. Spain was soon followed by other, much larger and better-armed European tribes into the Southwest.

For at least a millennium, the Goshutes made quality use of their territory. So did most North American hunter-gather bands. People had plenty to eat and were healthy, provided they had no major physical accidents or were killed or injured in war. The Goshutes survived in strong family unites. The men hunted big and little game. Like most huntergather cultures, the women and children provided the majority of the protein by gathering a large number of plants. In addition to wild rice, onions and pine nuts that were plentiful, tribal elders ate nutritious grasshoppers and fat, juicy ground squirrels. Members understood the complex food chain, and they did not violate the contract with nature. They also understood weather patterns and the food cycles. Although food was abundant, enemies were real and powerful.

Winters were viciously cold and like today, three months too long. Small villages with shelters were constructed of sagebrush covered by animal hides. Following the game, and avoiding the brutally cold winter weather, the warriors took their homes with them. The winter camping ground for the Goshutes was near the small town of Grantsville, Utah. The shelters were modest, but efficient.

This lifestyle worked extraordinarily well for a long, long time-certainly longer than the United States and the State of Utah have existed. The Goshutes, like numerous other tribes, had wondrous songs, imaginative stories, laughter, and healthy young people. Walking ensured strong hearts, and the high protein diet ensured long, healthy lives. Some men would walk 40 miles across the desert from present day Skull Valley, Utah to the Deer Creek Mountains in Nevada in one day. The Elders knew every watering hole in Utah's West Desert and were careful with all food sources. Their medicine men used not only herbal medicines from many different plants, but also holistic treatments that included spiritual and personal counseling. Warriors, out of necessity and good sense, took very great care of their war tools. They knew about the numbers and the health of animals in their territory. The forests and range areas were carefully utilized with controlled burns to ensure proper game habitat. Like other North American tribes, Goshutes had a complex religion that included sweat ceremonies. These ancient religious rituals were held next to what is now the Jordan River in Salt Lake County, Utah. The ritual involved heating rocks in a fire pit next to a structure shaped like a woman's womb. The fire would heat the rocks. When they were placed in the sweat lodge and water was poured over them, they would cleanse the entire body. Four rounds of ceremony would take place for the four directions of the wind. The sweat lodge ceremony leaves an individual with a feeling of complete and total body relaxation unlike anything you will ever experience. After the ceremony they would bathe in the cool river water. The ancient religion brought inner peace and harmony with the universe. This sweat ceremony was common to all North American tribes in one form or another. Some tribes would not allow men and women to sweat together. Many tribes had the sweat lodge opening facing the East for the sunrise. A few had the opening facing the West for the sunset. Some tribes had dry sweats with hot rocks but no water. Other tribes would pour the cool water on the rocks that created a steam that goes right into the bones of an individual.

Once, three lifetimes ago, the skies over what is now Salt Lake City were clear and beautiful with giant condors, diverse hawks, and large, strong golden and bald eagles flying overhead.

Since there were no cars or factories, the air was pristine clean. Unlike today, where we can see what we breath, visibility was clear year round. The streams, like the present Jordan River, were full of healthy, clean, very large fish. Today, the Jordan River is full of tires, oil, concrete blocks, and industrial and human wastes. The canyons of the Wasatch Front had streams with beavers, ponds filled with trout and meadows with small herds of deer, elk and even moose. Black bears and even grizzlies controlled certain territories, while wolves and mountain lions competed for wild game. The many types of abundant wildlife were well fed and disease free, not having yet been exposed to European livestock. The Salt Lake valley aquifer and water table was not yet damaged by mill tailings from the world's largest copper pit. Unlike today, there were not thousands of subdivisions with look-alike homes and lazy children worshipping in front of televisions.

So much of human existence has changed in such a very short time. What and who we are today is a result of the combined hard work, courage, and intelligence of warriors and others who saved Native Americans from extinction. Survival came to pass by overcoming brutal, almost impossible, military odds and unbelievable hardships. In the last two centuries, all of the Indians in what is now the Western United States would have been completely killed off had their warriors not fought with such bravery against impossible numbers, armed only with poor, hand-made weapons. Without their incredible courage, most North and South American tribes would have perished completely.

This early example of ethnic cleansing in the United States took many paths. Many tribes in the Eastern United States no longer exist as a result. The European invaders used biological weapons. Smallpox, a successful use of germ warfare, was their most effective killer. Millions were murdered with this weapon that was deliberately spread among powerful Eastern tribes to destroy them and take their land. In fact, the fight in the Eastern seaboard and later in the Western United States was over one valuable asset: land.

The racial terrorism was gratuitously brutal. In addition to the many massacres of women and children, others who were not Indian were sometimes slaughtered. The Mountain Meadow Massacre in Southern Utah left dead over 157 peaceful California-bound white settlers. The murders, committed by Mormon extremists, were blamed on Utah's Paiute Indians. The children who would be too young to remember, were given to Mormon families to raise as their own. Those considered old enough to tell others were savagely murdered.

Most notably in Colorado was the Sand Creek massacre. Over 400 Indian women, children and old men were living peacefully with an American flag flying over their village. They were ruthlessly slaughtered by religious extremists among others. The warriors were away from camp hunting while their loved ones were slaughtered in cold blood behind their backs.

In 1863, Northern Utah was the site of the Bear River massacre where more than 250 people were murdered near the Bear River. Indian women and children were killed because they were not considered human, much less citizens. Their private parts were cut from their bodies and kept as souvenirs. Finally, before the century ended, there was Wounded Knee, where in excess of 190 men, women and children were killed as a result of over reaction and arrogance.

Since Indians were not citizens, they were routinely killed for sport without fear of legal retribution from the American authorities. They had no legal rights to respect and received no sympathy from the United States Courts. In each major case in the 19th Century, the white litigants prevailed over non-citizen Indians. The Indians did not have attorneys or people in Congress to represent them or fight their battles. There was not yet a World Court to hold political trials on crimes against humanity for genocide.

The great tribal nations, in what is now the United States, like so many other warrior societies in other parts of the world throughout history, lost at war, despite 500 years of heroic resistance. The biological weapons of smallpox and measles, repeating rifles and sheer numbers of over 1,000 soldiers to one warrior ensured their defeat and demise. The invasion was truly overwhelming and unprecedented in human history. A military defeat like those suffered by the Japanese, Germans, French, Spaniards, Italians, Greeks, Chinese, Russians, Vietnamese, Egyptians, Argentines and too many other nations is nothing compared to the loss of religion, language, identity and self-worth experienced by the Indian tribes. Once, three life times ago, in the days of the Goshutes, each person really and truly mattered. Every life was very important to the small families and the tribe. There was no alienation and loneliness from being a replaceable cog in an assembly line at a manufacturing plant or fast food restaurant for minimal wages. The tribal members did not die from drunk driving. Goshutes and other tribal members did not go to prison and waste their youth behind bars in Draper or Gunnison, Utah for being constantly intoxicated or stoned on drugs. There were no under-employed individuals flipping hamburgers or completely unemployed citizens on state compensation. They did not have all of today's modern ailments associated with alcohol. Above all, once upon a time, Native Americans were a proud, healthy and spiritual people. The various members of numberless proud tribes walked the earth with courage and connection to their own lands. They were not the defeated and desperate drunks begging for change or food on the streets of Salt Lake and other cities.

Once three lifetimes ago, the Goshutes and hundreds of other tribes lived successfully, enjoyed good health and were happy. For at least one millennium, the Goshutes enjoyed peace with the natural earth environment and held political control of their territory. Their people were physically big and very, very strong. Goshutes, like all ancient warriors, had incredible courage, and were expert marksmen with spears, bows and arrows. Their hunting and fighting skills were outstanding. They respected their women, their elders and their children. The old were not dumped and forgotten in urine-smelling nursing homes or left to die quietly without bothering their relatives. The youth were not left to their own devices to be raised by friends, video games and television programs. The people ate well and nothing was wasted. The deer, antelope, elk and rabbit hides were tanned and used for clothes and shelter. Their intestines were used for thread and bow string. All members enjoyed a delicious pine nut soup. Wild strawberries and raspberries were there to be enjoyed with meals of rabbit and grasshoppers. They played games of chance and gambled before there were casinos.

A walk through the woods, the open range or desert, in search of meat meant knowing exactly where to go and how to get there. They had to be aware of body odors, the direction of the wind, the droppings of the deer and antelope. And they hunted in small, well-organized groups with each person doing his part; it was a great team that successfully fed their families.

Everything about the natural environment was known to these talented and disciplined Goshute hunters. There was no question in a young Goshute warrior's mind that rattlesnakes, mountain lions, wolves and bears were dangerous or that winter frost could kill you. Precautions were taken to ensure survival. Goshute warriors knew that if they ran into other enemy tribes, they would likely have to kill or be killed. So they were always armed.

Countless medicinal plants and roots were available near watering holes and riverbanks. The now rare and valuable reed baskets, woven by elderly Goshute tribal women, were used to store dried meat and plants in winter and for times of shortage. The Goshute Tribe had well over two thousand members. According to tribal sources, membership numbered as high as twenty thousand. This is substantially more people than the mere 124 in the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes today. They once had their own creationist myths about Coyote and how man came into being and even the origin of the universe. Some believed that man is evil. Once, the Goshutes and hundreds of other Tribes were a people with land, language, traditions, and culture. They held the area where approximately two million Mormons and others now call home. There was not the "improvements to the land" which have been brought about by modern technology. Certainly there were not the more than one million cars that zip along congested routes in Salt Lake Valley and all along the Wasatch mountains. Like today, life was hard; but certainly worth living. Each sunrise offered a new exciting challenge and adventure.

It has happened throughout history in various parts of this wonderful planet: the Goshutes' land was invaded. Some were hunted for sport killings. Others died from the diseases introduced. Eventually, there was open warfare. Being outnumbered by over 1,000:1, not having repeating rifles, canons and horses, reluctantly, the great Chief Tabby surrendered. He ended the small, yet brutal Goshute War with the United States government. In 1863 the Goshutes signed a "peace and friendship treaty" at gun point. In exchange for not killing Pony Express riders and attacking stagecoaches, the U.S. government and various hired bounty hunters would not hunt Goshutes into extinction.

The courage of Chief Tabby and this treaty saved the tribe from total annihilation. Then the Goshute tribe was divided into two bands. The Skull Valley Band of Goshutes is the treaty tribe. The Confederated Goshutes who live on the Nevada border are an Indian Reorganization Act tribe. The combined territory of both bands is only a small thumbnail sketch of their former territory. Their previous Mormon attorneys settled their land claims for approximately $.05 cents on the dollar and earned a great deal of money for themselves in legal fees. What is left today is 18,000 acres for the Skull Valley Goshutes next to a top-secret military facility that once tested nerve gas, biological and radiological weapons.

Throughout human history, in every part of the world, losing a war means not only military defeat and humiliation, but also occupation of your homeland, rape of your women, murder of your children, loss of your language, and destruction of your entire traditional, yet successful, thousand-year way of life. Like the numerous other peoples, the Goshutes suffered a total and complete military defeat.

Yet, there is no reason for the reader to feel guilty about immoral acts and intolerance committed three lifetimes ago. We are not responsible for the sins of our ancestors. We can only feel guilty if we learn nothing from them. Guilt is the worst of all human emotions. It builds resentment. Resentment leads to aggression. And aggression leads to more guilt. This world has more than enough resentment and intolerance. Countless other people in many parts of the world, throughout all of history, have experienced the same military defeat and destruction of their traditional ways of life.

This is the normal historical human experience we call change. Not progress, but just political change. Gone into history are the Summerians, the Assyrians, the Aztecs, the Incas, the Alani, the Goths, the Vandels, the Franks, the Huns and the Romans. Change comes, and it is not always good.

With the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, all of Europe fell into a lawless abyss that lasted for more than fifteen hundred years. The fall of Rome destroyed law and Western civilization. Military defeat and political change certainly did not mean progress. It meant death, terror, lawlessness, disease and destruction. Like the fall of Rome, the destruction of the great Indian nations of this continent meant millions of deaths from diseases, loss of language, depression, terror, and lawlessness. The conquered were far worse off as a result of the invasion of their lands and the loss of political control over their territories. The game herds were almost completely destroyed. Condors, wolves, grizzlies and other wild animals almost completely disappeared. Disease killed almost every member of the conquered Goshutes, Shoshones, Utes and other tribes. Life became a living hell with the introduction of alcohol and the new foods that result in obesity and diabetes. The mental depression that has lasted several generations is only now being overcome.

The old days of great health, a clean environment and abundant natural food sources are almost completely gone. Like Europe two thousand years later, life for all tribes is finally improving, and people are finally regaining their confidence and spirituality. The horrible wounds of the loss of the war and invasion of their homelands are starting to heal. In the 1950's, the Skull Valley Goshutes were down to 38 members. Finally, after over one century of military defeat, this small tribe and all tribes are beginning to increase their numbers. Like Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire, one thousand years later, eventually law and civilization returned. Indian country two hundred years after the invasion and holocaust, is finally starting to recover.

The dust has long since settled on the battlefields of the West. The American flag flies over the land. A new era has begun. This new era can be full of adventure if you dare to become a participant in the game of life. Or if you just want to be a spectator, this new age can also be very entertaining.

This new era has better medical care. For those of us who have been in need of having rotted teeth pulled because of the tremendous amount of sugar in our diet, it is nice to be able to visit a dentist. When we have gallstones, it is very convenient to have a simple gall bladder removal. Giving birth in a hospital rather than in the woods means more modern women are capable of surviving the pains of childbirth. Being able to see properly today means having eyeglasses and contacts available at an affordable cost. If you did suffer a major disability, the old days of "once upon a time" would have really sucked. You died. Today, there is wheel chair tennis, skiing, scuba diving and work.

The traditional songs are terrific. But so are sounds of a great Beethoven symphony and Rolling Stones rock and roll. Today, there is saxophone jazz, new age, and country and western music. All of it is available at your fingertips with modern stereo systems.

Once there was no jet travel because there were no jets. There was no scuba diving because there was no scuba gear. For that matter, there was no Internet, no computers, no big screen televisions, no pick up trucks, no socks, no books, no contact lenses, no food from various parts of the world, no deep sea fishing, and no hot tubs or swimming pools. There were no dishwashers, no microwaves, no refrigerators, no sports cars and no guitars. There was no piano, no chess sets from Mexico and Asia. No Homer Simpson, no football, no Robin Williams, no butter toffee peanuts and no videos. There were no pretty pictures of the sunset in Sweden. There were no cruise ships and no seafood restaurants. There was no U.S. Code online. There was no Comedy Club in Washington, DC or Midvale, Utah.

Yes, three lifetimes ago, like today, life could be very hard--and then you died. And when we die, whether it was two hundred years ago in the cold of winter in what is now Tooele Valley or forty eight lifetimes ago in Egypt, or today at home in an intermediate care nursing home in Salt Lake Valley, we are very dead. Yet three lifetimes ago worked extraordinarily well for those who were healthy. Three lifetimes ago, Native Americans were mentally and physically strong. To a certain extent, the same can be true for all of us today. But proper choices must be made in order to survive.

In 1924, after all of the Indian land that was thought to be valuable was taken, their people slaughtered and militarily defeated, the first inhabitants of this part of the planet were awarded the lofty political title of "American Citizens." By this point in our brief history, there was simply no reason not to make Indians American citizens. Having failed in the attempt at total genocide, we would be too impolite to kill the survivors. Remember that the U.S. had just finished fighting World War I and given women the right to vote. Finishing the genocide would have simply been bad manners.

Citizenship meant simply that now Indians were a small part of this vast American Empire. Pax Romana lasted for over 1,500 years. How long Pax Americana will last remains to be seen. Once, three lifetimes ago, the Goshutes and other tribes had their own nations. That time is gone. Today, Indians are part of the most powerful nation in the history of the world. Today, Indians are part of Pax Americana.

But what exactly does this mean for young Native Americans and others who want to survive in the new millennium?

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