At the Heard Museum with Karen

Our niece, Karen, came for a long overdue holiday from the UK in March. In between visits to the hospital to see Denis while he was recuperating from major back surgery, we did manage outings to a few favorite places. Karen had never been to the Heard Museum, so I made sure that was one of the places on our limited itinerary.

Come along with us!

There are so many eye-catching exhibits in the museum, and photography can be tricky because of all the glass.

Of course, there are many wonderful examples of pottery. The artist who made this is Lucy Lewis of the Acoma Pueblo in New Mexico.

If jewelry making and silversmithing is more your thing, this is a Zuni bow guard, 1900-1930.

Sample turkey feather blanket, 1981. Artist: Ramona Sakiestewa, Hopi. Ramona rediscovered the process ancestral weavers used to create a feather blanket. She learned that a 2.5-foot by 3-foot feather blanket required 180 yards of yucca cord and 3,000 feathers. It may not be pretty, but it does look warm!

The Heard had several cradleboards on display. Paiute cradleboard, c. 1920. Diamond-shaped designs are placed on Paiute cradleboards for newborn girls. A boy's cradleboard would have crosses on it, according to Brenda Drye, Kaibab Paiute.

Yuraryaraq hood, 1980s. Muskrat fur, calf skin, furs of Kuskokwim mink, seal, wolf, wolverine, Arctic hare, and beaver. Made by Augilnguq (Minnie Parker), Yupik, Alaska. It's a warm day here in Phoenix, and I can break out in a sweat just looking at this!

There is plenty of art outside in the courtyards. Left: Crane Woman, c. 2005. Artist: John Hoover, Unangan. Right: Heron and Turtle, 1990. Artist: John Hoover, Unangan.

Heading Home, 1979. Artist: Allan Houser, Chiricahua Apache.

You can almost forget that you're in the middle of one of the largest cities in the United States-- until you look up.

Basket weaving has always fascinated me. I can't imagine any place having a better collection of the basket weaving art than the Heard Museum. This is just one of many exhibits.

There are also many paintings to be seen. This is Rose and Coyote Dressed Up for the Heard Show, 1981. Artist: Harry Fonseca, Nisenan Maidu/Native Hawaiian/Portuguese.

Away From Home: American Indian Boarding School Stories. This is a sobering section of the museum that tells a very important part of Native American history. That barber chair with the shorn hair on the floor always brings tears to my eyes. The second the children arrived at the schools, their identities were stripped from them.

See the next photo for the description. These handcuffs are tiny.

You can always click on any photo to magnify it.

The Beginning of the End, 2019. Artist: Susan Hudson (Traditional Woman), Navajo. This quilt honors family and close friends who attended Toadlena Boarding School in Newcomb, New Mexico.

"My people are a race of designers. I look for the day when the Indian shall make beautiful things for all the world." --Angel DeCora (Winnebago), 1909.

This photo comes nowhere close to doing these art pieces justice. "Moondance" jar. Artist: Russell Sanchez, San Ildefonso. This was the one Karen and I chose as our favorite in the Museum Shop. Unfortunately, we didn't have a spare $55,000 to buy it. I believe the day Angel DeCora spoke of is here.

Afterwards, a snack out in the courtyard. My prickly pear lemonade was very tasty, and the sparrows managed to con bits of crackers from Karen.

I hope you enjoyed your virtual visit. If you ever come to Phoenix, I'd be more than happy to take you to the Heard Museum. It's a Must-See!

Medicine River by Mary Annette Pember

 

First Line: My mother's migraines hold me prisoner for much of my childhood.

Recently, I have immersed myself in the history of Indian boarding schools fictionally, historically, and physically. I often pass the site of the Phoenix Indian School, and my visit to the internationally acclaimed Heard Museum included much time spent in the excellent (and sobering) exhibit Away From Home: American Indian Boarding School Stories. That time brought to life many things I've read, including Mary Annette Pember's Medicine River. 

Pember's exhaustive research began as a way to understand her mother's behavior as well as her grandmother's. Both women were sent to Indian boarding schools, and Mary's mother in particular was indelibly scarred from her experience.

Indian boarding schools were the U.S. government's attempt to assimilate all Native Americans-- to make them think and behave like whites. The boarding schools were rife with disease, and those in charge sent sick children back to the reservation to infect and kill many others. To add insult to injury, these children were forced into schools that Native Americans were forced to pay for. They literally funded their own abuse.

Pember shines light on so many topics. Legislation affecting Native Americans over the years. Famous Native Americans who were products of those boarding schools. Insights into her own Ojibwe culture. The homegrown historians (mostly women, both Indian and white) who are documenting and preserving America's Indian boarding school history. This book is a gold mine of illuminating facts that also helped the author shed light on her personal history.

One of the things I found most interesting was the study of epigenetics-- that humans can pass along more than DNA in our genes, that genes can also carry memories of trauma experienced by our ancestors. It's an interesting avenue of thought.

Medicine River is an important addition to Native American history. It is a history that we should all know more about.

Medicine River: A Story of Survival and the Legacy of Indian Boarding Schools 

by Mary Annette Pember

eISBN: 9780553387322

Pantheon Books © 2025

eBook, 304 pages

Non-Fiction

Rating: B+

Source: Net Galley

A Visit to the Heard Museum: Stunning Craftsmanship

Today, I'll continue showing you some of the treasures to be found here in Phoenix's Heard Museum, founded in 1929 and dedicated to the advancement of American Indian art. This museum is filled with incredible beauty and so much knowledge-- it's a pleasure to go there, and there's always something new for me to see and learn.

This time, I'd like to focus on some of the amazing works of art. Let's get started!

 

Mohave cape necklace, late 1800s.

"The Mohave began to make beaded collars in the early 1880s. Blue and white were the most popular colors for collars. The glass trade beads became available through contact with explorers, settlers, and soldiers. Mohave elder Louise Patch referred to the design of this cape necklace as a turtle shell design. She said the diamond shapes represent the bank of the Colorado River, and the elements near the neckline are the tributaries of the Colorado River such as the Bill Williams River."

Detail. Just the thought of working with these tiny beads makes my eyes cross!

O'odham baskets

Apache baskets

You might be able to tell that I love baskets...

I also love silver and turquoise jewelry. What a fabulous cuff bracelet!

Plaque made in 1955. Mother of pearl, coral, turquoise, spondylus, jet, copper, aluminum, silver. Artists: Lambert Homer, Sr., Zuni Pueblo; Roger Skeet, Navajo; John Hoxie, Navajo.

Miniature wagon, salt and pepper shakers, oxen figures. c. 1950. Turquoise and silver. Artists: Frank Dishta and Leekya Deyuse, Zuni Pueblo.

"Betrothal," 1953. Artist: Pablita Velarde, Santa Clara. "Velarde depicts a pueblo home interior with the guests gathered around to witness the betrothal ceremony. Through the door to the kitchen is a glimpse of chili cooking on the stove. Sharing food and extending hospitality are important aspects of Pueblo life." I fell in love with Velarde's work when I first saw it in Santa Fe.

 

Following are some photos I took of the hundreds of kachinas in the Heard collections. The craftsmanship and attention to detail are phenomenal.

This represents part of the collection donated to the Heard Museum by Barry Goldwater.

What I've shown you in this post is a mere drop in the bucket of the treasures to be found in this museum. In future posts, I intend to show you a bit of the exhibits on Navajo weaving and contemporary Plains Indian dolls. So very much to see! If any of you ever find yourselves here in Phoenix, I urge you to pay the Heard Museum a visit.

A Visit to the Heard Museum: Away from Home

When I first moved to Phoenix, Arizona in 1976, there was no mystery about how Indian School Road got its name. It went right past a very large complex where Indian children were shipped to be schooled and assimilated into the white culture. It was the aim of these boarding schools across the country to erase these children's identities and remake them into perfect little "white" citizens.

 

I'm happy to say that most of the buildings have been torn down, and now there are undoubtedly thousands of residents who don't have a clue about the origin of Indian School Road's name.

 

The exhibit detailing the boarding school experience is one of the longest running at the Heard Museum, and every time I visit it has a powerful effect on me. The exhibit includes rooms showing what classrooms and dormitories looked like, as well as photographs and quotes from the children who lived in these places. So many of those quotes are heart-breaking.

 

I thought I would share some of the photos I took there.

 

 

The entrance to the exhibit. Away from Home: American Indian Boarding School Stories. The lightbox cycles through the graduation photos of Indians who graduated from these boarding schools.

 

The long curving entrance to the exhibit. The quote states: "I remember it was in October when they came to get me. My mother started to cry. 'Her? She's just a little girl! You can't take her.' My mother put her best shawl on me."

 

The entrance keeps drawing you in. "We rode three days and three nights before we reached Hampton." The aim was to get these children as far away from their families as they could.

Postcards from the Phoenix Indian School.

Another postcard from the Phoenix Indian School. These young women look happy, don't they...

Clothing and toy taken from a child when he arrived at a boarding school.

I don't know if you've heard about the hundreds of graves found at one of these boarding schools in Canada recently. "Death was the only way you could get home... it had to be a sickness or death before they'd let you out of there very long."

"Your son died quietly, without suffering, like a man. We have dressed him in his good clothes and tomorrow we will bury him the way white people do." I have no words to express how I feel about this.

Seeing this barber's chair with all the black braids littered on the floor around it always makes me cry.

"The next day the torture began. The first thing they did was cut our hair, while we were bathing our breechclouts were taken, and we were ordered to put on trousers. We'd lost our hair and we'd lost our clothes; with the two we'd lost our identity as Indians."

The entire human race has a lot to answer for, but I think the hubris of the white race is particularly heinous. This exhibit at the Heard Museum is a powerful one; one that I can't stay in very long because it seems as though the pain and sorrow seeps into my very bones. I find it diffficult to understand how anyone could walk through it and be unmoved.

Never fear! My next post about the Heard will be much happier, and it will showcase some amazing art. Stay tuned!