Читать книгу American Indian Ghost Stories of the West - Antonio Sr. Garcez - Страница 16

(T’iis-Ebah-Nnee)

The San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation is located east of Phoenix in southeastern Arizona and was established by Executive Order on November 9, 1871. The total landmass of the reservation is just under 1,900,00 acres. The reservation was reduced in size a total of five times for the benefit of copper and silver miners and land anxious Mormons whose demand for water surrounding the Gila Valley reduced it further. It is the seventh largest U.S. reservation, with over 7,100 people. Within the reservation borders are forested alpine meadows and wooded mountains, as well as desert plains. Anthropologists speculate that the Apache nation entered this region around 1450. The San Carlos Apache call themselves “t’iis-ebah-nnee” or “grey cottonwood people” and their language is closely related to the Di-neh’ (Navajo). The San Carlos Apache now consider themselves to be a unified people, even though their history shows they were originally several separate bands of the same Native nation.

After his surrender in 1873, the great Apache chief Cochise, along with his followers was forcibly taken by the U.S. military to San Carlos. Soon after, the famous medicine man Geronimo and his followers fled the oppression of the San Carlos Reservation. Presently, the reservation fights the continuous battle of arduous unemployment among its people, with the hope of further developing industry and tourism. Encouragingly, tourism is taking hold as a source of income and employment. The tribe is directly promoting its lakes and forests, focusing on campers and sportspeople. The cattle-ranching industry and the mining of Peridot, a semiprecious green stone found within the reservation, is also a source of employment. The largest nearby town of Globe provides needed medical and shopping facilities.