Chief Tuba

Tuba (also Toova or Tuvi) (c. 1810 – 1887) was a Hopi leader in the late 19th century. Tuba was the headman of the small Hopi village of Moencopi, roughly fifty miles west of the main villages on the Hopi mesas. However, he apparently was an important person in the village of Oraibi as well. [James H. McClintock. "Mormon Settlement in Arizona", 80 (University of Arizona Press, 1985)] Eventually, Tuba joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and later received his endowment in the St. George Utah Temple. Tuba City, Arizona was named in his honor.

Tuba's Youth

Tuba was born in Oraibi as a member of the Short Corn Clan, [Harold Coulander, "The Fourth World of the Hopis", 192 (University of New Mexico Press 1971).] or possibly the Pumpkin Clan. [Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi, 291.] Hopi tradition does not record his birth name, [Harold Coulander, "The Fourth World of the Hopis", 192.] but he related to a Mormon missionary that his Hopi name was "Woo Pah." [C. L. Christensen. "Hopi Legends", "in" Improvement Era (1921).]

Tuba related to this same missionary that during the Mexican-American War (c. 1846), the Mexicans were in full retreat from the environs of the Hopi mesas. However, as they left they caused considerable trouble for the Hopis, and in fact one tried to steal a beautiful girl from Oraibi to take south with him. Apparently, Tuba's brother challenged the Mexican interloper to a kind of duel, and the pair fought with bowie knives in the village plaza. Tuba's brother was killed, but Tuba stepped in and killed the Mexican with a spear. This story seems of doubtful historical accuracy for several reasons. Among them, the story recounts that Tuba was eighteen years old when the duel occurred although he would have been in his mid-thirties at the time of the Mexican-American War. However, it is possible that Tuba, around 70 years of age when he told this story, confused some details or they were recorded incorrectly some 40 years after that. Author Frank Waters writes of a Hopi tradition concerning a Mexican slave raid on Oraibi which occurred in 1832. Apparently, this was the last such attack on the Hopi by the Spanish or their descendants. In Waters' account, several children were stolen as well as the wife of one Wickvaya, although two Castillas [Spaniards or Mexicans] were killed in the fighting. Eventually, all of the stolen Hopis were returned and their kidnappers punished after Wickvaya traveled to Santa Fe and informed the governor that the Mexicans had stolen Hopis rather than Navajos. ["See" Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi", 268-69.] It is entirely possible that Tuba's story refers to this event, at which time he would have been the age of his recollection, perhaps in his late teens or early twenties. But more than likely, Tuba's story mixed Hopi myth with aspects of his personal history. For instance, according to this story, it is the vanquished Mexican who curses the Hopis with the name by which they were known among non-Hopis: "Moqui," meaning "dead" or a "dying people" in their language. [C. L. Christensen. "Hopi Legends", "in" Improvement Era (1921). This story was related to Christensen in 1880 during a three year period in which Tuba lived in Christensen's home.] However, this appellation had been in place for some centuries before this fight occurred. In the story, Tuba also repeatedly refers to the Hopi as "Aztecs," or of Hopis having "Aztec blood." This could be seen as an attempt to raise the respectability of the Hopi by connecting them to the great cities of the south. However, this claim is not so far-fetched as the Hopi speak a form of Uto-Aztecan that "hints at ancient connections with...the advanced central Mexican civilization"..." [David Roberts. "The Pueblo Revolt", 32 (Simon and Shcuster 2005).]

Whatever the case may be, Hopi tradition tells that at some point, Tuba became involved in an unremembered dissension at Oraibi, and left the village to "be at peace"." From then on, "Woo Pah" was known among the Hopi as Tuvi, meaning the outcast or the rejected one. [Harold Courlander. "The Fourth World of the Hopi", 192.] However, another account has it that "Tuvi" is the name of a child's game with a small ring made of pumpkin rind. [Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi", 291.] hgghf

Moencopi

Tuba settled at Moencopi, or "Running Water," about fity miles west of Oraibi. Moencopi had played any important part in the Hopi's legendary migration cycle. By Tuba's time, the area was used as summer fields for the villagers at Oraibi due to its springs and streams. ["Ibid", 191-92.] The Hopi say that at first, Tuba settled at Moencopi alone with his wife, living there all year long whereas before it had merely been a seasonal settlement. However, soon people of Tuba's Short Corn Clan followed him, and eventually members of other clans until a sizeable community was created. ["Ibid".]

Tuba told one Mormon that after he had settled at Moencopi, there came a time when the Hopis who lived with him "became lazy and wicked", refusing to "plant or tend the herds"." Tuba was greatly distressed about this, and as he sat brooding, he saw an old man approach with a long white beard. The man claimed to have a message from God that the people must plant and take care of their herds or they would die in in a three year famine that was to come. Tuba then turned his head and the man disappeared. Tuba did as instructed and stored his own corn in a bin which was enough to last through the predicted famine. Purportedly, Tuba explained that a long time ago there were three men that had been left on the earth, and when the Hopi were in trouble, one would come to advise them. He believed that this stranger was one of them. [Evelyn Wooster. "Echoes from the Past", "in" Improvement Era (1950).] [It is here interesting to note a Spanish chronicle describing the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. It records the testimony of an 80 year old shaman from the pueblo of San Felipe named Pedro Naranjo. Naranjo claims that the Tewa Popé settled on a plan to drive the Spanish from the Southwest after a vision in a "estufa" (kiva) in Taos Pueblo. In the vision, Popé saw three figures named Caudi, Tilini, and Tleume going underground to the mythical lake of Copala. It was they who told him to tie a yucca cord into knots to sympolize the number of days before the rebellion should take place. David Roberts. "The Pueblo Revolt", 140-42.]

Tuba's Visit to Utah

The first Mormon missionaries to visit the Hopi came in 1858 under the leadership of Jacob Hamblin. It is unclear if Tuba still lived in Oraibi at this point, or if he had already moved to Moencopi. However, Jacob Hamblin writes that upon their arrival a "very aged man" (presumably not Tuba) reported a prophecy that men would come to the Hopi from the west who would bring them back blessings which they had lost and that he believed that Hamblin and the Mormons were those spoken of. Hamblin soon left, but a few Mormons stayed behind to teach the Hopi. However, these left in the middle of winter to preserve the peace after a strong contention had begun in Oraibi as to whether they were in fact those spoken of by the prophecy. [Jacob Hamblin. "Jacob Hamblin: A Narrative of His Personal Experience", 63-64 (1881). One may speculate that the prophecy referred to is a reference to the well known Hopi myth of the Pahana, the Lost White Brother. However, the Pahana myth specifically states that the Pahana will return from the east, not from the west. Thus, either a mistranslation occurred, or the "very aged man" made reference to a completely separate prophecy.] It might be speculated that this contention over the Mormons is the unnamed dissension that caused Tuba to leave Oraibi and settle at Moencopi. In any event, in early 1860, Tuba became acquainted with Mormon missionaries Thales Haskel and Marion Shelton in Oraibi, and invited them to settle in Moencopi and build a wool mill. However, they returned to southern Utah. [Rex C. Reeve, Jr. and Galen L. Fletcher. "Mormons in the Tuba City Area".] Ten years later, in November 1870, Tuba left his home with his wife, Pulaskaninki, in company with Jacob Hamblin to spend time in southern Utah in order to learn the ways of the Mormons. [James H. McClintock. "Mormon Settlement in Arizona", 80.] This was apparently in contraversion of a Hopi taboo forbidding Hopis from crossing the Colorado River until three prophets which had led the Hopi to their current home returned. [Jacob Hamblin. "Jacob Hamblin: A Narrative of His Personal Experience", 63-64. The taboo about crossing the Colorado River has been recorded in other sources as well. Frank Waters writes in "Book of the Hopi" that after their migration cycle the Hopi were given the land between the Colorado river and the Rio Grande by the god Màsaw (or Masauwu). The Hopi were then warned that "no one should cross the boundary rivers without permission, or destruction would come upon them"." However, Waters' account makes no mention of the "three prophets" that guided the Hopi to their lands. "See" Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi", 32 (Penguin Books 1963).] Upon reaching the Colorado, Hamblin records that Tuba

"looked rather sorrowful, and told me that his people once lived on the other side of this river, and their fathers had told them they never would go west of the river again to live. Said he, 'I am now going on a visit to see my friends. I have worshiped the Father of us all in the way you believe to be right; now I wish you would do as the Hopees [their name for themselves] think is right before we cross.' I assented. He then took his medicine bag from under his shirt, and offered me a little of its contents. I offered my left hand to take it; he requested me to take it in my right. He then knelt with his face to the east, and asked the Great Father of all to preserve us in crossing the river. He said that he and his wife had left many friends at home, and if they never lived to return, their friends would weep much. He prayed for pity upon his friends, the "Mormons," that none of them might drown in crossing; and that all the animals we had with us might be spared, for we needed them all, and to preserve unto us all our food and clothing, that we need not suffer hunger nor cold on our journey. He then arose to his feet. We scattered the ingredients from the medicine bag into the air, on to the land and into the water of the river...After this ceremony we drove our animals into the river, and they all swam safely to the opposite shore. In a short time ourselves and effects were safely over. Tuba then thanked the Great Father that He had heard and answered our prayer." ["Ibid", 110-11.]

Tuba spent nearly a year in the company of the Mormons. He was even able to meet the Mormon leader, Brigham Young, then in St. George. Tuba was particularly impressed by a factory where yarn was being mechanically spun. In Hopi culture, it is the men who spin the yarn for blankets, and it is spun by hand. According to Jacob Hamblin, after seeing this factory, Tuba "could never think of spinning yarn again with his fingers, to make blankets"." ["Ibid", 113.] His wife was most impressed by the Mormon grist mills, a major improvement over grinding corn by stone. ["Ibid".]

The Sacred Hopi Stone

Although Tuba seems to have had various disagreements with village leaders in Oraibi, he apparently retained access to one of the Hopi's sacred stones. On one occasion, several Mormons were visiting Tuba in Oraibi and he took his visitors inside the village kiva. There, he produced what appeared to be a marble slab about 15"x18" covered in "hieroglyphic" markings including clouds and stars. [James H. McClintock. "Mormons Settlement in Arizona", 81-82.] The later Ethnological Report No. 4 produced by the US government seems to uphold the existence of such a stone based on the testimony of John W. Young and Andrew S. Gibbons. This describes the stone as made of "red-clouded marble, entirely different from anything found in the region"." ["Ibid".] This also may be the tablet which author Frank Waters claims he was shown in 1960 while at Oraibi. He describes the stone as "approximately 10 inches long, 8 inches wide, and 1 1/2 inches thick. The stone resembled a dull gray marble with intrusive blotches of rose"." [Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi", 33 (Penguin Books, 1963).] In "The Book of the Hopi", Waters writes a description of the stone's markings and includes a drawing of the tablet which shows etchings of corn, moon, sun, cloud, star, etc.

Tuba City and Baptism

In 1873, Tuba again invited the Mormons to come and live by his village of Moencopi. This time, the offer was accepted, although a permanent Latter-day Saint presence did not become a reality until 1875. But the resultant community became the first Mormon settlement in Arizona. [Richard G. Oman. "Sacred Connections: LDS Pottery in the Native American Southwest". BYU Studies 35, no. 1, 107 (1995).] Hopi tradition has it that Tuba invited the Mormons to settle near his village in order to gain protection from marauding Paiutes and Navajos. [Harold Courlander. "The Fourth World of the Hopis", 192.] Whatever the case may be, the Mormons came and Tuba was baptized into the LDS Church in 1876. [Rex C. Reeve, Jr. and Galen L. Fletcher. "Mormons in the Tuba City Area".] In April, 1877, Tuba and his wife attended the dedication of the Mormon temple in St. George, Utah in company with missionary Andrew S. Gibbons and his wife. It was sometime during this period that Tuba shared his new faith with Tom Polacca, a headman at Hano on First Mesa, who was also eventually baptized. ["INDIAN ART REFLECTS "SACRED CONNECTION" TO GOSPEL TRUTHS", in LDS Church News (Oct. 29, 1994). Polacca was the half brother of the famous Hopi potter Nampeyo. Though he eventually lost track of the Mormon Church, at his death he made his descendants promise that they would join no other Christian denomination. Today the Polacca/Nampeyo family is perhaps the most famous family of Hopi potters. Many of its members had joined the LDS Church in response to Tom's command.] In September of 1878, Tuba helped lay out the site for a new Mormon town near Moencopi which would be called Tuba City. Both Mormons and some Hopis moved into the new town, although other Hopi leaders objected when Tuba gave the land on which the town was situated to the Mormons. [Rex C. Reeve, Jr. and Galen L. Fletcher. "Mormons in the Tuba City Area".] In 1879, a wool factory was built in Tuba City in order to "benefit the Indians and the [LDS] Church"." [James H. McClintock. "Mormon Settlement in Arizona", 159.] No doubt this edifice reminded Tuba of the factory which had so engaged his imagination in southern Utah nine years before.

Later Years

The settlement of his Mormon friends at Tuba City and the completion of the factory may have been a high point in Tuba's life, for it seems his last decade was marked with sadness. The woolen factory was in operation for only a short time and within a few years it had fallen into disrepair. It is reported that Tuba "took particular pride in watching over the remains of the factory, but after his death the ruination of the building was made complete"." [James H. McClintock. "Mormon Settlement in Arizona", 159.] It also seems that at some point in his last years, Tuba's wife left him for a younger man, and afterwards Tuba spent about three years living in the home of Mormon missionary C. L. Christensen. Tuba died in 1887, and at least some of Tuba's children were still living in Moencopi into the mid-twentieth century. In 1941, a sandstone marker with a bronze plaque was dedicated in Tuba City by the LDS Church in honor of Tuba. ["The Church Moves On", "in" Improvement Era (1941).]

Notes

References

*James H. McClintock. "Mormon Settlement in Arizona", (University of Arizona Press, 1985)
*Jacob Hamblin. "Jacob Hamblin: A Narrative of His Personal Experience", (1881).
*Richard G. Oman. "Sacred Connections: LDS Pottery in the Native American Southwest". BYU Studies 35, no. 1, 107 (1995).
*Frank Waters. "The Book of the Hopi", (Penguin Books, 1963).