The Vanishing American (The Navajo, Hopi and San Juan Band of the Piute)

The Vanishing American is a complex story that revolves around the Bureau of Indian Affairs' efforts nationwide to assimilate Native American children into the broaders white American culture.  Specifically, central to the story are the Navajo, Hopi and San Juan Band of the Southern Paiute Tribe who attended the Western Navajo School in Tuba City in the years leading up to Zane Grey's visit in 1922.  

This exhibit will not attempt to tell that story.  Zane Grey's West Society already told that story in depth in its exhibit, "The Vanishing American: More Than Just A Western Novel."  You can view this entire exhibit if you:

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In addition, you can read Zane Grey's novel, The Vanishing American, online if you:

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Our intent with this exhibit is to focus on the Native American people who inspired The Vanishing American- The Navajo, the Hopi and the San Juan Band of the Pauite.

The Navajo

Another theme in The Vanishing American involved a young Navajo man who returned to the Navajo Reservation after an absence of many years.  He had been kidnapped as a young boy and sent East for his education.  His name is Nophaie.  Nophaie graduated from an eastern college where he was a star of the baseball team.  He also fell in love with a white girl, Marian Warner. 

In time, Nophaie returns to the land of his birth.  His lineage foretold his future as a leader.  However, he was caught between the white man's Christian world and the Navajo religion based on a close relationship with nature.  A young Navajo man once explained that these conflicts are very real even today.  His old friends called him "an apple" that was "red on the outside, but white within."

Nophaie's life became even more complicated when Marian followed him to the Reservation and the couple fell madly in love.  It was an unthinkable taboo for a white woman to fall in love with an Indian... though relationships between white men and Native American women were not uncommon. 

The eyes of the young Navajo man shown below seem to reflect the sadness and confusion shown by Nophaie.  The images was shot by well known Western photographer Edward S. Curtis. 

The San Juan Band of the Southern Paiute

In The Vanishing American, the Navajo hero, Nophaie, lives in the shadow of Navajo Mountain (Nothsis Ahn) near Paiute (Pahute) Canyon.  It is near there that he greets Marion Warner after she travels to the Navajo Reservation to be with him.  He also takes Gekin Yashi, an abused Navajo girl, to the Paiute people living there for protection from an evil Bureau of Indian Affairs Agent and a lecherous minister.  The Paiutes seem to represent a more traditional native people, less spoiled by the white man's culture. 

Note: In his novel, Grey spelled name of the people "Pahute".  We do not know if that was a term he coined or whether he misspelled "Paiute." 

The Pahute Canyon location and the Paihute people there were clearly influenced by Zane Grey's friend Nasja Begay.  Begay is the Paiute guide who guided Grey to Navajo Bridge (Naza).  Grey's expedition was among the earliest groups of white adventurers to the magnificant arch.  The author first met Nasja in Paiute Canyon along with his Paiute family, just like the story.

It is important to note that both Navajo Mountain and Rainbow Bridge are sacred locations for both the Paiute and Navajo people.  The sacred nature of the two places become abundantly clear in the novel. Also of significance is that Nasja Begay was a member of the San Juan Band of the Southern Paiute.  These people do not have their own reservation.  Rather, they have their own communities within the broader Navajo Reservation, including one at Paiute Canyon. 

In The Vanishing American, the reservation is struck an influenza epidemic that kills 3,000.  In real life, the same epidemic took the life of Nasja Begay, his wife and his children with the exception of one young son. 

The Hopi

Though their role in The Vanishing American is comparatively minor, the Hopi people have a very clear presence.  They are referred to as the "Noki" and rebelled against Friel, a missionary they despise.  Friel had cheated the very Noki people he was trying to convert.  The Noki also objected to the missionary proselytizing in their town.  In fact, at one point they lasso the man and threaten to hang him.  

In real life, the Hopi people sent a letter to the Bureau of Indian Affairs asking that Rev. J. B. Frey, a Mennonite missionary, named be removed for the same reasons as those sited in The Vanishing American.  In fact, there was even a real incident in which the missionary had been lassoed by some angry Hopi men.

The treatment of the Hopi girls at the Western Navajo School just a short distance from the Hopi community of Moenkopi was tragic.  All of the children's hair was cut short as one step in the school's attempt to cleanse the students of their native roots.  In the case of the Hopi girls, this resulted in the destruction of the unique "whorls" in their hair.