STEWART INDIAN SCHOOL ORAL HISTORY PROJECT MAKING THE MOST OUT OF SCHOOL: AN INTERVIEW WITH RUDY CLARK Interviewed by Terri McBride Transcribed by Barbara L. Zeigler Funded by: Nevada Indian Commission © Funded by: Copyright 2017 Nevada Indian Commission 5366 Snyder Avenue Carson City, Nevada 89701 Making the Most Out of School: An Interview with Rudy Clark Rudy Clark is a Hualapai Indian Tribe member and lives in Peach Springs, Arizona. He attended Stewart Indian School 1972-1974. Rudy was active in sports and a member of the Lettermen’s Club, the Booster’s Club, the Indian Club, Student Council, and played in a rock and roll band at Stewart. In this interview, he discusses in detail his work on weekends in the “outings” program at Stewart—placing students in day labor jobs for local residents—especially his work for Emily Greel, who had a farm. Rudy has a Bachelor’s degree in environmental science and two separate Master’s degrees in Education. Rudy has worked as an educational administrator in multiple states and as a health care director for the Hualapai Tribe, and has served on the Tribal Council. My name is Terri McBride. It is Tuesday, So, what language was spoken in your March 21, 2017. We are at the Hualapai household? Administrative Offices in Peach Springs, My first language was Hualapai and as we were Arizona. The interview is with Rudy Clark, a getting a little older we learned to speak English former student at the Stewart Indian School. We for elementary school, in elementary school. will be discussing his experiences as a student. Um, I can recall in elementary school my This interview is being conducted for the teachers having a very rough command of Stewart Indian School Oral History Project for speaking English properly. They would make us the Nevada Indian Commission and will be speak English with correct pronunciation. archived in the Stewart Indian School Cultural They’d make us read English with correct Center, the State Library and Archives, and pronunciation and at that time I didn’t know Special Collections at the University of Nevada what I was saying, but I was sayin’ words that Reno. had magic in them and they produced sound and Rudy, when were you born and where are you created the English language for me. Later, I from? made that equivalent to what our language meant and what it meant in English to get that I was born on April 8, 1955, in Kingman, true meaning of what the language is about. So, Arizona, in Mojave County. with that, I’m very grateful that I had good How many people were in your family? English teachers but very rough disciplinarians. (laughs) I mean rough disciplinarians because, Our family, there were six. They were all older you know, they meant well to teach us to than me. I think my next oldest brother, no, become civilized Natives, but also how to sister, is twelve years older than I am and I’m become proper Natives. So, I learned to eat, what they call the “miracle baby.” One last shot. sleep, and dress like the modern-day American. My mom was born in 1912. My father was born in 1901. So, at 54 years old he was a father So, once you learned English, were there again and my mom, at 40 some-odd years old, communication problems with you and your was a mom for one last time. I grew up in the parents or they knew English or did you just go Indian camp in Kingman, Arizona. We later home and speak Hualapai? moved to our own house on the south side of We always spoke Hualapai at home. The Kingman and dwelled there for a number of English, when I really started speaking English years until their passing in the mid-sixties. fluently, I think I was in third grade and my dad Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark used to get upset at me for speaking English at election day and it was always a ceremonial home, but we did anyway. I think we all did activity there. I remember a time at our when we were together as children, we’d speak activities where they had, getting ready to serve English to each other, rather than Hualapai. I lunches, somebody always spoke for the meal, don’t know why. I think it was because we were and everybody was quiet. It was solemn, and no practicing or gaining our skills in English in the matter if you were at the gym or if you were out elementary school period. We did have in the community and if somebody came by and Hualapai family members that came and spoke said they’re gonna talk, you kept quiet for a brief with us but we started speaking to them, moment to give the blessing for the day and then responding to them, in English. So, they used to you move forward. To have Indian, Native call us names. They used to call us “white kids” dancing at night, everybody got all dressed up. because we spoke English to them and, pretty They had round dancing. The old singers would soon when we all went to the reservation, we come and they’d sing drum songs and those were just known as white kids because we spoke drum songs are about the land, the people, and English. Everybody hears in Hualapai, spoke celebrations that we’ve had in the past and our Hualapai. It was kind of, ah, a culture shock for life, and it’s just supposed to be a gay, old time me at that time, the 60’s, the mid-sixties. But I for us. There were also times where I think we learned to live with it and got a little tough and had the first gambling hall outside of Nevada on fought several times over use of English words our reservation (laughs) because our women and language in this small community. When I would play cards and they, uh, they’d hide the mean fight, fought, I mean we fought physically. cards from the police officers and they’d bet You fought fisticuffs, wrestle on the ground and pennies and pitch pennies and do things like responded to the criticism we had. (laughs) that! Those were celebrations of a sort, but Yeah. those were only for night activities and mainly the women would do that. So, it was always a So, to ask a little more about your family life, fun time for the gambling operations at did your family celebrate, or your community, somebody’s house. like you said you lived in the Indian camp in Kingman, did you celebrate American Indian Well, gambling was a traditional activity, right? ceremonies or do traditional activities? Right, right. We used to do that out there when Well, let’s just put it this way. When I was a we were workin’ out in the field, way out there, child, our day was greeted by an elderly man in Frazier Wells. We’d go camping out there who spoke to the spirits and would announce a and it was always an activity to keep us discussion like Moses would on sermon on the occupied at night and laughing and joking and Mount and he’d give a discourse on why we’d enjoying ourselves with each other. It was need to get up, why we need to work with each great! other, how we’re supposed to help each other’s, So, were any of your other family members you know, there’s a family that’s suffering over educated at Stewart Indian School? here, direct our lives for us. And that’s the traditional way of getting your family organized No, I’m the only family member from my small for the day. The other things that we used to do community and my family, my immediate is we used to attend all the nightly sings that family; I’m the only one that went to Stewart. they had for celebrations, funerals. Every year My brothers and sisters, they all went to we always came to our Native “doing” where we Kingman High School, Kingman Elementary, had a spring or it would be in July; we’d have Palo Christi in Kingman. So, they’re all a our big talks by our tribal leaders, our big meal product of the Kingman School District. I was for the community. That later turned into the the only boarding school-type kid that came 2 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark about. It isn’t that I wanted to go to boarding Oh, yeah. school. It was that my parents were both dead I share that story often because it was a time I and the Bureau of Indian Affairs felt fit that it was homeless and I slept by—the lava rocks might be better for me to be in school kept me warm. And my aunt and uncle went to somewhere rather than be a vagabond and not Kingman one day and they saw me in the park have a home to stay in and, um, live with a and they brought me home and so I stayed with family and that’s how I ended up at Stewart, them and was raised by them. But they were with my Stewart family. And I loved all those getting older and they didn’t have the financial guys! I miss them! stability to take care of me or to send me to Well, they miss you too! I have a message for school from here. I had to go away for school. you later. So, what years did you go to Stewart? So, how did you get up there? Did you take a I went 1972 to ’74. bus—how did they—a plane? Did somebody drive you? Okay. So, you were—was that your sophomore, junior, senior year, or junior-senior? I’m trying to think! How did I get up there? I think I got the bus the first time I went up. I was No, junior-senior year. I was a dropout from just naïve about it. Kingman High School for a year. Did you have any idea where you were goin’? Oh. When the BIA told you Stewart Indian School? Well mainly, that was, uh, that was not by my I had no clue, I had no clue where I was going. I choice. It was because we were fighting in went to the Post Office and it was kinda weird. school and they told us to get out and. . . . You They had a whole list of these Indian schools. gotta remember that from 1969 to ‘71 it was Phoenix, Sherman, Stewart. They had other always a lot of racial tension in a small places that they had one or two kids going. It community like Kingman. I mean, don’t get me was like a roster of whose team you’re gonna be wrong, the high school kids that I hung out with, on, you know, and there was my name, bigger we all were friends and we played pool and we than lights, Stewart, and, uh, I remember—oh, I played baseball together and football in the went at mid-term because Mrs. Yellow Hawk, grass, but it was a certain element of people, a uh, no, no—yeah, Mrs. Yellow Hawk, but she certain element, a small clique of cowboys that was Miss [Hutchin?] at that time. She put me on didn’t like Natives, and we played the cowboy the bus to Stewart and had me sent up there, and and Indian part and, pretty soon, you know, that’s when I went up then that year I got on the there was always tension at the high school. bus and I was back on the roster! So, it was Stealing benches and making fun of us and, you always great to see my name going somewhere! know, enough is enough, you know? You want And I also went to Sherman for a short period of to go at it? Let’s go for it. We went for it and time, too. we were the ones that got the short end of the stick. Yeah, so, I had to sit out a year and think Oh! about what I did but I also didn’t have a place to And I didn’t make it there. It was not—the go. cliques there were just as bad as Kingman. I So, where did you live during that year? With mean, we had tribal cliques and we had like, extended family or kind of . . . ? intertribal wars. It was like the Papagos and Pimas against the Navajos. The Navajos against Well, I used to live in a park in Kingman, called the California Indians. The Hualapais and Metcalf Park. Supais and Hopis against the Navajos. It was 3 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark Rudy Clark, Peach Springs, Arizona. March 21, 2017. crazy! I just couldn’t hang with that because I show up at seven o’clock for a dorm meeting was, I used to call myself a Cosmopolite. I’d be and this Indian boy wasn’t used to that! more hip than anybody else. Listening to soul Right. and rock ‘n roll and jazz and onto Dizzy Gillespie and a classical rocker and a classical I was used to getting home, washing my hands, music fan. That wasn’t my cup of tea. I was resting, getting ready for supper, getting my more cultured than wanting to be a tribal chores ready, sweeping the floor, washing the member. It was all tribal, but I was more like a dishes, and then going to wherever I sleep on the diplomat. floor or watching a little TV, and then lights out at eight-thirty, nine o’clock, but this was a little Right. more freedom than that. This was meeting at Just maintain my cool and then got crossed over seven; you’re done by eight and then we did our and I got in a fight again and there I was, outside chores together and, I’m going, “wait a minute, the doors. here; this is out of line!” Because right after our chores was our room check at eight-thirty and (Laughs) So, you think you recall you took the then bedtime at nine and that’s a half hour more bus up to northern Nevada. What was your first freedom time for me to get in trouble. I mean, impression when you arrived at the school? Do I’d go from, I was a little butterfly, you know? you remember what thought when you first got Fly around, or cockroach, go from room to room on campus? and say, “Hey! What’s goin’ on, guys?” and Where the hell am I at?!? That’s what I said! they’d say, “Hey! You gotta be in your room! What am I doing here? It was all regimented. It You can’t be in ours!” It was always fun, but was like I got off the bus and had to go to a line that’s how you break the rules a little; it was fun, to see which dorm I was going to be in. I had to it was great. It was a good time. Oh, and since I get a room assignment. That same night I had to was always dapper, I had to have “the over” on 4 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark the iron and the ironing board. I was always showing me how to be a real good citizen, and a trying to keep my clothes pressed and neat and gentleman. I carry myself that way today. lookin’ sharp, you know, and I got a little So, did you take anything from home with you criticism for that, you know. I wasn’t a Levi - when you went up there besides your clothes? type of person. Any, you know, favorite objects, things that Right, and yeah, that early 70’s period, would remind you of home? everybody was wearing denim and, yeah, (Pauses) No, not really. I left here with my superstar shirts and stuff. tennis shoes, my slacks and tee shirt, and jacket. Yeah, I was more of what they called a Native Right. Cholo type, you know, with slacks and a tee shirt. I didn’t have much clothes. I had a footlocker with a couple of things in it but it made me look Button down. cool. (laughter) It wasn’t packed with shirts or Yeah, button down. I had to look cool! clothes or tee shirts or new socks or anything. It was just a footlocker with a few clothes in it. But you enjoyed being a student there? And you know, I gave that footlocker away to Oh, I loved being a student at Stewart! Once I one of my Apache friends because I was got used to the regimen of waking up early, fortunate enough to get—I didn’t know this— going to eat breakfast with my brothers, having a but I was getting money every month and it was small pastime with the girls over there, laughing, just building up at the Stewart bank and finally, I you know, teasing each other, sitting with think Mrs. Collett got ahold of me and asked me friends, making new friends. It was always what I was going to do with this because it was great! To me, they were like sisters and brothers building up and I went to her office in Student and sometime during my senior year, I finally Affairs and she says, “You know, you have discovered women, or young girls, or a some money here and you’ve been getting $89 a girlfriend. I do miss her! I cherish the smile; I month.” “Oh, really? What can I use that for?” cherish the conversations, and that made it great, She says “Well, you can check out $10 or $5 or you know. I was always happy to be at Stewart, $10; you know, whatever you need.” So, I think you know. It was, it was good. I found a place, that first time I took out $20 and took a couple a niche, as a part of the Lettermen’s Club. I of guys to the movie instead of the gals because found my political, uh, skills and honed my we were tough and we wanted to watch, uh, I political thinking and thought, and I always think it was, uh, what the heck was it? Uh, enjoyed being a student. I was a student not Electric Cowboy, or something; I can’t only in the academic area but in the extra- remember. It was a 1970’s somethin’ film. But curricular activity area. I mean I was a little we wanted to watch that. But we went leader every now and then. Plus, I had two great downtown and had popcorn and soda at the men that taught me the way of life. Bud Heron, movies! That was, to me, that was a great thing. the ex-Marine, and Albert Tyler, a black That’s all I took was my clothes. That’s all I basketball—football coach, and a mentor to me, had and purchased. I later used my money to and . . . I can’t remember the other black buy myself a letterman’s jacket. gentleman’s name. It’ll come to me, but him and the principal, Brungee, they got me to speak So, was it hard to leave people behind when you in Rotary’s and speak to groups of people and went? I mean, what did you miss the most while Ruby Shannon and Miss Gentry taught me the you were up there from Arizona? art of talking directly and being a diplomat and Deer meat gravy over biscuits. grateful to people, and shaking hands, and 5 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark Sounds fantastic! was when I was reading all the health magazines and bedbugs and things like that—dust mites—I The hunting. Being in the woods and lookin’ at learned to not make my bed right away but to let the Grand Canyon is what I missed. my bedding air out. Prior to that I used to make The smell of pine trees and cedar and sage. I it tight and it looked like I was ready to, you always had sage up there but not like Hualapai know, live a good life and pick things up. rez and the smell of the dirt here. You know, Maybe I’ve gotten sloppy in my older age but I when I wake up in the morning and I go outside do have a laundry basket that clothes go in and and I smell the air out there, I smell all the that’s it. I mean, but, I learned all that at dorm elements that make me a Hualapai here and why life. I learned how to mop, how to vacuum, how I was left to help protect the land. That’s what I to clean windows, how to make sure you have a missed when I left. spring cleaning. They used to make us clean the outside of the dorm. Can you believe that? I Right, yeah. didn’t know why. The weeds were cut around the dorm even though we had maintenance guys, And of all my years that I’ve been around, I’ve our windowsills were always washed, our always had that calling and that’s what brings windows were washed; it was great! I mean, it me home, the land. was somethin’ that I remember, in detail, and I So, let’s talk a little bit more about campus life. cherish those thoughts, you know. I laugh every You mentioned it earlier; what was living in the now and then because, of course, I stayed in dorms like? several rooms. I stayed in the east wing, the west wing, uh, and . . . (Laughs) It was great! After school it was, if I wasn’t in sports I was doin’ homework or else You were in the big boy’s dorm? figurin’ out my next moves. What I was gonna I was in the big boy’s dorm, but I was never in do, which church I was gonna go to, who had the honor dorms; the ones that all the supposed the best cookies, who was havin’ hamburgers, good guys go to, where they got their own who was havin’ sandwiches. That was always rooms. I shared my room with three other guys the forefront of, of my afterschool activities. and we—it was the nastiest thing to do was to The worshipping, which church to go to, but share with three other guys but we did. And I also the social activities. Dorm life was very say nasty because, you know, some of us had cool. I mean, I had a run of the mill on the iron good personal hygiene and some of them didn’t. and ironing boards, cleaning every morning, So, it was my job to teach everybody to have cleaning every night, making my bed, making good hygiene and to tell them, you know, you sure there was no dust in the room. You could need to get more deodorant. I even offered, “I’ll clean, clean, clean but to the dorm matrons and do the socks today, I’ll do the underwear, I’ll do to the guys who are checking your room, it’ll the laundry and you guys go do what you need never be 100%. I know that. No way I could be to and when it comes your turn you can do it,” perfect. My tee shirt could be out of line and and, you know, we did that. We learned to help they’d say it was messed up. I mean it was just each other. crazy, but that was more discipline, though. So, the dorm life made me a little bit more Cooperate, yeah. disciplined about my environment, to be sure the floors are mopped. You go to my house, my Yeah. That’s what dorm life was about to me. floors are mopped, to make sure the bathrooms Of course, we always covered for each other are cleaned, to make sure that, uh, that the when we missed night check. blankets and foods (?) well, your towels are Uh-huh, of course! folded. The only thing I acquired in my later life 6 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark You know, when I was in somebody else’s submarine sandwiches there but that was the, the room. “They’re coming, they’re coming,” and social life there. Plus, I played in a band there, we’d all run down to our room as quickly as we so . . . can. It was great! I mean, those were the Oh, I’m going to ask you about that in a minute. challenging times. It was a few moments of my So, did you have a favorite class? life but it was a challenging time. My favorite class was Robey Willis in history. So, the dining hall, what was eating over there like? What was the food like? So, history with Robey Willis? Honestly, the food was great to me. Uh-huh. Okay. He also taught civics, didn’t he? I guess when I first went in it wasn’t that great Yes. That’s where I learned my parliamentary but then after I got there and ate a few hundred procedures and my governmental structures in times, you get used to the way the cooks—the United States so when I went to Washington I cooks prepare the food. But what was more knew what I was doin’! You know, which intriguing to me was when I got the opportunity congressional members to meet, how to talk to to work in the kitchen and then to cook food and the caucuses, the lobbying—correct way to to serve food and to begin my process in scullery lobby—introducing myself to senators, what did work, in kitchen and washing dishes and serving senators do, how did the House meet, all that the people. You begin to appreciate what you kinda good stuff. Learned that from Mr. Willis. receive there. If you do good, you get a ream of Plus, I learned historical—how to—it was kinda bologna and that was always great at night time great! I learned not only the civics portion but, with a half a loaf of bread and chips that you with him, I learned how to do what you would acquired somehow. call transitional historical development from year to year and decades within the decades. Right. He’d take those eras and then he’d say, “Prior to Whether they be absconded or acquired from the that . . . ” then we’d do that little history there store. I don’t know where the chips came from and then we’d do the ideology of the law or but we always had Frito chips and Lays and that we’d do the ideology of the historical was it and they went in between our sandwiches development in any kind of technology, tool, or we ate them with a soda. Uh, we’d scrape up manufacturing outfit or anything; and also our change and go to the store. taught us how to transform the American society from just the “Wild West” to equal rights in Novake? The store? women and until finally we received our Indian We’d hit Novake. Yeah, we did that and get rights and talked a little bit about that. And then some soda. It was always great! Novake, it was the national trends in scientific, science and always great at Novake. I remember I used to technology. He did all that. He didn’t know hang out at Novake on, uh, Saturdays and that, but he was doin’ it. Sundays, just to watch my basketball games. Right, right. So, were they still doing vocational That’s where the guys hung out. It was like our ed when you were there? You said you worked own man cave there. in the kitchen. Were they still doing agricultural Yeah! (laughs) stuff, or? (Laughs) And we had a little money. We could Yes, they were. They were, they were, they buy submarine sandwiches. I just loved the had—my friends, they were all in agriculture. 7 Stewart Indian School Oral History Project: Rudy Clark 1974 Stewart Baccalaureate Program in which Rudy gave the Tribute to Seniors. Courtesy of Rudy Clark. They were doing—shuckin’ hay, raisin’ hay, young kids, we were still doin’ things like that. taking care of animals and the animal sciences I learned how to do my tractors there too, but it were still there. A lot of them did heavy wasn’t for class, it was from learning my equipment. Some of them did heavy equipment; buddies and hangin’ out with them, you know. they operated equipment. Even though we were But they did it for class. I didn’t. 8