West by Southwest: Ernie Bulow

MY MOST UNFORGETTABLE CHARACTER CARL GORMAN

CARL GORMAN’S HORSES ARE AS DISTINCTIVE AS WOODY CRUMBO. HE HAD A LIFETIME LOVE AFFAIR WITH HORSES.

CARL MADE ME A MUG WITH THESE DONKEYS CARVED INTO THE SURFACE.

One day in around 1968, I left my classroom at Wingate to take my break when I found a handsome Navajo with a leonine head of white hair, holding forth in the lobby, completely surrounded by people. I knew a master storyteller when I saw one. When I asked who the man was, I was given a chorus of strange looks: who didn’t know Carl Gorman? In the summer of 1971, I was working for the Duke Oral History Project under C. Gregory Crampton at the University of Utah. I got a call from him saying, “Get your behind over to the Navajo Museum, and take your tape recorder and plenty of blank tape.” He wanted me to take my wife and second tape machine. We didn’t really know what was going on until we got there and our friend Martin Link explained. Considering the secrecy surrounding them, I at least knew what the Code Talkers were. But I quickly found that I didn’t know much. Over a three day period, I taped a bunch of these amazing men. The only person I know who got multiple tapes was Carl Gorman. After that, I crossed paths with this amazing man rather often, and I believe I can call him a friend. Early in life, he did well as a bootlegger on the Reservation. Then he was one of the few native traders. His father Nelson Gorman had a post near Chinle. Carl’s language skills were obvious—during the infamous stock reduction, he was used as a Navajo translator for the government—and he was one of the first Code Talkers taken. Born in 1907, he was older than most of the guys—he lied about his age to enlist—but he was needed to craft the original code. It is a fortunate person who has heard Gorman the storyteller. Over the years, I noticed an interesting thing: he never bragged on himself, and he had plenty to brag about. The Marines skipped through the Pacific, but the men only had to make every other island landing, except for the Code Talkers who made every landing, carrying a battery and phone as heavy as a car battery, along with pack, rifle, and the rest of the gear everyone else carried. Carl had more life experience than most of the men, but they all shared one thing—life as a Navajo. More than one man told me he just skipped basic training. The Navajos were in good physical condition and they all knew how to shoot so they jumped the queue, so to speak. Many of the men had little or no education. One man told me when he was six or seven his parents took him to the local trading post. It was the first time he ever saw an Anglo. Carl was ten years old by the time his parents decided to put him in school. In a letter home, he described the teachers as “mean as scorpions.” There is an excellent biography of Gorman—two actually—by Henry and Georgia Greenberg who spent quite a lot of time with him. It is full of Carl Gorman tales. One of Carl’s stories that upset a lot of white folks was about his treatment during his boyhood school days. For a personality like Gorman’s, it was inevitable he would get in trouble. What he had not expected was the treatment he received. He waited for a chance to escape. A friend found out what he was doing and tagged along, and then his younger brother Wallace joined them. They went over 100 miles on foot in February. He finished his education at the Albuquerque Indian School, and the policies there were not too different than what he had seen already. Until 1970, the official BIA stand was to make little Christian White Men out of the kids. Carl’s diploma said he was “A competent farmer.” At least he got to play football.

Ernie’s Selfie

West by Southwest

by Ernie Bulow

HE PAINTED MANY CEREMONIAL SCENES LIKE THIS ONE PORTRAYING APACHE GHAN DANCERS.

Getting to talk to these Code Talkers was amazing. Many stories I can’t repeat. Actually, I didn’t do much of an interview; I turned on the tape recorder and they talked. Their stories about the war in the Pacific were pretty horrific. The Japanese were dangerous enemies and the Navajos saw it all first hand. As many people know, the Japanese had made extensive tunnels on the islands they occupied. One Code Talker told me the story of clearing the heavily fortified burrows on an island. He was creeping along in near darkness when he came across a dead Japanese soldier. He was stepping over the body when it came to life. “He didn’t have any weapons, so he grabbed my leg and bit it; hung on like a bulldog. There was no surrender in those men.” The most famous story, and I heard him tell it, was when they sat on an island for some time. Carl was bored, and ever-adventurous, so he took off his uniform and made himself a loin cloth. He slipped through the lines where the Americans and Japanese faced one another. Back in the hills, there were natives who had been decimated by the war. Gorman crept through two armed and dangerous lines. Apparently, he hit it off with the islanders and repeated his trek several times. Eventually he had to get caught, and luckily, it was the American side that captured him. But he was not out of trouble. The soldiers wanted to shoot him on the spot, though I can’t imagine how they thought the tall, handsome Indian was a Japanese spy. He did some fast talking and was escorted back to his unit.

I don’t begin to do justice to his story, which had all the elements of a good novel: scary at times, hilarious at times, and always mesmerizing. The only plot element missing was romance, and given time, he might have added that one too. Who else would sneak past two armies out for blood? And then joke about it? After the war, he went through a period of anger at the treatment of American citizens who had served so bravely. Most Indians still did not have the vote, and signs pointed out that they were not welcome in bars. But Carl didn’t waste his energy on bitterness, but instead took advantage of the GI Bill to further his education on his own terms for once. He had been drawing all his life, but now he got into the Otis Art Institute. For years, he signed his work with his clan name, Kin-ya-onnie-beyeh. He started a Navaho Club in Southern California, but he realized he could reach more of his people back on the Reservation. In 1964, not long before I met him the first time, he became director of the Navajo Arts & Crafts Guild. In the late Sixties, things started to change for Indian tribes as they got more autonomy from the government and project money like the Office of Navajo Education Opportunity. He had two projects during this time that were of great importance. He created a traveling exhibit of traditional Navajo history with several original paintings. He organized an effort to tape record as many Hatathli—medicine men—as possible, before all their knowledge passed into the darkness. The original aim of the medicine man project was to put together a definitive Navajo mythology. The book was never produced for two reasons. First, it was agreed that no detail went into the book that wasn’t agreed on by all the participants. Turned out they didn’t agree on much. Then the money ran out and hundreds of hours of tape are stored for some future resurrection. I was always sorry that book didn’t come to pass. In the summer of 1970, I was allowed to copy some of the tapes. I gave them to Wingate High School for use by students. The following year I found out that the head of the art department had erased the tapes so they could be reused. Who could understand the “guttural gibberish” anyway? I TOOK A LOT OF PHOTOGRAPHS OF CARL OVER THE YEARS. THIS IS ONE OF MY FAVORITES.

The spontaneous little stories were often the best. One day out of the blue, he told me about the first time he smoked marijuana. He was stranded in Gallup at a time when there were no rooms to rent. A Mexican fellow he knew offered to share his hotel room. At some point in the evening, the man took out some pot and rolled a nice one. Carl’s description of the two of them high was hilarious. Gorman fled the room half dressed.

When Carl Gorman died in Gallup at the age of 90, the New York Times ran a generous obituary. In the first sentence, the writer says: “Carl Gorman, a gentle Navajo artist who talked his way valiantly through some of the fiercest fighting of World War II…” had passed away. The writer almost certainly did not realize how appropriate his statement was. He was talking about the Navajo code that was never broken, not the silver-tongued storyteller. I will never forget Carl Gorman the raconteur, teller of tales, Gorman the artist, the man who advanced the Navajo tribe in so many ways.

- ernie@buffalomedicine.com