224 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuU. 188 



Tuba City, and particularly with the hospital. As an alternative to 

 a 110-mile round trip its advantages are obvious, although Shonto's 

 telephone is out of operation for an average of 1 or 2 days a week due 

 to primitive equipment and faulty installation. 



There are two telephones in Shonto community, one at the store 

 and one at the school. The latter is located in the teachers' residence 

 and is for their use only, so that the trading-post telephone is the only 

 set wliich is practically accessible to Navahos. It is used from time 

 to time to call various Government agencies such as the court and the 

 Soil and Moisture Conservation office, but most of all for inquiries to 

 the Tuba City hospital concerning admissions, condition of patients, 

 and times of discharge. Month in and month out Shonto Trading Post 

 averages at least three such calls a week. A few individuals are 

 willing to talk directly into the set, but the great majority require 

 the trader to speak for them. In spite of the nuisance involved, 

 telephoning is a privilege accorded to all Shonto Navahos for any 

 reasonable purpose. 



Finally, Shonto's trader sometimes serves as a face-to-face inter- 

 mediary between local Navahos and outside agencies. Because of his 

 existing and formalized relationships with his White neighbors and 

 with such institutions as the Railroad Retirement Board and the 

 State Department of Public Welfare, he is occasionally asked to convey 

 information directly to them, or to find out various matters from 

 them. It should be mentioned also that the trader is not infrequently 

 called on to act as an interpreter, as for example in interviews between 

 caseworkers and Navaho welfare claimants (see pp. 218-219) . 



BENEFIT AGENT 



Shonto's trader is called upon by his customers to secure nonfinan- 

 cial as well as remunerative benefits (cf . "Charter Functions," pp. 216- 

 220) for them. He may even act as an intermediary in their distribu- 

 tion, as was noted earlier in the case of tribal emergency relief (cf . also 

 Coolidge and Coolidge, 1930, pp. 68-69 ; Sanders et al., 1953, pp. 233- 

 234). In recent years, for example, he has handed out on request 

 seedling fruit and shade trees, alfalfa seed, and rodent poison for the 

 Bureau of Indian Affairs Soil and Moisture Conservation program, 

 and surplus powdered milk (for supplementary lamb feeding) pro- 

 vided by the Department of Agriculture. He has assisted Shonto 

 families in their relations with Government agencies at Tuba City and 

 Kayenta in such matters as borrowing a tractor for plowing, and in 

 securing construction of charcos and check dams on their grazing 

 territories. 



Most of all, Shonto's Navahos require the assistance of the trader in 

 securing the benefits of Wliite medicine. It has not been many years 

 since traders or their wives usually had to take critically ill patients 

 to the hospital. Nowadays there are enough Navaho-owned pickups 



