Adams] SHONTO: ROLE OF NAVAHO TRADER 275 



The trader has also a more direct source of information with regard 

 to welfare accounts. Since the store is utilized by caseworkers as a 

 contact point in mterviewing their Navaho claimants (see "Ancillary 

 Functions for Whites," pp. 227-229), he is sometimes able to obtain 

 information face-to-face. His relations with caseworkers have in one 

 or two cases been sujficiently cordial so that the latter have been will- 

 ing to furnish him with private information about increases or de- 

 creases in welfare payments, so that he could make the necessary 

 adjustments in their credit accounts. Speaking of a woman recipient 

 of Aid to Dependent Children, a caseworker in 1953 told Shonto's 

 trader "you'd better clean her up ; I'm going to cut her off ;" i.e., "you'd 

 better close out her credit account now because her next relief check 

 will be her last." 



Successful credit saturation depends largely on obtaining advance 

 information of this kind. Wliere information is lacking or where 

 the individual involved is slow in accumulating debt, however, it 

 can also be furthered by the practice of delaying the delivery of checks 

 and money orders until most of their face value has been exhausted 

 in credit. As mail distributor for the community, Shonto's trader 

 always has first notice of the arrival of any income. In sorting the 

 mail for delivery (which is always done in the privacy of his own 

 living room) his first act is to take out all checks and money orders, 

 and determme the amounts thereof. Most of these are nowadays 

 mailed in window-type envelopes and are thus readily identifiable, 

 and face values can be read by squeezing the envelope at the sides so 

 that most of the check is visible through the window. Other letters 

 suspected of containing checks (e.g., letters written home by railroad 

 workers) are held to the light to ascertain their contents. 



The great majority of checks arriving in any given mail delivery 

 are certain to have been anticipated by the trader as a result of his 

 various sources of information, and their face value will have been 

 duly exhausted in credit. These can therefore be earmarked for im- 

 mediate distribution. Checks which arrive unexpectedly, on the other 

 hand, can be "lost" (i.e., set aside) until sufficient credit has been 

 allowed against them.^^ 



^ Only one Instance Is on record when Shonto's owner was caught completely off guard 

 by the arrival of a large sum of money In the community. A woman recipient of Aid to 

 Dependent Children opened her regular check envelope and discovered not one but three 

 checks for $85.00 each ; the two extras having been inserted to cover a period when 

 benefits were withheld by mistake. The trader was entirely unprepared for this develop- 

 ment, and realized that It was now too late to transform the windfall Into store profit 

 by any device other than old-fashioned high-pressure salesmanship. The result was an 

 extreme but not unheard-of example of trade Ingenuity. Since the crowded atmosphere 

 of the store Is seldom conducive to effective salesmanship, Shonto's owner solved the 

 problem by closing the store, giving as a pretext the fact that a meeting was going on 

 outside. He then secretly readmitted the woman, thereby locking her In and all other 

 customers out, and had over 2 hours In which to concentrate his salesmanship on her 

 without Interruption. Eventually he sold her a wagon, the full value of which came to 

 considerably more than the value of the two unencumbered checks. 



