Johnston] NAVAHO POPULATION 139 



belated efforts on the part of the officials to bring their estimates into 

 line with their own impressions of Navaho population growth. Thus, 

 for example, the official estimates jump from 18 to 21,000 between 

 1888 and 1889, and again from 23 to 27,000 between 1903 and 1904. 

 The figure of 22,455 reported in the 1910 census was widely regarded 

 as an undercount, but the absence of significant increases in the 

 population estimates of the subsequent 7 years is equally questionable. 



A figure of 40,000 for 1930 enjoys the support of the close agreement 

 between the Bureau of the Census and the Bureau of Indian Affairs 

 figures for that year. The figures given by the Bureau of Indian 

 Affairs for the years of the Second World War revealed a further 

 large upward adjustment, from 49,000 to about 60,000 between 1942 

 and 1944^6. Subsequent estimates suggest that the figures given 

 for 1940^2 were too low. The 1957 estimate shown in table 27 was 

 compiled by adding births and subtracting deaths reported since 1953 

 to the estimated Navaho population in 1953. The resultant figure 

 is an official estimate of the total Navaho population at midyear 1957. 



Assuming a population of 11,000 in 1870, the implied average an- 

 nual rate of increase between 1870 and 1957 is 2.33 percent — a truly 

 remarkable rate to have been sustained over so long a period. 



The 1961-62 estimate, finally, represents an adjusted count of 

 total Navaho population from IBM cards on which information from 

 the original Navajo Agency rolls was transcribed. This estimate 

 (93,377) yields practically the same average annual rate of increase 

 since 1870 — 2.34 percent. Similarly, it implies an average annual 

 increase of 2.56 percent since 1950, assuming the Navajo Agency esti- 

 mate of 69,167 in 1950. It is therefore apparent that the Navaho 

 have experienced at least three generations of very rapid population 

 growth, and that their rate of increase has itself been rising in the 

 recent past. 



A COMPAEATIVE ANALYSIS OF SELECTED DATA ON 

 THE DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS OF THE 

 NAVAHO POPULATION 



The chief purpose of the following is to elucidate the apparent limi- 

 tations or defects in the available data on the demographic character- 

 istics of the Navaho population, in order to indicate corresponding 

 defects among the major sources of this information. It is hoped 

 that this will also shed light on the problems of data collection that are 

 revealed by these limitations, and on the utility of alternative pro- 

 cedures designed to overcome these problems. 



SELECTED AGE DISTRIBUTIONS 



Summary characteristics of 25 Navaho age distributions, together 

 with those of 6 additional distributions for other Indian populations, 

 are presented in table 28. 



