tradicion revista fall 2012 - LPD Press & Rio Grande Books

Fig. 17. Two young women astride their horse. The woman at the back seems not to mind Arthur Goss with his camera raised. She smiles and
is relaxed. HHUA: 03830019
Birthing and raising children
was difficult during these desperate
times. Feeding their families remained
a primary concern for the
women. By the 1880s men were either
in prison or deprived of their
rifles for hunting. Encroaching settlers
hunted out wild game. During
the years from 1855 to 1874 women
had collected some rations at nearby
Fort Stanton, but they always
went there reluctantly, fearing that
they might be imprisoned or even
killed. In 1870 the government had
provided Mescalero women with
thousands of yards of cloth along
with needles, pins, and thread which
the women quickly fashioned into
clothing for their families. Women
raised a little corn, but when they
used it to brew tútibai (a weak corn
beer), the army put a stop to it. Fearing
that women might use rations of
corn for brewing, they issued them
less nutritious flour instead. The
government had no formal treaty
obligation to provide rations but
promised regular rations when the
hungry Mescaleros agreed to stay
on the reservation in 1874. Mescalero
women were to receive weekly
rations of beef, flour, coffee, sugar,
baking powder, as well as clothing,
cooking utensils, and blankets. By
1890 the women would gather Sunday
mornings at the commissary at
Mescalero. Cattle were brought in
from Las Cruces, butchered, and
given out. At least the beef was fresh
most of the time and the women
gradually accepted it as a substitute
for the wild venison they had
butchered themselves and brought
home from the hunt. The women
continued to gather wild plants and
to grow some crops. 20
Women already knew that refusing
to obey the agent might be
TRADICIÓN October 2012 77