https://voicesofignacio.cvlcollections.org/files/original/0a0923b51a97ffe89e05da47dc0ea3e8.pdf 93d4ec610dadd4a746e54a36c2874330 PDF Text Text ~ ~ 'I ~ ~ ,, ' } 1 ) l ) 1 1 ) ) } ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) SUNSHINE (Burch) SMITH (TAV-NEE-JA-GET) Sunshine was born on October 20, 1916. Sunshine's parents loaded her and her luggage into their buggy and drove slowly to the railway station south of Ignacio. She was very excited and a little frightened to be going so far from home. Haskell Institute, a secondary school for Indian children was located in Lawrence, Kansas. With the help of the B .I.A. superintendent, Sunshine was enrolled at Haskell. She rode the train to Alamosa and in the evening boarded a Union Pacific Pullman for Kansas. After supper a porter approached her and said, "Little girl, your berth is ready." Sunshine slept, occasionally awakened by the roar of passing trains and the screeching of brakes as the train stopped in small plains towns. In the early morning hours, the porter came to her berth and said, "Little girl we're almost there." Sunshine dressed quickly and in a few minutes the train stopped and let her off. She was greeted by two girls from Haskell who told her they were to be her big sisters until she was settled in the new school. Haskell was a wonderful place. There were Indian students there from dozens of tribes all over the country. There were Senecas, Otoes, Pottawatomies, Pawnees, Creeks, Papagos and many more. Sunshine enjoyed the school band and the football team (which beat the University of Kansas) and especially enjoyed the "Indian Club." The club was intended to preserve Indian history and culture. It produced pageants depicting Tribal history for fairs and other public events. Sunshine says Fritz Box was there and was a member of a band called the "Night Hawks". Sunshine worked part time in a hospital in Lawrence and considered going on to nursing school. One of the nurses in the hospital took such a liking to Sunshine that she even offered to pay her way through nurses training in Independence, Missouri. Sunshine's parents, however, had other ideas. They decided she had been far away from home long enough. She spent the summer at home and after considerable thought, decided to go to college at the University of New Mexico. ) J _) _) ...) ..J J J J J J ...) J J J ...J ....J ...) Sunshine took many courses in Home Economics and Art, but the course she enjoyed most was probably horseback riding. She had to act a little inexperienced to get into the course, but the truth was Sunshine had ridden horses all her life and loved it. As a child she had ridden a horse to school in good weather and bad. The Ignacio School had a stable where the horses could eat their oats and rest for the ride home. By the time school was out both students and horses were "feeling their oats". Sunshine recalls, "We often raced our horses all the way home." Her love for horses and riding was a natural outgrowth of her family's race horse ventures. John Burch owned several race horses, hired men to train them, entered them at Cortez, Farmington, Montrose and Monte Vista and made good money at it. His best horse was called Bumblebee. Sunshine remembers crying to ride Bumblebee at the age of 8 or 9. Except for learning to jump horses over fences and hedges, the horseback riding course at the university served mainly as recreation. In the summers, Sunshine earned money working in the Ed C. Taylor Hospital in Ignacio. Later she worked at the hospital at Towaoc. Francis Buck was the secretary for Superintendent Mcspadden. Whenever he would come to Towaoc, Francis came, too, and she and Sunshine would have a good visit. Sunshine went to Indian School (Ute 1 55 �vocational) and was Assistant Matron to small Navajo girls. She then went back to Business School at Haskell. After graduation in the early 1940's Sunshine moved to Muncie, Indiana, and worked for the Owens-Illinois Glass Co. which made land mines. She made friends with a group of ladies who began talking about joining the W.A.C.'s. Finally, they talked themselves into joining. Basic training at Ft. Des Moines, Iowa, was in the heat of mid-summer. It included K.P. duty and drill on a blistering parade ground. After basic training Sunshine was given the blitz courses for surgical technician. From there she was stationed at a hospital on Staten Island, New York. She well remembers the damp cold of that winter. P.O.W.'s were imprisoned in a nearby compound. "Every morning one of the prisoners was sent into our barracks to build our morning fire." Sunshine worked a while at a hospital in Utica, New York, and then was sent back to Staten Island for convoy duty. This was a 24 hour duty to receive the sick and wounded who were arriving back in the U.S. Some of these man had been involved in the European war for years. "Many of them cried when they got off the ships, they were so glad to be back in their own country. Some would ask to be taken off the stretchers so they could kiss the ground. We would get them settled in the hospital and then allow them one free phone call to their folks. It was all a very emotional and touching experience." After this Sunshine was given training in occupational therapy, the field in which she worked until she was discharged in 1945. By then she had reached the rank of T-4, Technical Sergeant. Sunshine was very happy to return to Ignacio. "The thing I missed the most was the mountains.'' She worked for a while at the girl's dorm and while there became acquainted with a fellow doing construction work and painting on the campus. Sunshine and Diamond Smith were married and soon afterward move to California, but not just to California - to Hollywood. They lived in Hollywood Hills overlooking the whole beautiful metro area of Los Angeles. She wouldn't mind living there again if it were as clean and uncrowded as it was then. In 1947 sunshine's only child Gayla was born. They lived in San Diego and in Bullhead City, Arizona, for a while before coming back to Ignacio. In 1950 Sunshine was elected to the Tribal Council. II was in interesting transitional period for the tribe. During the preceding decades the BIA superintendents had managed the affairs of the tribe in a paternalistic way, expecting the tribal council to act merely as "yes" men. About this time the council changed this. They began meeting separately rather than under the watchful eye of the BIA. Soon they began to act independently on all matters related to tribal policy and welfare. Sometime during 195254 the Southern Ute Tribe won their land claim case and was awarded a very large sum of money. It became the job of Sunshine, Eddie Box, Fritz Box, Jack Frost, Julius Cloud, Sam Burch and others of that period to create a program for administering the money. Of all the work required during those years it's obvious Sunshine is most proud of one idea she put forth. It was her idea to set up a trust fund for each Ute child. The youth in the tribe are still benefitting from her foresight. Sunshine is bilingual, and an inspiration to many. She was a dancer and still dances occasionally. Sunshine has worked for the Tribe all her life and is still very active. When 156 �""'\ "") ~ } J ' 'J J ) l ,l } ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) J J .J .J ...J J she was younger, she did beading and made dancing costumes for her grandchildren. She has had Tao Chi training. "Diamond was a good baker," she said, and they owned the "Cornbread Feather Cafe" in Ignacio during the oil boom. She's seen lots of changes. She said, "At one time there were few buildings and now it's so different". Ignacio had "out houses" and no sewers. She also said the Tribe developed it over the years and now it's hard to find an outhouse. She got electricity in 1959. Sunshine stated it "brightened up the place." She said running water in the house was "something, because before we had to carry it in." When asked about the old days, Sunshine says there were more farmers and more livestock in the country. More people grew wheat and oats and other crops, and neighbors helped one another. She remembers fondly their neighbors - the Washingtons, Joneses, Stones, Holinsons and others. "My father would help them with their harvesting and then they would come help him with his. We didn't think of our neighbors as Anglos or Indians, just as people. We had no trouble and we were happy." The greatest improvement in the area since the 1920's according to Sunshine has been the roads. Pavement and graveling has made a great difference in convenience. However, one old time means of travel she misses is the sled trips to town in the winter. The whole family would bundle up in coats and blankets and go into town for shopping. She recalls a few differences in the town. Practically the whole block where the city hall and the Texaco station are today was a corral and hitching area for horses and buggies. A meat market stood where the Shell station is and the old Post Office was located where the Phillips now live. Diamond died in December, 1991 . Sunshine now lives with her grandson. She has 5 grandchildren and they all lived with her while attending high school. She has served on the many tribal committees. Some include the Cultural Board, Health Board, Sunshine tells her grandchildren "you don't know how easy you have it". She told them she had to bring in wood and do lots of chores that don't have to be done today. Sunshine is very active today. Besides serving in various capacities of the Tribe, including the Constitution, the Ute Dictionary, and the Committee of Elders, she joins the other seniors in Eldercize and travels often. She is a pleasure to be around . Started by Shelby Smith (October, 1974) Ended by Karen McKay-Wright _) ..) ._) .._) J J ..) ...J J ._j ...J J 157 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Shelby Smith Interviews Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource https://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-NC/1.0/?language=en Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 1973-1980 Subject The topic of the resource Ignacio; Southwest Colorado Description An account of the resource Collection of biographies, predominantly of residents from the Ignacio Senior Center, based on interviews conducted by Shelby Smith from approximately 1973 to 1980. The abridged interviews were originally published as individual entries in The Thoughtful Years newsletter, published by the Ignacio Senior Center, beginning in 1973. They were later published as a whole in Smith's book: Oral Histories of the Southern Pine River Valley, from which the original scans in this collection have been derived. Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smith, Shelby Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sunshine (Burch) Smith Biography Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 1974-10 Subject The topic of the resource Smith, Sunshine (Burch) Description An account of the resource Biography of Sunshine (Burch) Smith based on an interview conducted by Shelby Smith. Originally included in the October, 1974 issue of "The Thoughtful Years" newsletter published by the Ignacio Senior Center. Later included in the book "Oral Histories of the Southern Pine River Valley" by Shelby Smith. Spatial Coverage Spatial characteristics of the resource. Ignacio, Colorado; Southwest Colorado Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Sunshine (Burch) Extent The size or duration of the resource. 3 pages Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NKC/1.0/ Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smith, Shelby; McKay-Wright, Karen