FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — A bent and dusty “Elden Pueblo Ruins” sign was swapped out for a shiny new “Elden Pueblo Heritage Site” sign on U.S. Highway 89 in east Flagstaff Feb. 29, pointing to the ancient archaeological site of the Sinagua people.
Members from the Hopi and Navajo tribes, U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and National Park Service (NPS) came together to witness the sign change, which has been years in the making. All shared a common belief: Elden Pueblo is not a “ruin.”
“This thing is a big thing, it matters,” Hopi tribal member Marilyn Fredericks shared with the group. “This place is not a ruin.”
Fredericks lives on the Hopi reservation but is often in Flagstaff to babysit for her daughter, Coconino Forest Service Tribal Liaison Anna Masayesva. She frequently brings her granddaughter to Elden Pueblo, which in Hopi is called Pasiwvi, meaning gathering place.
“I came here as a child, my father brought me here and taught me the story about this place and the place name…and I brought my children here and now I’m bringing my granddaughter,” Fredericks said.
Fredericks said her granddaughter can already identify the different spaces in the 60-room pueblo, including its community room, plaza, kiva and dance area. Stone remnants of the structures remain in place. The Northern Sinagua people occupied Mt. Elden Pueblo from A.D. 1070 to 1275.
Nearby Walnut Canyon and Wupatki national monuments are also remnants from the Northern Sinagua, while the Southern Sinagua people are thought to have occupied what are now national monuments in the Verde Valley, including Tuzigoot, Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well.
Many modern Hopi cultures believe the Sinagua are their ancestors, and that ‘ruin,’ is a disrespectful term.
“A ‘ruin’ in the dictionary says it’s something that’s decaying or disintegrating and is dead, but we know that (Pasiwvi) is an ancestral village and it’s still alive, and we spiritually make our offerings and our visits here to remember our ancestors,” Fredericks said.
NPS volunteer Diana Henry had been advocating with Fredericks and her daughter to replace the sign that called Elden Pueblo a ruin.
“It was Marilyn who first really alerted me to the use of that word and how it wasn’t the correct word to use,” Henry said. “For many years we wanted to just take some brown paint and paint it over.”
The number one project on the Coconino National Forest’s new cultural program’s list has been the sign, Henry said.
“It’s taken several years, and many of the great archaeologists that are very well known in town, when I mentioned it to them they were like, “Oh Diana, it’s hard to make the change, this is in books, etcetera,’’ Henry said. “So I think that issue needs to be addressed because change is difficult but change is important, we need to move forward.”
Henry believes the change to more culturally respectful language at sites is happening, albeit slowly. She said she received a one-page document of preferred Indigenous terminology for her recent training with the park service. Elden Pueblo Program Manager Lisa Deem said that smaller signs within Elden Pueblo, as well as audio and written materials have already transitioned to call it a heritage site instead of ruins.
Education has been key for Coconino National Forest sites like Elden Pueblo, she said.
“We have been doing education programs for most every kid that goes to class here in 3rd, 4th and 5th grade for over 30 years,” Deem said. “We get a lot of parents that want to chaperone their children because ‘I came here as a child too,’ and they want to see their children having the same experience that they had. This reduces vandalism — we have some of the lowest vandalism rates of Coconino National Forest with the highest density of archaeological sites. So we feel this really shows that outreach, that education (helps people realize) this is a part of your home, this is a part of where we are. So these signs are creating more of that home.”
Deem recalls giving a school group a tour one spring at Elden Pueblo when a Hopi woman was there to pay her respects and found that they were teaching the children about the Sinagua.
“She was very overwhelmed, almost to tears, and she sang them a blessing song,” Deem said. “Nobody walked away from that experience without feeling something, without feeling a connection…We talk about the people of the past, but they are all still here.”
Elden Pueblo was first studied in 1926 by archaeologist Jesse Walter Fewkes. He tried to turn the area into a national monument, but the plans fell through, according to a cultural overview of the site on the U.S. Forest Service website.
The Forest Service considered the area around Elden Pueblo for a land exchange in 1978, however, testing found much of the pueblo intact, and determined it should be preserved as a cultural heritage site instead.
In 1980, it was decided to interpret Elden Pueblo through public archaeology where visitors and students could gain an understanding of archaeology and Hopi traditions while developing a sense of stewardship for cultural, historical and natural resources on public lands.
Not your trash can
While the Forest Service took down the old sign and put up the new one, the group helped pick up the trash that had accumulated around the area from the highway, once again reiterating the fact that Elden Pueblo is not a “ruin.”
“The word ruin means its broken down, it means forgotten, you know, its garbage – throw it in the garbage,” said Kvann Smith, Diné. “That word is a misnomer to locations like this, because these are active, living spaces of ancestors.”
Smith was there with her dog, Buddy Red Bow, and said she comes to Elden Pueblo to walk and talk to the ancestors nearly every day.
“This is a sacred place for a lot of us and the fact that the white people are acknowledging it, its about damn time,” she said.
Henry thinks the new sign will also draw in more visitors to the site, which is free to the public.
“One of the things I think is that by having a heritage site, there are going to be more people that are going to stop — ‘ruins’ is not an appealing word,” she said.
Henry was happy with the new sign, but hopes they will add another one underneath, with the Hopi term for the site.
Fredericks took photos of the sign change, saying the new terminology will definitely help the perception of the pueblo people.
“The ancestral Puebloans built a community here, had families, raised children, they made their homes, they built their kivas, they farmed, they had their store houses, and they thrived here,” Fredericks said. “And when they were given a sign here to move on as groups or as a family, they left things here as is because they intended to return.”
Fredericks said puebloans intended to return to all of the ancestral sites in the southwest.
“And so it’s not a ruin because spiritually the Hopi people believe that they are still here, and so in a spiritual sense we remember these places in our ceremonies, in our songs, in our hearts and in pictographs, petroglyphs,” she said. “We have to keep these places warm and alive because we are awaiting their return and so we make our pilgrimages here to deposit our prayer feathers, say our prayers and to acknowledge their presence.”
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — A bent and dusty “Elden Pueblo Ruins” sign was swapped out for a shiny new “Elden Pueblo Heritage Site” sign on U.S. Highway 89 in east Flagstaff Feb. 29, pointing to the ancient archaeological site of the Sinagua people.
Members from the Hopi and Navajo tribes, U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and National Park Service (NPS) came together to witness the sign change, which has been years in the making. All shared a common belief: Elden Pueblo is not a “ruin.”
“This thing is a big thing, it matters,” Hopi tribal member Marilyn Fredericks shared with the group. “This place is not a ruin.”
Fredericks lives on the Hopi reservation but is often in Flagstaff to babysit for her daughter, Coconino Forest Service Tribal Liaison Anna Masayesva. She frequently brings her granddaughter to Elden Pueblo, which in Hopi is called Pasiwvi, meaning gathering place.
“I came here as a child, my father brought me here and taught me the story about this place and the place name…and I brought my children here and now I’m bringing my granddaughter,” Fredericks said.
Fredericks said her granddaughter can already identify the different spaces in the 60-room pueblo, including its community room, plaza, kiva and dance area. Stone remnants of the structures remain in place. The Northern Sinagua people occupied Mt. Elden Pueblo from A.D. 1070 to 1275.
Nearby Walnut Canyon and Wupatki national monuments are also remnants from the Northern Sinagua, while the Southern Sinagua people are thought to have occupied what are now national monuments in the Verde Valley, including Tuzigoot, Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well.
Many modern Hopi cultures believe the Sinagua are their ancestors, and that ‘ruin,’ is a disrespectful term.
“A ‘ruin’ in the dictionary says it’s something that’s decaying or disintegrating and is dead, but we know that (Pasiwvi) is an ancestral village and it’s still alive, and we spiritually make our offerings and our visits here to remember our ancestors,” Fredericks said.
NPS volunteer Diana Henry had been advocating with Fredericks and her daughter to replace the sign that called Elden Pueblo a ruin.
“It was Marilyn who first really alerted me to the use of that word and how it wasn’t the correct word to use,” Henry said. “For many years we wanted to just take some brown paint and paint it over.”
The number one project on the Coconino National Forest’s new cultural program’s list has been the sign, Henry said.
“It’s taken several years, and many of the great archaeologists that are very well known in town, when I mentioned it to them they were like, “Oh Diana, it’s hard to make the change, this is in books, etcetera,’’ Henry said. “So I think that issue needs to be addressed because change is difficult but change is important, we need to move forward.”
Henry believes the change to more culturally respectful language at sites is happening, albeit slowly. She said she received a one-page document of preferred Indigenous terminology for her recent training with the park service. Elden Pueblo Program Manager Lisa Deem said that smaller signs within Elden Pueblo, as well as audio and written materials have already transitioned to call it a heritage site instead of ruins.
Education has been key for Coconino National Forest sites like Elden Pueblo, she said.
“We have been doing education programs for most every kid that goes to class here in 3rd, 4th and 5th grade for over 30 years,” Deem said. “We get a lot of parents that want to chaperone their children because ‘I came here as a child too,’ and they want to see their children having the same experience that they had. This reduces vandalism — we have some of the lowest vandalism rates of Coconino National Forest with the highest density of archaeological sites. So we feel this really shows that outreach, that education (helps people realize) this is a part of your home, this is a part of where we are. So these signs are creating more of that home.”
Deem recalls giving a school group a tour one spring at Elden Pueblo when a Hopi woman was there to pay her respects and found that they were teaching the children about the Sinagua.
“She was very overwhelmed, almost to tears, and she sang them a blessing song,” Deem said. “Nobody walked away from that experience without feeling something, without feeling a connection…We talk about the people of the past, but they are all still here.”
Elden Pueblo was first studied in 1926 by archaeologist Jesse Walter Fewkes. He tried to turn the area into a national monument, but the plans fell through, according to a cultural overview of the site on the U.S. Forest Service website.
The Forest Service considered the area around Elden Pueblo for a land exchange in 1978, however, testing found much of the pueblo intact, and determined it should be preserved as a cultural heritage site instead.
In 1980, it was decided to interpret Elden Pueblo through public archaeology where visitors and students could gain an understanding of archaeology and Hopi traditions while developing a sense of stewardship for cultural, historical and natural resources on public lands.
Not your trash can
While the Forest Service took down the old sign and put up the new one, the group helped pick up the trash that had accumulated around the area from the highway, once again reiterating the fact that Elden Pueblo is not a “ruin.”
“The word ruin means its broken down, it means forgotten, you know, its garbage – throw it in the garbage,” said Kvann Smith, Diné. “That word is a misnomer to locations like this, because these are active, living spaces of ancestors.”
Smith was there with her dog, Buddy Red Bow, and said she comes to Elden Pueblo to walk and talk to the ancestors nearly every day.
“This is a sacred place for a lot of us and the fact that the white people are acknowledging it, its about damn time,” she said.
Henry thinks the new sign will also draw in more visitors to the site, which is free to the public.
“One of the things I think is that by having a heritage site, there are going to be more people that are going to stop — ‘ruins’ is not an appealing word,” she said.
Henry was happy with the new sign, but hopes they will add another one underneath, with the Hopi term for the site.
Fredericks took photos of the sign change, saying the new terminology will definitely help the perception of the pueblo people.
“The ancestral Puebloans built a community here, had families, raised children, they made their homes, they built their kivas, they farmed, they had their store houses, and they thrived here,” Fredericks said. “And when they were given a sign here to move on as groups or as a family, they left things here as is because they intended to return.”
Fredericks said puebloans intended to return to all of the ancestral sites in the southwest.
“And so it’s not a ruin because spiritually the Hopi people believe that they are still here, and so in a spiritual sense we remember these places in our ceremonies, in our songs, in our hearts and in pictographs, petroglyphs,” she said. “We have to keep these places warm and alive because we are awaiting their return and so we make our pilgrimages here to deposit our prayer feathers, say our prayers and to acknowledge their presence.”