Arizona republican., 1913-03-02
IF PIMA
 WATER TROUBLES
Coming of White Man has Brought Trouble for Sac aton Tribes; Acceptance of Pump Water Taken as End of Fight

In it's recent attack on the recla- nation service the house committee ! on expenditures in the interior de- ! partment touched upon the story of the Pima Indian tribe of Arizona <. the most tragic story on the dark page ot the history Of the white mans inhumanity to his red brother of the southwest.
 But now the friends of the recla- nation service are rushing forward to declare that of all the government bureaus the one under the direction of Frederick H. Newell is the only ! one in which this shamefully treated tribe has found a friend. All others 1 have been deaf 10 the Pimas' pas sionate cry for justice.
 The story of the Pimas is similar to the one told in Ramona, which made thousands of Americans weep when that novel was at the height of its popularity twenty years ago-the ! story of d peaceful people dwelling in d vale of contenment for centuries; I then the coming of the white man; the pathetic advances of the red men to be friends but brutal disregard 1 of the Indians right to life by the whites: finally the fertile valley [ turned into desert; and the once | happy tribe dispersed and broken up. wandering as nomads and beggars ! through the towns and cities of the southwest
 Pimas Best Indian Tribe I When white men discovered this i continent the Pimas were probably the most highly civilized of all the Indian tribes. They lived on d tract of several thousand acres of level valley land through which ran the | Gila river When the Spanard ca beza de Vaca discovered them in 1855 they had been irrigating this land from the Gila for centuries They were the only American Indian tribe ! economically independent. Being farmers pure and simple, they never went hungry The other Indians, hunters. were subject continually to the bitter famine described in Long fellows HiaWatha.
 When the Spanish missionaries wis ited the Pimas they became devout Christians. They also added sheep raising to their farming And they continued to thrive for three centuries more-until 1890. when the first white farmers came into the country smell- ing out fertile lands and stopping where they saw the garden of the Pimas made possible in that dry country by the precious water of the Gila.
 Then began the destruction of Sac aton. the Pima reservation. The whites went into the narrow valley above the Indians and tapped the river wherever they settled-first the Mormons at SolOmOnVille, then Gen tiles" at Florence and at other points. Bv 1905 Indian agents began warning the government what was going to happen, as colony after colony ot whites constructed their flimsy wing dams and extended their irrigation canals.
 Then Came Trouble
 The blow fell year or so later the first of seven years of drought The river failed the Pimas almost en- tirely: what water there was in the Gila was diverted to the farms of the whites farther up stream. For seven years the Indians planted their crops each spring after the freshet only to see them burn up by summer A bitter poverty fell upon them and they were driven out to beg for work many of them to become drunkards and Vagabonds
 It is the boast of the Pimas that their hands nave never been stained by the blood of white men. They are probably the only tribe which never fought against the whites. On the contrary, they gave shelter and pro tection to white refugees during the Apache and Navajo troubles anc furnished scouts to the American sol ders.
 It was the fate of this gentle peo- pie to receive the most scurVy ano contemptible treatment given to any Indians by white men, They pro- tested to Washington, and the gov ernment sent them rations instead oi the water they asked for. That was before the reclamation act was passed There was no law to protect them and so their protests fell on deal ears Their valley. which had beer green with wheat, corn, sorghum ano beans became a parched desolatior except for a narrow strip along the