The Kwahadi organization is the story of a journey created through the efforts of hundreds of youth and their families, a few giants among men who inspired us, and countless friends across America who have been the wind beneath our wings.  The following is only a reflection of the highlights of the Kwahadi journey. There have been so many good and great people who helped along the way and made it all possible. Only a few are named here, but all are human treasures and heroes. We begin by understanding more about some of the giants.

    Special thanks to former Head Chief, Guy Giersch (1968), for contributing to the ideas of this journey of memories and for helping us to understand about the origins of the notion of youth doing Indian crafts and dancing.

    To tell the story of the Kwahadis is an illusive task. Thousands of people within and without the organization have each experienced a piece of the Kwahadi story as it passed by. There is not one story, but a matrix of thousands of stories. My best hope is that the story which follows can provide a framework into which alumni and friends can add their own memories and tales and by which others can learn about the story of these amazing youth.

The Origins of the Use of Indian Lore in Scouting

    Indian Lore was not a part of the original Scouting program. There are several people who inspired the use of Indian crafts and dancing in the Boy Scouts of America. Ernest Thompson Seton had used concepts of native crafts and dance as the core of his Woodcraft Indians program for youth.  He later merged the Woodcraft Indians into the new Boy Scouts of America in 1910. He became the first President of the new Boy Scout organization. He wrote the first Handbook for Boys for the Boy Scouts and entrenched Indian crafts and culture into the scouting program. After his term with scouting, he focused again on Woodcraft, believing that American scouting was staying too focused on Baden Powell’s military model of scouting. He found the use of native ways more effective as a program to build better men. Woodcraft still thrives as a program for youth in eastern Europe.

    Ralph Hubbard acquired immense knowledge of native ways and had many native friends help him with scout performances and the training of boys. He too saw the benefits of native ways on humanizing and developing boys into men. Hubbard was a major influence on the early scouting program all across America and influenced thousands of scouts and leaders. Enthusiasts for “traditional scouting” continue to focus on older ways as scouting itself evolves over time in response to pressures and trends.

   Ben Hunt (March 13, 1888 – March 30, 1970) contributed greatly to the use of Indian Lore in Scouting. He was born in Greenfield, WI in a. 1900, and he grew up in a log cabin. He dropped out of high school to become a lithographic engraver (graphics designer).  He moved to Hales, Corner, WI with his wife, Laura, in 1920. In 1924 Ben, his father-in-law, and his brother, Edwin C. Hunt, built a 16’ x 28’ log cabin behind his home. The cabin was the subject of his first article, “How We Built Our Log Cabin” in 1924. His cabin became famous as his “crafting cabin” in his later writings!

    In the late 1930s Hunt began to study the work of Native American artists. He met with artists and leaders such as Nick Black Elk, Frank Smart (Chief Gogeoweosh), and Buck Burshears. Hunt shared his knowledge of “Indian Lore” with Milwaukee’s boy scout leaders. In 1942 he started writing articles for Boys’ Life, a national monthly publication of the Boy Scouts of America. He became a regular member of the magazine staff, ultimately writing over 1000 articles (3 or 4 per issue). (Wikipedia)    

    His craft articles were under the name, “Lone Wolf.” His craft and “how to” articles in Boys’ Life were mailed into millions of American homes and were viewed by millions of young men every month! He put a collection of his craft articles together into a book, The Golden Book of Indian Crafts and Lore, which was first published in 1954 and continues to be available to this day!

     Ben wrote many books: Indian and Camp Handicraft with Fred Schmidt in 1938, The Flat Bow with John Metz in 1939, How to Build and Furnish a Log Cabin in 1939, Rustic Construction in 1939, Indiancraft in 1942, Ben Hunt’s Big Book of Whittling in 1944, Ben Hunt’s Whittling Book in 1944, More Ben Hunt Whittlings in 1947, Building a Log Cabin in 1947, American Indian Beadwork with Buck Burshears in 1951, Indian Silversmithing in 1952, Kachina Dolls in 1957, The Golden Book of Crafts and Hobbies in 1957, Whittling with Ben Hunt in 1959, Let’s Whittle in 1962, Crafts and Hobbies in 1964, Comment Vivre an Indian with Robert Doniol in 1967, Contemporary Carving and Whittling in 1967, Ben Hunt’s Big Indiancraft Book in 1969,   After his passing his work continued to be published: The Complete How-to Book of Indian Crafts and Lore, 1974, and American Indian Survival Skills in 1991   He served on the staff of the National Boy Scout Jamboree in 1950, 1954, 1957, and 1960.

    Hunt’s articles were written for boys and beginners in arts and crafts.   Like Thomas Mails, he researched, wrote, and illustrated his own books. His articles and books made beading, feather work, dancing, and crafting look like fun with his easy to read stories and colorful illustrations!  He stirred the interest of millions of Scouts in native crafts, dances, and ways. Although some grew up to become great scholars and book writers on various native topics, many and probably most got their start experiencing the love and enthusiasm Hunt displayed for his crafts!

    Seton and Hubbard greatly advanced the national role of Indian Lore in Scouting, but Ben Hunt was a quiet and inspirational voice that spoke every month to millions of Scouts, and continued to do so for decades!

   Scouting has served youth in thousands of scout troops all across America for over 100 years!  It is the power tool for families to provide exciting programs of adventure, education, and training in character and leadership. The Scout Oath and Law have remained the same since the beginning and are the core principles of successful adults and the scouting program. The use in Scouting of native crafts and skills has greatly attracted youth to the adventures of Scouting.        

The Emergence of the Kwahadi Dancers

The Giants Upon Who’s Shoulders the Kwahadis Stand

 

Dr. Ralph Hubbard, A Man as Big as the West!

June 22, 1885 – November 14, 1984)

 

. Among the many young men influenced by Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show                                           and Horace Greeley's famous words, "Go west young man, go west!", was Ralph Hubbard. He was the son of famous turn-of-the-century publisher, arts and crafts movement leader, and conservative, Elbert Hubbard.  In 1902 Ralph traveled with his six-foot tall grandmother, Hinkle, to Medora, South Dakota to visit the homestead of two of his uncles, Elmer and George Crawford, near Meagher, Montana.  Ralph became enchanted with the people of the western lands. After Hubbard finished high school, he chose to give up a comfortable life in the publishing and arts and crafts businesses with his father.  He headed west to live with Elmer Crawford and to pursue his interests in the ways of cowboys and Indians. In 1908 he homesteaded in Mud Creek, Montana close to his uncle Elmer’s ranch. He moved to Boulder, Colorado in 1910 to study for his master’s degree in biology which he finished in 1913. 

    While living in Boulder, he became friends with members of the Lamson family. They lived in Boulder and had a large ranch nearby in Elbert County. Ralph loved the ranch and its location with timberland and grazing pastures. He began to dream of owning the ranch. 

    In the summers before WWI, he returned east to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York where he earned his PhD. In the summer of 1914, his father, Elbert, was on his way to talk to Kaiser Wilhelm, leader of Germany, thinking he might help avert WWI.  He sailed aboard the Lusitania which was unfortunately sunk by a German submarine on May 7, 1915.  In 1916 Ralph took his small inheritance from the father’s estate and bought the Lamson ranch, renaming it the Ten Sleep Ranch. In 1917 he entered service in WWI as an ambulance driver in France. After the war during the 1920’s, he brought Native American friends to dance at the elegant Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs.  

     Raised with skills and as a hard worker, he immersed himself in the culture of the west. He began as a ranch hand, started his own homestead, built his own home and furniture, and later became owner of the Ten Sleep. He also taught science at both the high school and college levels in Boulder, Colorado.  

    Hubbard, made friends easily among the people of the west. He organized dance performances by native friends for many private and public events. He became a popular speaker on Indian topics. The Boy Scouts of America began in 1910, and he became popular almost immediately as a speaker, trainer, and consultant. After his service in WWI, he began to host scouts at his Ten Sleep Ranch. Scouts would travel west on the railroad, and he would meet them at the train station in Boulder, Colorado. He would then load them and their gear on horses and ride to the Ten Sleep Ranch! At the ranch the scouts would learn archery, crafts, dancing, outdoor skills, horsemanship, and many of the skills of cowboys and Indians! Unfortunately, Hubbard lost the ranch due to unpaid taxes during the Depression.

   Hubbard was dedicated to the Boy Scout program. Along with a good friend from Santa Clara Pueblo, Ben Naranjo, Hubbard conducted camps outside of major cities all across America to promote scouting. invited youth to come out and experience Scouting through camping, storytelling, and cowboy and Indian skills.  He organized performances with Indian friends and scouts all across America, including a big show on May 17 and 18, 1940 for the Greater New York Council Scout-O-Rama with 100 Scouts dancing in Madison Square Garden.  He worked directly with Carl Parlasca, Director of Camp Big Timber near Elgin, Illinois, to develop and provide wardrobe for the famous “Song of Hiawatha Pageant” which was produced annually from 1927 through 1979.

     Hubbard was chosen to lead the national contingent from Boulder, CO of 100 boys (all of whom were 18 years old!) to London, England to the first World Scout Jamboree in 1920. He trained the scouts to dance, provided needed regalia and tipis, and taught them how to make much of their own dress. They traveled via train with all of the gear including tipi poles to New York and boarded a ship to England. Upon arrival they set up their Indian Village and presented regular performances (still portrayed in old videos from the jamboree on U- tube). Many European boys had read stories about American Indians, and the Indian Village proved enormously popular! (Indian lore programs were subsequently made a part of jamboree programs.)

    He also made sure the scouts had many other adventures and learning experiences around England! They performed for King Albert and the Royal Family, and also for the Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium. He led a similar contingent to the 1924 Jamboree in Copenhagen, Denmark! The shows were very popular at the jamborees! In 1927, Hubbard was called upon to write the “American Indian Craft” section of the 1927 edition of the Handbook for Boys (3^rd Boy Scout Handbook). He developed the Indian program at the first American Boy Scout Jamboree in the United States in 1937 in Washington, D. C. 

    Ralph spent much of his later life in Medora, South Dakota where he built the Museum of West and also gave a museum to the Sioux people near Wounded Knee.   The cabin he built in the old way is still there in the shadow of the new American Inn Motel.  During the Depression years he wrote two successful novels for boys: Queer Person (published 1931) told the story of a handicapped Indian youth and the challenges he faced among his own people. His second book was Wolf’s Song (1935). Both can occasionally be found.  

    (An interesting note: Charles Eagle Plume (Eagle Plumes’ Trading Post north of Denver) was inspired by Ralph Hubbard who was one of his high school teachers. He became a huge success on the national speaker’s circuit, presented hundreds of lectures and dance demonstrations around America, and was one of the leading lecturers on Native American topics. His story is recorded in “Joy, The Life of Charles Eagle Plume: An American Legend,” Henry F. Pedersen, 1991.)

    Hubbard’s, along with scouting’s first President, Ernest Thompson Seton, (“The Chief: Ernest Thompson Seton and the Changing West”, Allen Anderson, 1987) influenced scouting greatly to incorporate into the scouting program the arts, crafts, and skills of Native American people. 

      Ralph Hubbard was a phenomenal man of great achievement. His amazing life story is recorded in “A Man as Big as The West”, a biography by Nellie Yost published in 1979.  The roots of the beginnings of the Kwahadi program are easily traced back to Hubbard through our first teacher, Dr. Charles Colgate.

Dr. Charles Colgate (Passed 1977) and Ralph Irelan (1898-1987)

     Among the many counselors Hubbard employed to help him with his summer scout camp programs at the Ten Sleep Ranch was Charles E. Colgate of St. Louis, Missouri.  Colgate was fascinated by the Indian culture he learned from Hubbard.  Colgate later taught dancing and crafts to scouts in the Webster Grove, Missouri area from 1928 through 1942. Inspired by Hubbard, Colgate became a forensic doctor.  During World War II he served as a navy Lieutenant with the Veterans Administration and was transferred to Amarillo, TX.

    In Amarillo Colgate was recruited by Ralph Irelan, Scoutmaster of Troop 9, in the fall of 1944 to became an assistant Scoutmaster for the Senior Patrol of Troop 9. At this point the nascent tip of a grand tradition touched Amarillo and fell onto fertile ground in the form of Troop 9, BSA! The heritage of Hubbard was about to the transferred into the Senior Patrol via an inspired, informed, and talented agent, Dr. Charles E. Colgate, a fortuitous choice by Scoutmaster Ralph Irelan!

    In the fall of 1944 Troop 9 was beginning to prepare for the annual spring scout skills show. The competition event was held annually in Elwood Park in Amarillo. Troop 9 needed to win several competitions, one which was a skit presented at the campfire in the evening. As they thought about this, Dr. Colgate, the new advisor for the Senior Patrol, opened up his regalia case from his days of working at the Ten Sleep Ranch and with scouts in Missouri. Charles Schmidt, one of the original dancers, said, “We were all immediately hooked on the idea of doing Indian dancing after looking at the beautiful things in his suitcase!”

          The traditional competition for Troop 9 at the camporee was the troop sponsored by the Presbyterian church. Every contest at the spring skills show was important to win if Troop 9 was to be awarded first place! The troop worked hard through the winter months preparing for the various contests, including their dance for the campfire presentation. Dr. Colgate taught them how to build their regalia and how to do a dance which he called the “Sioux War Dance.”  They stretched a piece of old inner tube (scarce during the war) over a wooden nail keg and made a drum.

  The eight boys of the Senior Patrol danced at the Elwood Park Competition representing the Troop 9 in May, 1945. Walter Wolfram, another member of the troop had just turned 14 and had become a member of the Senior Patrol. The eight original boys did the dance and Walter was assigned to beat the drum.  The original eight dancers from the Senior Patrol were Ted Abrahamson, Henry Bates, Tom Fotheringham, Charles Schmidt, Jack Rogers, Jerry Abrahamson, Phillip Wolfram, and Carl Johnson with Walter Wolfram beating the drum.

    It was an intense time in the world. The D Day Invasion to free Europe had begun 11 months before with horrific loss of life. Germany had just surrendered on May 7 ending the European War, but the war in the Pacific continued. The bombing of Hiroshima, Japan was three months away in May of 1945 when the spring competition arrived.

    The troop had prepared well and entered the competition with confidence and determination. It was soon evident they were doing very well and had first place within their grasp! Unfortunately, as Walter Wolfram recalls, his drumstick broke during the dance presentation at the campfire!  He is confident the incident disrupted the dance and cost them a victory. Troop 9 took second place in the campfire competition and fell to second place in the overall competition behind the Presbyterian Church scout troop again!

    As far as we know, Irelan and Colgate intended for the boys of the Senior Patrol to perform only one time at the camporee, but then the telephone rang, and the Downtown Lion's Club wanted the boys to dance at their meeting.  A new drumstick was prepared and the dance was performed for the Lions. Then the phone rang again.  The Rotary Club wanted Ralph to bring the boys over to do the dance for them. Then the telephone rang again....and again.

    The team was saddened by the passing of one of the dancers, Jerry Abrahamson, the following winter. Short a dancer for the original eight-man routine taught by Dr. Colgate, Ralph Irelan stepped in as a performer until another scout could be trained.

    Dr. Colgate soon moved on. The original eight dancers were a very dedicated group, and their program began to attract other boys. Ralph Irelan stood by them and helped them build their new program. All of the dancers in 1940’s and early 1950’s look back fondly on those days of dancing and particularly on their beloved Scoutmaster, Ralph Irelan. Ralph was a devoted scouter who demanded excellence from his boys. Many will tell you he kept them out of jail and inspired them to become the men they became!

    Dr. Colgate’s time with Troop 9 was limited.  Ralph Irelan provided the continuing leadership for the Kwahadis from 1945 through the fade away in 1954, but he was adamant about the credit to be given to Colgate. Ralph’s words to the author: “Although Dr. Colgate left soon after it all began, I want history to show Colgate and Irelan as cofounders of the program. We each had our important roles.”    

   By the 1970’s at Christmas time the Kwahadis had a new tradition of traveling about presenting dances in the homes of friends, nursing homes, and retirement homes. Ralph and Ruby Irelan stilled lived in their house on Taylor street where early Kwahadis had decorated Ruby’s grass by painting tipis on it! Each Christmas the group would go to Ralph’s house. There wasn’t room for the group to come inside to dance, so they would dance on the front lawn in the cold of the night. Ralph and Ruby would come out on the porch, and Ruby always had cookies for the boys – her wonderful homemade chocolate chip cookies!

A Fortunate Moment in Time

    There is another interesting part of Ralph’s story. He was Scoutmaster of Troop 2230 in La Junta, Colorado in the 1920’s early 1930’s.  While he was Scoutmaster, the first Eagle Scout in Troop 2230 was earned by a young Scout named James Francis Burshears.

     Ralph was an engineer with Santa Fe Railroad, and he was transferred to Amarillo in 1930.    Ralph again became a Scoutmaster, this time for Troop 9 which met at the Jewish Temple in downtown Amarillo near his home. This led to many years in service to Troop 9 and eventually the events that led to the Kwahadi Dancers.

    Back in La Junta, no one was willing to take the Tr 2230 position as Scoutmaster after Ralph moved away, so James Burshears, the youth leader of the troop, took on the job of keeping their troop going in the absence of a willing adult volunteer.  As a boy, Burshears had an avid interest in archery competition, and frequently visited antique stores looking for old things with interesting stories. While attending college, he came home on weekends to serve the troop. He not only kept the troop going but stayed with the troop as their beloved, talented, inspirational, and famous scoutmaster throughout his life! The famous Koshare Dancers emerged under his leadership. Although they later built a world class Indian museum, they began dressing for dances in “Ma” Burshears backyard in a chicken coop!

    Some clerk or supervisor with Santa Fe Railroad made a decision to reassign Ralph to Amarillo. What if Ralph had not been transferred from La Junta? It seems without Ralph in Amarillo there would have been no invitation to Colgate, and the Kwahadis would never have existed. Troop 2230’s story would probably have been very different as well. Without the opportunity for young James Francis Burshears to step up as the unit leader, stay connected with the troop, and evolve into their inspiring life-long Scoutmaster, it is questionable if events would have transpired that created the Koshares!  Other groups inspired by these groups might never have existed either! Whatever or whoever caused Ralph’s transfer it certainly led to a fortunate moment in time! 

James Francis “Buck” Burshears

    There were many who contributed to the existence and growth of the Kwahadi program.  A major influence was the inspirational James Francis “Buck” Burshears, Scoutmaster of the famous Koshare Dancers of Troop 2230 of La Junta, Colorado. The Koshare dance program came to be, according to Buck, partly because of inspiration from Lester Griswold. Griswold was Scoutmaster of Troop 10 in Colorado Springs. The Troop 10 Dancers were inspired by Ralph Hubbard.

    Money was scarce during the Great Depression and funding for youth activities was a challenge.  Buck noticed that Troop 10 was earning money by dancing. He was impressed with the idea that his troop, like Troop 10, could earn money by doing shows. Buck supported the growth of a similar program in his own troop beginning in 1933. It began with his support for a group of boys who wanted to form an Indian club and blossomed under Buck’s amazing and inspiring leadership into Koshare Dancers! They opened their fine museum and performance center in 1949.  Buck and the Koshares had many interactions with Ralph Hubbard at the Ten Sleep Ranch and continued their connection with him until his passing in 1984.

     The Koshares were in their 11^th year and were soon to build their museum when the Kwahadi program struck its first drumbeat. Ralph took the early Kwahadis up to La Junta several times to meet Buck and the Koshares. The Troop 2230 folks were kind and willing to help teach them. The Koshares gave training sessions to the early Kwahadis and helped them learn some of their dance and craft skills in the late '40's.

     Their exciting performances and help inspired the Ralph Irelan’s Troop 9 scouts.  Books by scouters and researchers such as Ernest Thompson Seton, Ben Hunt, Buck Burshears, and Ralph Hubbard enriched the early-day Kwahadi program.  By the 1930’s and 1940’s many scouts had grown up with an interest in native ways, and many had become expert craftsmen and dancers. Scouters like Julian Salomon and Bernard Mason published advanced how-to books on crafts and dancing.  Native friends, other dancing groups, knowledgeable scouters, and other supporters down through the decades have contributed to the Kwahadi collection of folk art, stories, and artifacts

    The early day Kwahadis flourished under Ralph Irelan’s leadership. The Kwahadis became frequent performers at area events. Their membership doubled – then doubled again!  Ralph chartered a bus on several occasions to take them on performing trips such as the Martha Washington Celebration performance in Laredo, TX.  In 1952 Ralph led them to the National Scout Jamboree in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. About 40 members of the troop rode the train east, danced at the Jamboree, visited the nation’s capital, and had an adventure of a lifetime!

    It is interesting to note that the troop which was camped across from the Kwahadis’ at the jamboree was a contingent from Uvalde, TX.   A young scout named Bill Dillahunty was in the Uvalde group and remembers how he was inspired by the Kwahadis. He became involved in a new program in Uvalde, TX in 1955, the Sahawe Dancers, and has spent his life in active service to the youth helping them build their own great story and traditions! Another scouter, David Kandik, saw the Koshares when they performed in Lake Charles, Louisiana in 1956.   Inspired by the experience, he devoted over fifty years to helping the youth of Sulphur, LA become the famous Kossa Dancers.  His teams were active in the OA and won several national championships for their dancing The Kossa frequently toured with the Kwahadis from 1996 through 2011.  The youth of the Koshare, Kossa, Sahawe, and Kwahadi programs have shared adventures and developed friendships. All share the inspirational influence of Burshears. It is amazing how the stories of these groups, and no doubt many others, are linked together.

    The Kwahadi program was very active from 1944 until 1954. Ralph reported by 1954 interest had begun to fade as the original group aged and left for college, the military, and adult life. Membership declined and the group stopped rehearsing in 1954. A couple of the original group, the late Ted Abrahamson and Walter Wolfram tried to keep it going with some success. The old enthusiasm still ran strong in their blood, but the drums went silent for a while.

Jack Bryant

    Another scout troop, Troop 80, sponsored by the Elks Lodge in Amarillo, was in crisis and could not find an adult volunteer to be the new scoutmaster.  Jack Bryant was persuaded to take the job temporarily until a replacement could be found, a temporary position that lasted 30 years! The troop began to prosper in the late 1950’s under the leadership of their new scoutmaster. Jack was a charismatic man and a man of action. He was immensely admired by his scouts, parents, and the community. He was complimented as a “genuine scoutmaster!”   He took the troop to a higher level of challenging activity, including their own annual summer camp in Midnight Canyon near Questa, New Mexico.

  The Koshares had opened their museum and theater in 1949 and were living their “golden years” as Jack became Scoutmaster of Troop 80.  Jack took Troop 80 to see the Koshares perform and to spend the night in the Koshare Museum on their way to summer camp. Inspired by the experience, the troop made other trips to see the famous group. The Troop 80 Dancers soon emerged.  Of the 120 boys in Troop 80, 30 of the older Scouts had become enthusiastic dancers by 1960. These were the days of Joe Riggs, Jack Seeds, Rick Poppe, Joe Dickson, Steve Bryant, Tommy Sides and other great dancers and craftsmen. It was common then for every Kwahadi Chief to bead his own fully beaded vest! Jack had dedicated assistant leaders too, like Walter Skipworth and Welton Sides. Original Kwahadis, Walter Wolfram and Ted Abrahamson, were serving as assistant Scoutmasters and helping with the Troop 80 program.

     Ted Abrahamson and Walter Wolfram invited Ralph Irelan to come visit the troop’s dancers. Ralph was properly impressed, and he gave his blessings for the troop to become the new Kwahadis in 1960. He also became active and helped Troop 80 in the effort.  The Troop 80 Dancers became the Kwahadi Dancers, and soon the old Kwahadi dances and traditions from the Colgate and Ralph Irelan days merged with the traditions of the Troop 80 dancers. The Kwahadi Dancers and their story were given new life!

    Jack Bryant was an inspirational scouter who, like Ralph Irelan, helped boys become better men and brought his magic to the Kwahadis. It is interesting to note that Jack was a square dance caller and was used to singing in public. It was Jack who added the first use of songs to the Kwahadi show. The original dances were performed with a drum only! Jack not only sang, he was a great narrator for the show and provided his PA system.

    It is also interesting to note that Troop 80 sought the help of Troop 9 who had sold Christmas trees for many years.   Under the leadership of Jack and his strong team of adults, Troop 80 then built a phenomenally successful Christmas tree business. The troop leadership created a non-profit corporation, Eighty Scouts, Inc. They won the bid and purchased their tree lot property in a Sheriff’s Sale in 1965.   In 1966, Eighty Scouts authorized the construction of their own “Scout Hut” on the land. It opened in November of 1967 and was affectionately named the Jack Bryant Scouting Center in his honor! 

    The building of the troop hut had taken much of Jack’s and the troop’s time and had taken its toll on the Kwahadi program. The Kwahadis continued to rehearse on Sunday afternoons at the Elks Lodge, but they performed infrequently in 1965 and performed only one show in June of 1966 during the big push to build the building. Membership and interest had declined as the older group of the troop began graduating. In June of 1966, Jack opened up the Kwahadi program to allow scouts from other troops to join.  New ideas and energy flowed in from scouts who came to the Kwahadis from troops and area dance programs like the Shoshoni of Dumas, the Troop 58 Dancers of Dumas, the Kachina Dancers of Amarillo, and the Wa-apalonis of Canyon. The influx of enthusiastic new dancers helped the Kwahadis to again find new life.

   The Kwahadis performed in November of 1967 at the opening ceremony of the new scout building and began to call it “the Kiva.” That winter the Kwahadi OA members danced together at the Order of the Arrow Conclave at Buffalo Trails Scout Ranch. The conclave judges awarded them First Place in the dance team competition. The Regional Chief of the OA was Steve Napper, and his friend Glen Harrison was a dancer. Both indicated they came north to college in Canyon to associate with the Kwahadis. Both serve today on the Board of Trustees of Kwahadi Heritage!

     In 1968 Jack Bryant said he was tired. He had given every Sunday afternoon for years to the Kwahadis and he hadn’t seen the Dallas Cowboys play in years! He was still Scoutmaster of Troop 80 and President of Eighty Scouts, Inc. Board of Trustees, but he transferred the reins of the dance program to Bob Mack. Bob was a dedicated Troop 80 dad whose son, Joe, was a dancer. Explorer Post 80 was chartered under Eighty Scouts, Inc. to house the Kwahadi Dance program.

   A few months later in April of 1968 the Kwahadis performed their first ceremonial in the new building featuring all new “winter dances.” Summer shows, which had been held at Potter County Stadium in previous years were moved to the new building too.

Thomas E. Mails

 1920 – November 18, 2001

    Tom Mails was born in California. He grew up mesmerized by the tales his uncle told to him about the Ute Indians of Colorado and by the little stick figures his uncle would draw to illustrate his stories.  He grew up with an interest in Indian people and their ways. He began at a young age to search antique stores for old native things which could still be found. During WWII, Tom served as an officer for four years in the United States Coast Guard. After the war he attended the College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, California. He spent nine years as an architectural designer.

          Mr. Mails shared the story of how one night in his apartment he awoke to find all the lights on. Tom was a man of great clarity of thought and academic rigor, and he clearly remembered the presence of some sort of entity in his apartment who told him that he was destined to serve God. Afterwards the lights stayed on for some time before they faded away even though the switches were off. This strange, yet vividly remembered experience, led Tom to enroll in the Luther Theological Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota to become an ordained Lutheran minister. After graduating from the seminary in 1958, he served for eighteen years in three different congregations in Minnesota and California. He published 21 Bible study books.

    His spiritual awakening as a minister enhanced his insight and appreciation of the beauty and wonder of the Indian ways.  He carefully drew illustrations of the old cultural pieces he found or saw in museums and private collections, and he began to write his understandings about them. On one occasion in an antique shop a person from Doubleday and Company noticed his art and stories portfolio. He was intrigued and invited Tom to publish his work. The result was Mystic Warriors of the Plains published by Doubleday in 1972. The book became a standard reference book worldwide for those interested in the culture of the Plains Indian people.

    Tom was respected by many native folks for the way he told about Native American culture. After his first book, he was invited time and again by tribal elders to come and tell their stories. Many were concerned their stories and ways would be lost because the young did not care about them anymore. Tom ultimately wrote 14 books, 13 at the requests of native leaders who brought him into their inner worlds. Tom was a significant contributor to the understanding of native peoples because he had the rare status of being invited into their world. He wrote the stories they wanted told, researched the literature by other authors, and created all of the hundreds of powerful illustrations in his books.   

    He spent the next three decades responding to such invitations and to writing and illustrating thirteen more books about native people. In his words: “I have come to regard the gathering of knowledge to be as important as the rendering of it.The Indian people enjoyed a rich and varied existence as parents, hunters, horsemen, artists, builders, and traders. They were of deep religious faith and had a profoundly complex ceremonial life. I believe there is much to be learned from native peoples who for thousands of years have faced and surmounted seemingly overwhelming odds, with a grace and dignity that has enabled them to lead happy and productive lives.” Other works by Mr. Mails include, The Apache, The Cherokee, Sundancing on the Rosebud, Foolscrow, Pueblo Children of the Earth Mother, Hotevilla, Microcosm of the World, and The Hopi Survival Kit. His books have been published in multiple languages and reprinted many times.

    We first met Tom Mails in the fall of 1984. Clara Webb of Webb Art Galleries of Santa Fe and Amarillo (who has subsequently served on our Board of Trustees) had met Tom in her travels and art dealings and had invited him to Amarillo to present his popular seminar about the spiritual pathways of the Native Americans. Most Kwahadis were well aware of Tom Mails as many members had purchased his first great book, Mystic Warriors of the Plains. Seeing Clara’s ad in the newspaper, I forked over three hundred bucks to attend the seminar just to meet him!

    The seminar was interesting, but most significantly Mr. Mails accepted an invitation to come to the Kwahadis’ winter show at the Troop 80 building. I picked him up from his motel and took him to the show. Along the way he said, “I am old and diabetic. Don’t be offended if I need to leave early and return to my room.” I assured him I would take him back when he was ready to go. The Kwahadis were excited that he was coming to their show! Instead of the usual folding chair, a special regular chair draped with a Pendleton blanket was set for him in the front row.

    There he sat quietly with his hands on his knees. Boys peeked out to see him. Then the show began, and they danced from the heart for him! (Motivated boys put on better shows!) At intermission I went out to Tom and offered to take him back to his room. He declined saying, “This is great!I wouldn’t miss this for anything!”  He sat watching and smiling through the second half of the performance. After the show the boys gathered around to meet him, and one brought his copy of “Mystic Warriors of the Plains” for him to autograph. We began to see his amazing artistic skills. He pulled out two or three colors of pencils, rapidly drew a magnificent drawing inside the front cover and then signed the book!

   At that point a frenzy of autograph seekers flooded around him. He had never seen such a group of boys who owned and had read his books. Some boys had four or five of his books for him to autograph. Many ran to the trading post and bought his books until they sold out, then joined the line waiting to present their book to him to sign. It was a magical event for the Kwahadis!

    Mr. Mails signed books until midnight and the line had only grown longer. He needed to rest at that point, and he promised he would return the next day to the Sunday rehearsal and sign more.  This was good news because most people had his books at home. I helped Tom into my car and departed for his motel. Surprisingly, he announced he was hungry, so we went to the nearby Waffle House. We sat up until almost 2:00 in the morning talking about the evening and his experiences. He was deeply impressed by the boys’ commitment to the dances, their regalia, and the way they used their arms and motions and not just the dancing legs. It was the most realistic portrayal outside of a native setting that he had seen, and he proclaimed what a powerful and worthwhile journey it was for the youth!

   The events of the evening began a great friendship between Tom and the youth of the Kwahadis. He became involved in our dream of building a museum and theater.  In 1990 Mr. Mails said he would like to make a donation of art to the Kwahadis. In typical Kwahadi style we loaded the bus with 43 people at the beginning of the four-day Thanksgiving school holiday, drove all night and arrived on Thanksgiving Day in Los Angeles, California. We had a Thanksgiving dinner at a local diner, then went to the Fullerton YMCA to spend the night in the gym. 

    We departed for his home which was high up on the mountain above Lake Elsinore south of Los Angeles. He called his home “the Hawk’s Nest!” Our 1964 Continental Trailways “well used” bus had a couple of problems: 1) The fuel filters would sometimes clog and limit fuel flow to the engine making it run very slowly, and 2) the clutch in the old bus was a weak link in the powertrain. The heavy bus could not begin to move from a total stop on much of a slope. Both of those problems came in to play as we chugged up the narrow mountain road to his home. It turned out the road up the mountain was a major cut-across from the ocean side of the mountain with lots of traffic. As we started up the hill the fuel filter problem kicked in right on cue and limited engine power forced us to climb the hill in the lowest and slowest gear. We crawled steadily up the winding narrow road at about 6 miles per hour. Traffic began to back up behind us – California traffic – all in a hurry to get somewhere. 

    As we approached a pull-out on the road, we knew it would be courteous to pull over and let the traffic by, but the clutch problem would have made it impossible to get moving again on the steep slope. Having no choice, we slowly passed the pullout and the attitudes of the drivers in the cars behind us began to change. They had no idea why the bus a Texas license plate just kept going! The line of cars behind us grew longer, we passed a second pull-out, and continued the long slow climb up the mountain. Tom’s home was near the top, of course, and we pulled in to his level driveway area when we arrived.  Cars began to roar past with all kinds of friendly greetings and salutes from the California folks. They were obviously very glad to see the Kwahadis!

   Inside Tom’s home, we spent the afternoon sitting on the living room floor with Tom, his wife, Lisa, and their young sons, Mathew and Ryan. Lisa served cookies to the group (Why does everyone always feed the Kwahadis cookies?).  We explored the fabulous art in his home and listened tirelessly to Tom as told of his travels among native peoples. Late in the afternoon he invited us out to his studio, and he gave the Kwahadis 26 of his beautiful paintings! We were stunned! We had hoped someday to be able to buy one of his paintings for our collection, but this was overwhelming! 

    We loaded the paintings carefully into the bus bay. Mr. Mails and his family led us back down the mountain to dinner.  The bus did well downhill! After an enjoyable meal together at a local Denny’s we bid farewell to the Mails’ family and returned to the YMCA for the night. On Saturday we arose early and spent the day at Disneyland! Afterwards, we drove all night and got home Sunday evening in time to rest up for school on Monday! What an exciting and challenging journey!

    The paintings were first displayed in the Troop 80 building, but then traveled for several years while we worked to fund and build the museum. The collection was also displayed in the Hutchinson County Museum thanks to Kwahadi Chief, Ed Benz (Museum Director), at Alamosa College in Colorado thanks to Koshare Chief and Kwahadi friend, Marvin Holbrook, in the Seton Museum at Philmont Scout Ranch thanks to Kwahadi Chief, Steve Zimmer (Director of the Seton Library and Museum], and in the Koshare Indian Museum in La Junta, Colorado again thanks to Marvin Holbrook.

     The gifts from Mr. Mails continued. He gave us 3000 stone lithographs to sell to help raise money for the museum. He energized the funding campaign, and we began to make progress. We flew Tom to Amarillo three times to take part in publicity and fundraising activities. He was a natural leader in any crowd, always delightful and full of wit, and he enjoyed his times in Amarillo!

    The University of Southern California and the University of Nebraska wanted Tom to give his collections and research materials to their research libraries. Tom did not want his things going into “some basement where few people would ever see them.” He wanted his things to go into a “living museum” where they could be seen and be useful. He liked the Kwahadis idea of a theater and museum, and he became very interested over the following years in helping the Kwahadis to build their dream.

    Consequently in 2000, he decided to give his things to the Kwahadi Museum. He donated to the museum his collections and materials. We planned a western show tour and brought a large truck. While the Kwahadis played at Disneyland again, Dr. Glen Harrison from Virginia (also a Board member) and I spent the entire day packing and loading his gifts into the truck! The collection included another 100 paintings, his library of a thousand selected books on Native Americans, his handwritten manuscripts from all his books, hundreds of photographs from his journeys, hundreds of charcoal drawings used to illustrate his books, and many fine pieces of native art and artifacts.

    Tom wanted us to sell the paintings to raise money for the museum. We told him we couldn’t sell his paintings. Instead we would have to build an even larger museum to hold his wonderful things! We did!

________________

    There are so many men and women who have given long and dedicated service to the youth of the Kwahadi organization. People who worked without pay helping the Kwahadis succeed and have adventures. They have helped with crafts, dancing, singing, bus driving, wardrobe, electrical, scout advancement and unit charters, vehicle maintenance and repair, museum grounds maintenance, exhibits, trading post, donations, inventories, cleaning, building repair, and helping the Kwahadis get ready backstage. Some did many different things, some did one thing well. Some helped for a short while, others helped for a long time. Some serve on the Board of Trustees or Committee jobs.

      Some are always there to cheer on the kids! Many stay active in service to the Kwahadi program long past the active years of their own children. They too become great Chieftains, and we call them the Silver Haired Scouters or Bald Eagles (not our dedicated ladies, of course!) Some were dancers who grew into adults and stayed to help others who followed in their footsteps.  There are those who have lived great distances away and still come to be part as often as they can. There are those all across American, Canada, and Europe who have sponsored shows, provided a place for the kids to sleep, shared their knowledge and skills with the Kwahadis, or opened up the camp swimming pool late at night after a show just so the kids could swim. There are so many who have donated money, collections, time, wisdom, and skills.  

     As one our greater volunteer leaders and committee chairman, Harry Janzen, responded when asked how long he planned to volunteer, “I love this! I am never going to quit!” He spent the rest of life in service to the Kwahadis! Perhaps we should try to say a special thank you to those who have served for over twenty years That list would include: Jack Bryant, Bill Burnett, Bill Chudej (Sioux Chief & HC), Larry and Donna Cunningham (both recipients of Scouting’s highest award, the Silver Buffalo Award), Dr. Gerri Elliston,  Guy Giersch, David and Beverly Fry, John Fruge, Verl and Jackie Hawbaker, Ralph Irelan, Harry and Janet Janzen, Karl Johnson, Steve Napper, Chris Redmon (Sioux Chief), Tom Roller (Kiowa Chief) , John Stich (Kiowa Chief and HC), Debbie Stich, Freddie Toledo, Clara Webb, David Wesley, and Walter Wolfram.   There are far more people who served and could be counted on. The Kwahadis are grateful to all. Everyone who has served has become an important part of the story.

Honored by the Name…

     The early Troop 9 dancers had chosen “Kwahadi” as their name, but it wasn’t until the fall of 1977 through the friendship of Dr. Bill Walker with the Comanche people that Melvin Kirche, a respected headman of the Comanche, held an honoring dance at the Walker family ranch   near Canyon, TX. Mr. Kirche and a group of Comanche people came from Lawton, Oklahoma and officially gave the boys the use of the Comanche name “Kwahadi.”

    The Kwahadi or “Quahadi” were one of several bands of the Comanche nation who controlled the High Plains for 300 miles in all directions from Amarillo. They occupied this section of the High Plains from the time they migrated from the north. They arrived on the southern plains riding Spanish Mustang horses in a. 1680 until, with the demise of the buffalo herds, they decided to voluntarily ride to Ft. Sill, Oklahoma in 1876 to submit to the authority of General Ranald McKenzie. They were the last of the native nomadic buffalo hunters to do so.

The Great Chiefs Have Gone Their Way

    Dr. Charles Colgate was active with the Kwahadi program for only a short period of time, but he brought the gift of dance which he had learned from Ralph Hubbard. Like Hubbard, he had become a forensic doctor and was interested and involved in many things. Also, like Hubbard, he inspired and made a positive difference in the lives of many youth in Missouri and Amarillo through programs of Indian dancing.   He returned once to attend the Fall Awards Dinner of the Kwahadis in the Jack Bryant Center in 1972. He passed away in 1977. 

     Ralph Hubbard passed away in Medora, S. Dakota in 1985.  He had retired there, built his last log cabin, and built the Museum of West with the help of Harold Shaefer, a wealthy industrial leader. The museum featured the fine old-time regalia of northern plains Indian tribes. He built a museum for the Sioux people near Wounded Knee and donated displays of fine old native regalia.   His grave is in the community cemetery on a hill above Medora near the entrance to the Burning Hills Amphitheater, the site of the famous Medora outdoor summer musical show. Nellie Yost recorded his amazing story in her book, “A Man as Big as the West.”

   It is interesting that the museum Hubbard built at Wounded Knee for the Sioux people was sacked and burned by some of the 300 Sioux and other members of AIM who had taken over the community of Wounded Knee, SD in the winter of 1973. Dennis Banks (1937-2017), co-leader of the Wounded Knee event and the most influential Native American leader and activist, came to visit the Kwahadi Museum with about 100 native folks on a Walk Across America in 2010 (the first of two visits by the group). The group slept in the Kwahadi Museum and Kwahadi families fed over a thousand meals over the four days they rested with us. The Kwahadis helped them with tires and gas for their equipment vehicles. They were a beautiful, pleasant, interesting, friendly, and intelligent group, and we were honored to share time and our resources with them.  

   During their stay, we went to Walmart with Mr. Banks and his great assistant leader, Larry Brings Good, to buy rice, beans, sugar, coffee, etc. for their commissary as they prepared to continue their walk to Washington, D.C. While sitting at McDonald’s eating burgers and visiting, I asked Mr. Banks about the burning of the Hubbard museum. He said, “That should never have happened. Not all native people understood what we were trying to do. They still don’t.” The beautiful old things of the Sioux people which were donated back to the Sioux people and preserved in the museum were stolen and scattered. A single youth moccasin from the museum collection was later found in a field several hundred yards from the incident. This small item from a lifetime of collecting by Hubbard has found its way, thanks to Mr. Banks, to the Kwahadi Museum.

    Mr. Banks told the story of his childhood and how when he was five years old an agent from the Bureau of Indian Affairs took him and his siblings from his grandmother’s home. They were taken three hundred miles away to an Indian boarding school. He was heartbroken because he did not hear from his mother. Each day he looked for word from her, and it never came. His mother passed away during his time in the school, and he never understood why she had forgotten him.  Later in the 1980’s, the BIA files were opened up, and he found in a file many letters and money from his mother. She had missed him greatly and loved him dearly. The letters were never given to the young Dennis, and he said his heart still aches for his mother.  Many Indian children of those times have stories like this.

    Mr. Banks enjoyed the stay at the museum and said he was going to come back with his granddaughter to see the museum and dancing. As we finished our coffee he said, “Keep teaching your dancing kids. It is a good thing for them to dance and to learn about the Red Road.” Following heart surgery Dennis Banks passed away with complications from pneumonia on October 29, 2017 in Rochester, Minnesota. America lost a compassionate leader that day, and the Kwahadis lost a friend. We honor his memory.

     Buck Burshears lost Jane, his wife for 18 years, in the fall of 1967.  She and Buck’s mom had been deeply loved by the Koshares. He sold his home and moved into the upstairs apartment of the museum in his later years. The Koshares hosted hundreds of scouts in their museum for overnight stays during the summer months.  Buck got up one night in June of 1987 to check on a disturbance below and fell down the steps. He was in the hospital for several weeks before passing away in August of 1987. He is buried in the Catholic Cemetery of La Junta, Colorado next to his beloved wife.

    Buck was the most famous scoutmaster in America. The tragic news of his passing spread quickly and even made national news. America and Scouting had lost a true human treasure. The guiding wisdom of Buck Burshears and the Koshares’ story is presented in Scott Balicki’s great book, “Be a Great Boy!” The Koshare story is also told in a book by a former Koshare, Jack Kelly, in his book, “Koshare” published 1975.  The magical spirit of the Koshares is well illustrated in a novel by Val Gendron published in the 1958 entitled, “Behind the Zuni Masks.” Their amazing adventures and achievements are recorded in countless magazine and newspaper articles, including the February, 1962 article about them in Readers’ Digest which first inspired this writer as a young scout.

     Ralph and his wife, Ruby, remained active helping the youth of the Kwahadis for over fifty years and had a powerful influence on youth! He helped Jack Bryant with the new Troop 80 Kwahadi dance program every week and frequented Kwahadi activities until he became ill. He and Ruby moved to a nursing home in Oklahoma City to be near his daughter, Alice Whittington, as he suffered from a long battle with lung cancer. He passed away in September of 1987, shortly after the passing of Buck Burshears, his first Eagle scout from his days long before as Scoutmaster of Troop 2230 in La Junta, Colorado.  Ralph is buried in the mausoleum of the Llano Cemetery of Amarillo. 

    Ruby survived Ralph by several years. The Kwahadis stopped by her nursing home on several trips to dance for her and the other residents. Her daughter, Alice Whittington, always had chocolate chip cookies for the boys!

      Jack Bryant led Troop 80 to become the largest troop in the area, to build the area’s largest Christmas tree business, to form their own non-profit corporation, and to build their own center for the troop and other scout units. He helped the Kwahadis put together their first journey overseas in 1984 to the International Festival of the Arts in Ammon, Jordan, and he accompanied the Kwahadis on the journey. He remained the Scoutmaster of Troop 80 for over 30 years, devoting a huge gift of time and money in service to other people’s children. He served as President of the Llano Estacado Boy Scout Council and served on the Southern Region leadership board. He was awarded the Silver Beaver by the local council and the Silver Antelope for his service to the Southern Region. In the troop he built a talented and devoted team of leaders and made a great difference in the lives of hundreds of boys. Jack was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1980. He succumbed to the disease on January 30, 1994. Jack is buried in the Llano Cemetery of Amarillo. He was preceded in death by his first wife, Margie, on April 5, 1981. He later accidently ran the troop bus into a lady’s car and eventually married her (Jo Bryant) in the late 1980’s. Jo Bryant still resides in Amarillo.    

   During the school spring break in 2001 we planned a western show tour including a visit to see Tom Mails. Shortly before the tour, Tom suffered a severe stroke while driving in his car. He made it home, but he couldn’t move. He honked his horn for help, which finally came, but much damage to his body had been done.  He was in recovery in a hospital when the Kwahadis arrived in Lake Elsinore. He was allowed only one visitor at a time, but we slipped the entire group of 36 Kwahadis in the back door and gathered around his bed. Tom was delighted! He could move one arm and offered handshakes to everyone and smiled.

      He later recovered enough to return home, and the Kwahadis visited him again on the August show tour to the west coast. The Kwahadis sat on the ground in his back yard and Lisa brought Tom out in his wheelchair and in his robe and Scottish cap. We had a chance to visit with him for an hour. As we pulled the big bus away from in front of his house, he and Lisa were on the front porch waving goodbye. He passed away on November 18, 2001. I attended his funeral on behalf of the Kwahadi organization to convey our respect, gratitude, and love. He was buried north of Lake Elsinore.

    Just nine months later in August 2002 the Board of Trustees of Kwahadi Heritage, Inc. authorized the construction of the museum and performance center to begin. A ground-breaking ceremony was conducted in September of 2002. Lisa Mails came in Tom’s place to be our honored guest and speaker at the event.

    Lisa was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2003 and was unable to attend the grand opening on June 4, 2004. She passed away on Sunday, February 6, 2005. She had been a prominent school teacher who was awarded the school district’s Woman of Year.  A new campus was dedicated in her honor, Lisa J. Mails Elementary School, in 2007.

    These amazing men and Scouters and their supportive wives, the giants among men who influenced the Kwahadis story greatly, have passed on, but their spirit and influence continue to this day. Men and women continue to volunteer in service to the Kwahadis.  As Buck Burshears often shared this quote, “A hundred years from now it will not matter how big my bank account was, how big my house was, or how big of a car I drove. What will matter is that I was important in the life of a boy.”  Forest Whitcraft, a Kansas City Scouter. These were immensely important men who spent much of their lives being involved in something bigger than just their own selves!

The Kwahadi Program

    Performing and travel are the heart of the Kwahadi program.  Since 1944, over 2000 boys and girls have earned a place in the Kwahadi show. They have presented over 4000 shows in 48 states and overseas. The telephone, fax machine, e-mail, and letters continue to bring friends and opportunities to the Kwahadis!

    The Kwahadi show is an accumulation of the combined gifts of knowledge and inspiration by hundreds of friends. preserved by succeeding generations of boys and girls who stand on the shoulders of those who came before. It is seen in their dancing feet, spirited attitudes, fine regalia, and devotion to the program. No one receives any pay, but hundreds have volunteered in service to youth and to helping preserve the Kwahadi traditions. That is why the adventure continues 75 years after that “one time” performance in the spring of 1945. 

    Over the decades, we have been given great gifts of folk art, crafts, and wisdom by native people from among tribal groups such as the Mohawk, Pueblo, Kiowa, Comanche, Shoshoni, Sioux, Navajo, Blackfoot, and Cherokee. Charles Shunatona, a Pawnee Otto member of the Council of the Five Civilized Tribes used to come visit his daughter, Jen Cale, in Amarillo. He would come visit the Kwahadis, sing and tell stories to them, and play his flute. He told them, “There will always be people who will oppose anything you do. Listen to your heart, and do what you think is right.”

   Melvin Kirche of the Comanche Nation honored the Kwahadis with the gift of a naming ceremony. George McArtle, Chief Top Leaf of the Mohawk Nation, attended their show and spoke with them afterwards. He told the Kwahadis that what they do honors Indian people and to always wear regalia well and to dance with enthusiasm.

    Abe Trujillo, a Pueblo man and War Chief, was a good friend of Jack Bryant. He welcomed the boys on many occasions to his home and taught them songs and about dancing. Tony Whitecloud, the world champion native hoop dancer at the time, invited Bobby Jones, a young Kwahadi, and his family to his Pueblo home for dinner. He taught him to do the hoop dance and gave him a set of wooden hoops.

   Mrs. Marcus, a Pueblo lady who had just lost her husband in the Vietnam War, welcomed Kwahadis into her home on 12^th night for the dancing in celebration of the new Governor of the Pueblo. A Shoshoni lady in Utah brought her grandsons up after a show to shake hands and said, “Thank you for telling the truth.” A Navajo lady, Mary Chee, after a show in New Mexico told the boys what they do is good and she respected their dancing. Juan Chavarria talked to the boys about Pueblo dancing and shared stories about the dances.

    Dr. Alex Seowtewa took many groups of Kwahadis on tours of the Zuni Mission Church to see his wonderful murals and told them the story of each mural and about the beautiful Shalako ceremony the boys have visited for over 50 years. Dennis Banks, the most influential leader of AIM, told the boys their dancing is a good thing and to keep on.   Larry Brings Good watched the Kwahadis and said the program does good things.

   The Amarillo Native American community organization came to Kwahadi performances many times as a group. One Shoshone member said, “What you do is so beautiful. You honor our people.” A visiting native scout leader said, “I have always opposed Indian dancing in Scouting, but what you do is different. I enjoyed the show.” He later arranged to bring the show to other scouts in his council. (My grandmother, Minnie Burns, was a Choctaw lady. She passed away in the Bird Flu Epidemic of 1918 that killed over one million Americans.) Charlene Dodson, a Choctaw and leader in the local native group and director of the Indian Cultural center, was a friend of the Kwahadis. She hosted our shows during our homeless years in the Cultural Center, and donated many things to the museum and facility when we opened in 2004. Others have taught dancing to the boys and served as leaders.   One of the greatest honors remains the loving gift from Melvin Kerchi of the Comanche people who hosted a powwow in 1977 and gave the boys the name “Kwahadi” (Quahadi).

    We continue to add fine works of art by native artists to the museum. Over 100 native artists and craftsman are represented in the fine pieces for sale in the museum gift shop. No one profits from the trading post sales, but proceeds help the native artists and helps keep the museum open for hundreds of school children from area schools and for thousands of visitors who come from all over the world.

The Road Show

    The Kwahadis typically present between 70 and 100 performances each year for conventions, city celebrations, camporees, fund-raisers, touring groups, youth groups, museums, and schools. The show has been presented in gymnasiums, convention halls, activity centers, dining halls, or outdoors in amphitheaters or football fields.  During the summer months, the troop has traditionally taken the show on the road for at least two weeks each summer. The long tour has given the Kwahadi youth experiences from coast to coast as they performed for distant friends. Occasionally, at any time of year, we have flown the Top Ten Kwahadis to perform for distant events.

Winter Night Ceremonials

    In May of 1966 Jack opened the Kwahadi program up to Scouts from outside Troop 80, and scouts from around the area soon joined in the fun!  Newcomers included great future Chiefs Steve Zimmer, Guy Giersch, Phillip Tuttle, and Dennis Carathers along with college leaders Steve Napper, David Bailey, Ed Benz, and Glen Harrison. The new members created the winter show which was built around a style of dance different the early dances of the Kwahadis. The Kwahadis first performed dances of Southwest cultures at the opening of Troop 80’s building, The Jack Bryant Scouting Center, in November of 1966. A show series was performed featuring the new dances in early spring of 1967, and was presented again in December of the same year. The team was enthused about the new winter dances! The Winter Night Ceremonials were originally inspired by the Koshare Dancers in the mid-1960’s, and soon led to hundreds of Kwahadis and leaders making dozens of trips out west to attend native events and watch their magnificent dancing. The winter show emerged in 1968 as a full production and has been presented every year since!

   The winter show has become a rich collection of song and dance which is presented in the Kiva room of the Kwahadi Museum. It takes the audiences on a journey a thousand years back into time to the ancient village of Tyuonyi (Bandolier National Park in New Mexico), where long ago people knew how to care for their families and survive in challenging environments. Named after the ancient village of Tyuonyi, the show portrays a time when people would gather in the kivas on the long cold winter nights and group after group would dance.

    The Kwahadi Trading Post emerged as a stock of craft supplies sold out of a foot locker under the leadership of a young Kwahadi Chief, Steve Zimmer. The Kwahadi Museum emerged as Ed Benz set up three display cases in the “committee room” of the Troop 80 building. 

    The Kwahadis began summer shows in 1960 when Jack rented the Potter County Baseball Stadium, and the Kwahadis danced for a nice crowd for a single show. This continued for several years, then moved to the new Jack Bryant Center. Hundreds of Kwahadis have great memories of performing summer shows and winter ceremonials from 1967 until 1997 in the Jack Bryant Scouting Center! They also remember what fun it was to sell Christmas trees with Troop 80 each year on the tree lot, stand by the fire barrel to warm up on the cold evenings, help hundreds of people find the perfect Christmas tree, and drink gallons of hot chocolate. Jack Bryant was always there with great partner scouters like Welton Sides and Walter Skipworth. They were always busy organizing the boys, pricing trees, and making it fun for everyone!

    Today, the summer home show has emerged into Song of the Eagle, a journey of song, dance, and story. The Kwahadis perform the show ten to twenty times each summer in the Plaza.   Much like a scouting campfire, the show has “big ideas” for youth threaded through the show. During the summer months thousands of Scouts overnight at the museum on their way to mountain summer camps have the opportunity to experience one of the summer shows. 

The Summer Show Tour

    In the winter of 1969, the Kwahadis hauled their equipment and team up a tiny elevator to the top floor of the Fisk Building to perform for the State Disabled American Veterans Convention. The President of the National DAV was in attendance and the Kwahadis were soon awarded an all-expense paid trip to perform at the National DAV Convention in Los Angeles, California the next summer! The deal was fostered by our committee chairman, Ed Donelson.  The Kwahadis traveled in August of 1970 in a new Continental Trailways Silver Eagle chartered bus on a ten-day adventure to California! The team went to Disneyland, visited the USS Ticonderoga aircraft carrier, and performed in the base theater of the San Diego Naval Base. They spent a day at the San Diego Zoo and presented a one-hour performance on the big stage for the huge DAV convention!

     It was an unbelievably amazing adventure!  The Kwahadis were excited and wanted more summer show trips! The Kwahadis have since taken a summer show tour almost every summer! Summer show tours include many shows and visits to national parks, universities, museums, scout camps, and communities all across the nation.  The gang typically travels 200 to 300 miles each day, visits all they can along the way, sets up and performs in the evening, packs the show way, showers and settles in for the night – then they do all again the next day!  The challenges of a summer tour give young people opportunity to build endurance, responsibility, leadership, self-reliance, teamwork, social skills, and lifelong memories. They get to meet hundreds of people along the way, see the magnificence of America, and maybe build even bigger personal dreams! Oh, the tales which hundreds of Kwahadis can tell!  As Kwahadi Chief, Tim Benton, once said, “You know, I just love this!”

    Along the way there were some great opportunities! In 1984 the Kwahadis were invited by King Hussein and Queen Noor of Jordan to represent America in the International Festival of the Arts in Amman, Jordan! The Kwahadis, the Brigham Young University Choir, and the Up With People production were the U.S. representatives that year!

    In 1999, David Knorr, a military contractor who saw the Kwahadis perform at Philmont Scout Ranch, invited the Kwahadis to Germany! We presented five shows, ascended the Alps in Switzerland, visited Czechoslovakia, toured Berlin, and explored much of Germany! It was an amazing adventure at a new level! The Kwahadis wanted more adventures in Europe!  In 2004 the Kwahadis presented 3 shows in Hawaii and surfed at Waikiki! In 2009 63 Kwahadis and Kossa friends and leaders took a 23-day trip to Europe and performed 18 shows in Ireland, Scotland, and England. In 2011, the Kwahadis, Koshares, and Kossa groups traveled and performed together on a three week show tour that took them all the way to Nova Scotia. They presented 18 shows and stopped along the way to explore museums, national parks, swim, and play in theme parks! What adventures we shared together! 

    

      In 2014 the Kwahadis returned to Europe on a three-week tour which included shows and sightseeing from Rome, Italy to London, England. The team presented 13 shows in Italy, France, and England.  The team particularly enjoyed the sites in Italy such as Rome, the Vatican, Pompey, the St. Francis of Assisi Church, Florence, and Venice. Swimming in the Adriatic Sea of the Mediterranean is one of many great memories! As Buck Burshears once succinctly put it, “Kids get excited about travel!”

   The two or three-week long show tours of the Kwahadis are made possible by scouters, community leaders, alumni, and friends all across America and overseas! We have had the good fortune through our travels to meet even more great scouters, community leaders, artists, and friends across the nation who have shared their own gifts and helped to build the quality of our program. 

     On a return trip to perform at a Ft. Stockton, TX celebration, a parent came up and said, “I want you to know that because my son saw your show last year, he did not commit suicide. I am sure the show is reason.” We receive cards and letters, especially from scouts and leaders, about the effect of the show on them.  Many scouts tell us, “I didn’t quit! I just finished my Eagle Scout!” We meet scouters all the country who pull out old and tattered Eagle Scout challenge cards from their wallets to show that they still carry them!  Our mission is to share through our travels and our performances the gifts of song, dance, stories, and big ideas with which we have been blessed. We want to make a positive difference not only in our own boys’ and girls’ lives, but also in the lives of as many other children as possible. All of the program and journeys are accomplished with volunteers – no one receives any pay!

         The Kwahadis present Indian Summer performances typically on the last Saturday night in September and the first Saturday night in October during the delightful fall evenings in the Texas panhandle. The show has been presented annually since 1986. The show began as an outdoor performance in the Palo Duro Canyon Pioneer Amphitheater at the request of its director, Raymond Raillard. The summer musical, TEXAS, ended in August, and he was looking for a performance to utilize the theater in the fall.  Indian Summer was presented in the canyon amphitheater through 1996. We remember grand nights with six or eight large tipis standing tall across the spectacular outdoor stage in the canyon as hundreds of people sat under the stars to enjoy the performance!

   When the cost of using the amphitheater suddenly rose dramatically after Raymond’s retirement, Indian Summer was presented at Camp Don Harrington, in the Plaza of Las Tiendas, at the Don Harrington Discovery Center, and at the Amarillo Civic Center. Since 2004 it has been performed in the Plaza of the Kwahadi Museum. Thanks to a wonderful gift from the Sybil Harrington Trust in 2006, a massive roof was installed over the outdoor Plaza to make it into a fine indoor theater and activity center. Many community activities take place in the Plaza throughout the year.

    Each fall, on the two school days before Thanksgiving, Kwahadis are excused from classes to entertain in 10 to 12 area schools. The Thanksgiving Shows have been presented annually since 1987. Since 1977, the Kwahadis have also presented Dancing in the Homes annually, usually on the Friday and/or Saturday night before Christmas. This is our version of “caroling.” The Kwahadis dress in elaborate winter regalia and travel to nursing homes, retirement centers, orphanages, and the homes of friends. At each stop, small groups perform one dance after another.  Then they shake hands with the residents and wish them a Merry Christmas before rushing to the next show!

    The realities of extensive travel and of performing for live audiences put the Kwahadis in very real situations which foster pride, responsibility, leadership, confidence, teamwork, and service to others. The lasting value of the principles of the Scout Oath and Law are manifested over and over!  We think it is important for all of us to get involved in something bigger than just ourselves!! Kwahadis often perform at home and on the road for 30,000 or more youth a year, hundreds of volunteer youth leaders, and hundreds of tourists and families from all over the world. We want to honor and encourage volunteers who share their time, resources, and wisdom with youth.

The Kwahadi Museum and Performance Center

And Sybil B. Harrington Event Center

    As Buck Burshears once said, “You can’t get interested in Indian dance and song without getting interested in and appreciating their beautiful art and ways.” The Kwahadis were blessed with the gift of the extensive collection of art, artifacts, and research materials of Thomas Mails, famous author and artist of Native Americans.  Tom Mails published his first work, “Mystic Warriors of the Plains” in 1972 and earned the respect of native leaders of many nations. He was invited by elders of a variety of tribes to record and interpret their own stories and cultures. The gifts from Tom Mails supported the Kwahadi dream  building a museum and event center to house our performances and exhibits, Since the museum opened in 2004, we have been blessed with hundreds of gifts of art, artifacts, books, and beautiful pieces of native craft including a massive collection from the Northwest, a gift of former Kwahadi Chief, the late Terry Carnes,

    The effort to build a Kwahadi center began formally in 1977. A group of alumni and friends started an exploration of what it would take to build a home for the Kwahadi program.   The group became known as the Kiva Committee. The committee was chaired by West Texas State University professor, Dr. Jack Muthersbough, a grand scouter and friend of the Kwahadis. Walter Wolfram, the drummer for the group that performed the first dance in 1944, had become a lawyer and helped the team to form a non-profit corporation. T. W. Gilstrap, a parent of Hopi Clan member and Kwahadi Chief, Bill Gilstrap, donated $1000. Dr. Author Garner, first elected Head Chief of the Kwahadis in 1947, traded free dental care in return for the architectural services of his friend, Terrance Doane. Terrance labored long hours helping to produce plans and drawings of an original concept. A beautiful artist rendering the concept of Mr. Doane hangs in the Kwahadi center. Builders told us it would take about $300,000 to build it – a real bargain compared to prices later on!  Community leaders told us the time was not right for a new organization to fundraise. Although the committee got off to a solid start, it was not a fundraising group and the interest faded. That means we didn’t follow through. We learned that dreams take carefully planning, hard work, and enduring persistence!

    In 1994 at the 50^th Anniversary Celebration of the Kwahadis, 128 old-timers and current dancers gathered in the Amarillo Civic Center thanks to Kris Miller, a former Kwahadi who was director of the center. It was a grand evening of sharing memories, food, and fellowship. Among other events of the night, we began a campaign to fulfill an old dream – to build a place to house the Kwahadi collections and program. David and Beverly Fry, alumni parents, led the way that night with the first pledge of a thousand dollars towards the effort.  New life flowed into the old dream of having our own place!

    In 1997, the Kwahadis became a non-profit corporation, Kwahadi Heritage, Inc. and fundraising was begun with renewed energy. Contributions and pledges continued steadily. The late Harry Janzen, Kwahadi Committee Chairman, administered a time-consuming program of bank drafts with monthly gifts from many pledgers. Several grant applications were sent out, and we received funds from most of them. The Maybe Foundation pledged a challenge grant of $50,000, and suddenly the project began to seem not only achievable, but inevitable.  Dr. Glen Harrison donated $100,000 and Laurie Belcher pledged $25,000 in memory of her late husband, Dennis Carathers, a Sioux Chief and dedicated scouter.  Joe Kennedy at Amarillo National Bank awarded the Kwahadis another $50,000 grant from the estate of a man wanted it to be used for a new and innovative project. Several small grants were awarded. 

     Tom Roller was a Chief in the Sioux Clan in the Jack Bryant Kwahadi days.  He brought Mike Schuminski to the team. Mike took an interest in the project and provided several gifts totaling over a quarter million dollars. He also gave us 22 acres of land along I-40, and a mountain of caliche soil which we would need for the foundation and parking lot!  Xcel Energy donated tons of fly-ash to harden the caliche. Charles Schmidt, an original member of the Kwahadis, who was co-owner of Amarillo Road Company, sent one of his big machines to load the caliche and move it onto our land. It took several days to build the small mountain of caliche on the north end of the property! Charles Schmidt also pledged to pave the parking lot for us when it was ready, an $80,000 gift.  Twenty Kwahadi alumni and friends became Founders with pledges of $10,000 or more each.  Gary Roller, a successful artist and a former Chief from the Kiowa Clan during the Jack Bryant days, provided a beautiful bronze sculpture, Eagle’s Way, for each of the Founders! Many people donated to help with the project including one young Cub Scout who gave us his entire allowance of five dollars following a performance for Scouts in Oklahoma! Every gift counted then, and still helps immensely today!

    In August of 2002 the Kwahadi Heritage Board of Trustees authorized construction of the Kwahadi facility. It was expected to cost $800,000 dollars to complete. Terrance Doane completed the plans, the engineering was finished, and City of Amarillo granted the building permits. In late September, Charles Schmidt sent over big machines to clear the weeds and prepare the construction site. A grand ground-breaking ceremony was held on the site on October 2. Each Clan in the Kwahadis danced, and speeches were made. Tom Mails had passed away in February of 2002, just six months before the project was started. His wife Lisa flew out from California and made the keynote address to the crowd of friends, alumni, active parents, and community members. Then dignitaries took shovels painted gold and scooped out the first earth!

    The project was led by former Head Chief and trustee, Bill Chudej. He was critical to getting the place built and to getting us through some tough times along the road of construction. Earthworks soon began, the foundation was poured, walls began to come up, and truckloads of big logs and things began to arrive! It took 21 months to finish the building. Bill donated the extensive irrigation system and landscaping. Charles Schmidt and Amarillo Road Company finished the parking lot.  We emerged out of the often-muddy field of construction and into a beautiful campus adorned with 100 trees and with an encircling parking lot with curbs and sidewalks!  It was an exciting time!   

     On June 4, 2006, a crowd gathered for the ribbon cutting ceremony, and the Kwahadi Museum and event center opened its doors. It had taken longer and cost more than planned, but it was complete. Rehearsals, craft sessions, museum projects, and summer shows were performed in the outdoor Plaza. Almost immediately hundreds of Scouts were soon overnighting in the new facility on their way to and from mountain summer camps. The little Kwahadi Trading Post which was started in a footlocker by Kwahadi Chief Steve Zimmer in 1968 began to emerge as a real gift shop. In addition to being Founders, Larry and Donna Cunningham donated tables, chairs, and several antique display cases from an old drug store. Most of those cases are in the trading post and help create an old-time appearance!  (It is also interesting to note that Donna and Larry were involved at the national level and led the way creating the new Venturing program. They are the only husband and wife recipients of the Silver Buffalo, the highest adult volunteer award in Scouting. They are scouting royalty, and we are proud to claim them too!) Sales of crafts by over 100 native artists have since helped to pay the bills and keep the museum open for over 100,000 visitors from across America and across the seas!

     Some had predicted a scout unit could never build such a place or that a museum was not compatible with youth programs and performances.  In 2016 the last mortgage payment was made! Head Chief Ben Glover led the Board of Trustees in a mortgage burning ceremony and celebration.

    In 2006, Bill Burnett, one of the Kwahadi active leaders, arranged for a gift of $400,000 from the trust of Sybil Harrington. The gift was used to build the Cochera (“carriage house” – our bus barn) and to put a massive roof over the Plaza.   In gratitude we named the new indoor Plaza the Sybil Harrington Event Center. The Sybil Harrington Trust later included the Kwahadi Museum and Sybil Harrington Event Center as one of the benefactors in the ongoing income of Mrs. Harrington’s trust fund.

Future Kiva Projects

   The Kwahadi Museum is a living museum. Plans to improve and expand will help better serve the community. The Kiva requires a lot of attention to maintain the building and grounds, but volunteers cover most of the expense with their time, labor, and donations. Our plans for the future include putting a roof over the outdoor patio on the east side to create a girls’ dressing room and installing heating and air-conditioning for both dressings dressing rooms. The project will cost about $150,000. The girls have been dressing in the small library. 

     We have a beautiful concept drawing from Overland Architects of San Antonio showing the exciting Phase II plans! The plan will build the children’s theater, double the size of the museum, provide a proper entrance access, double the size of the gift shop, and provide museum support and storage space. The parking lot has served us well, but has worn out over the years since it was installed. Phase II is estimated to cost three million dollars including replacing the parking lot which Charles Schmidt originally donated so long ago. The expansion is a good and functional idea in search of an Angel to help make it happen! We are hoping for another friend who will take an interest in the youth center and museum and can give life to the project to help make it all possible.

Wheels

    Ralph Irelan’s group had no bus, so he chartered buses for trips in the early days. In the Troop 80 days the boys not only used their two old school buses for camping, but also for show trips. The 1952 Chevrolet and the 1954 Ford buses were painted black (the Troop 80 theme color.)   Many Kwahadis remember trips in the old buses, like one to La Junta in the days before it was illegal to pick up birds along the road that had been hit by cars. Cruising at the high speed of 50 mph towards La Junta, someone would call out “Bird!” Bob Mack would turn the bus around and go back so the kids could pick up the smelly carcass and pull feathers for their regalia. We would not go very far until again the cry “Bird!” was heard!

    The Kwahadis had fixed up an old Silver Eagle bus during the 1997 to 2007 years, and had taken numerous national performance tours in it! In June of 2007 while the roof on the Plaza was being finished over the Plaza, the Kwahadis headed for Los Angeles to catch a plane to fly to Hawaii for our summer show tour! Bad luck struck as we lost our bus transmission, but we had some Kwahadi luck and coasted to a stop at the Furr’s Cafeteria in Gallup, New Mexico. Three hours later after a great lunch at Furr’s we loaded our gear onto a chartered bus and continued on our adventure, but the old bus, which we called the “war canoe,” was never to come back together.

    John Paul Jones was a member of the Kwahadi Navajo Clan (singers) during the days of the Troop 80 Dancers in the early 1960’s. He remained a Kwahadi enthusiast and a great admirer of Jack Bryant, a father figure in his life. He and Kathy had already received an Eagle’s Way bronze as Founders of the museum.  They owned a successful car dealership in Greenville, Wisconsin, north of Chicago. John Paul heard of our bus troubles and again took action. He persuaded a friend to donate an MCI diesel coach which he no longer used. He arranged to have the MCI and our old broken Trailways bus traded in on a used, but beautiful, 1993 $100,000 red Van Hool Coach!

    John Fruge, our amazing dedicated tour driver for many years, flew from his home in Louisiana to Chicago and drove the MCI bus back to Arlington, TX for the trade! We had our old Silver Eagle bus towed from Gallup all the way to Arlington.  John Paul donated $30,000 and got the balance down to where the Kwahadis could pay the rest of the cost. Our old truck was also problematic. John Paul donated a much newer truck from our neighbor, Bruckner’s Truck Company! The Kwahadis were back in business!  We have been running those vehicles on trips ever since!

The Kwahadi Program

    All young people can become members of the Kwahadis. All Kwahadis are encouraged to achieve two great goals: 1) Earn the rank of Eagle Scout and/or the Venturing Summit Award, or the Girl Scout Gold Award, and 2) Earn the rank of Kwahadi Dance Chief. As a young Kwahadi progresses up the ranks of scouting, he/she also constructs regalia and attends dance training! We are proud of the over three hundred boys and girls whose photographs are displayed in our Eagle Hall of Fame.

    One of our traditions is to honor a boy or girl for achieving their goals by performing the Eagle Dance at the Court of Honor when he or she receives the Eagle Scout, Summit Award, or Gold Award.  Over the years many other troops became aware of the tradition and have invited the Kwahadis to perform the Eagle Dance to honor their scouts too. We have been pleased to dance for many ceremonies here in Amarillo, surrounding communities, and around the nation!   We remember flying the members of the Kwahadi Top Ten to Camp Many Points, Minnesota where the Kwahadi Chiefs performed for a statewide recognition ceremony for a thousand new Eagle Scouts. We flew the Top Ten Kwahadis to ceremonies in Vermont and Arizona to take part in Eagle Scout presentations. We have encouraged thousands of Scouts in well over 100 Scout camps in 48 states to never give up on their quest to become an Eagle Scout!   We have also been blessed to perform for scouts and leaders all across Europe and to visit many fine camps and scout centers to encourage them to earn their own high ranks!   It is always an honor to take part in Eagle Scout Award ceremonies for near and distant friends! 

    Kwahadis who earn the Eagle Scout, Summit Award, or Gold Award and who earn the rank of dance Chief become members of the Kwa or Eagle Society. The Kwa Society traditionally performs the Eagle Dance at the end of each winter show, a tradition which began in 1969. The dance encourages all of the dancers in the program to achieve the high goals of Eagle Scout, Summit, or Gold Award and to become a dance Chief who can lead, inspire, and get things done.

    Kwahadis typically have the opportunity to perform during their teen years in 700 to a 1000 or more shows, in 40 or more states, and to visit major national parks, universities, theme parks, fine galleries, and museums. They get to meet great scouters and scouts all across America and perform in fine theaters and in dozens of beautiful scout camps, churches, schools, and other facilities.   They have performed for community celebrations, conventions, scouting events, fundraisers, church groups, youth detention centers, etc. in their travels across America.

    The Kwahadis travel, at their own expense several times each summer to perform at the Volunteer Training Center at Philmont Scout Ranch.  We made our first performance trip to Philmont in the summer of 1986 when former Kwahadi Chief, Steve Zimmer, was director of the Philmont Seton Library and Museum. Steve told the training center director, Forrest McVicker, about the Kwahadis, and he invited the group to travel to Philmont and perform on the Saturday evening “Western Night.” The Kwahadis accepted the invitation and 26 Kwahadis made the trip to perform! The next morning at breakfast he brought his calendar book and wanted to know which dates we could return! We were surprised and honored!

    That was the beginning of a great tradition of traveling to Philmont each summer to entertain hundreds of scouters from all over America, Canada, and the world. Over the past 33 years the Kwahadis have performed 146 Philmont shows at the training center for over 55,000 scouters and members of their families. We are honored by this opportunity and thoroughly enjoy entertaining and meeting scouters from around the country! The center is a mecca of trained and enthusiastic volunteers who make a tremendous difference through Scouting in the youth of our country!

The Clans

    During the Troop 80 days of the Kwahadis, the boys had divided into clans, apparently inspired by the clans of the Koshare Dancers. The clans gave the boys a choice of regalia and dance styles. The Kiowa Clan traditionally wears fancy dance regalia and study the fancy dance style of dance. The Sioux Clan traditionally wears “traditional” regalia, clothes representative of a more distant past, and dances in the traditional style.   

    The Hopi Clan provides the drum and song for dances.   It began as the Navajo Clan in the Troop 80 dancers. John Paul Jones was the first Chief of the Troop 80 Navajo Clan as Jack Bryant introduced songs to the group. In 1968 the Navajo transformed into the Hopi Clan. Led by Steve Zimmer, the group grew and became strong drummers and singers. Over the years many who started as a Hopi have moved into one of the other clans to dance.  Peter deKeratry was the last Chief of a fully functioning Hopi Clan in the early 1980’s. Since that time alumni and leaders have joined together to sing the old songs and drum the shows. Many of the Kwahadis have also learned the songs and join in when they are not dancing.

The Kwoneshi

    In 1997, a Kwahadi program for girls was created under the leadership of John and Debbie Stich. A few girls had performed in certain dances from time to time in past. With the beginning of the winter show a few ladies were chosen to perform roles in the performance, but most Kwahadi shows were just the young men. The new program was set up as Girl Scout Troop 99.  They elect their own officers and manage their part in the performances. The Head Chief and the Head Maiden work together to engage all of the youth in each program.  The project immediately prospered as dozens of girls joined and began training to dance in the Kwahadi shows! Over 200 girls have now performed in the Kwahadis!

    The girls group became known as the Kwoneshi. The name Kwoneshi is the Lakota word for “Dragon Flies, and was inspired by the girls’ group in Carl Parlasca’s Song of Hiawatha production.  According to tradition, Lakota warriors riding off to battle considered it a good sign if the colors of the rainbow could be seen in the wings of the dragonflies around their horses. The girls’ program has certainly been good fortune and a blessing for the Kwahadis!   Many of the dances performed by the Kwahadis have roles for girls which had been either left out or had to be performed by the boys in the past. It is amazing how much better things became with real girls dancing! Today the Kwoneshi are well established and bring much talent, leadership, and fine regalia to Kwahadi performances.

    The Kwahadis train each fall to prepare the winter dances and train each spring to prepare summer dances.  New members are welcomed year around at rehearsals by the Kwahadis to train with the team. They eventually join the Kwoneshi, Sioux, Kiowa, or Hopi clans.

The Kwahadi Heritage

     Every Kwahadi has his or her own package of experiences, adventures, memories, buddies, and moments which they will never forget! Together they have created one of the most active groups of Scouts in America, have reached out to encourage thousands of Scouts and youth all across the nation, Canada, and Europe, and have built a great museum filled with the beautiful art and things of the first Americans.

    A golden thread of inspiration and tradition has been passed down from Hubbard, Irelan, Burshears, Bryant, and a host of inspirational families and friends over the past 75 years. Rich traditions of dance, song, travel, teamwork, and comradery flow throughout the hundreds of youth who have danced over the past 75 years. Each generation of Kwahadis becomes the teachers who pass on the traditions to the next. Coaches can teach youth to dance, but the heritage dwells in the hearts of the dancers and must be passed on from one to another. Dancing and performing is much more than just the mechanics of dance. It is much more than any one dancer. It is through the power of the team that the magic is found!

     There is so much to remember and to be thankful for! Thanks for celebrating our anniversary and for taking a moment to relive or learn of the Kwahadi story. We hope there will be many more boys and girls who will walk through the Kiva door and who will create their own adventures, stories, and memories.  They will inherit the golden threads of inspiration and magic which we have joined over 2000 Kwahadis together for 75 years! The golden threads have made us all into a great family who share this unique inheritance. We expect the best is yet to come!

HIGHLIGHTS ALONG THE WAY

The Beginnings

1920   Ralph Hubbard led 100 Scouts to first World Scout Jamboree in England, set up the Indian Village, and wowed thousands of European youth with American Indian style dancing by the American scouts.

Late 1920’s  Charles Colgate works as staff member of the staff of Ralph Hubbard’s Ten Sleep Ranch near Elbert, Colorado. From Hubbard he learns about the west, outdoor skills, cowboy skills, native dancing, and crafts. 

1922 – 1930  A young Ralph Irelan, Santa Fe Railway engineer, lived in La Junta, Colorado, an important train stop and cattle shipping center. Ralph served as Scoutmaster of Troop 2230. His first Eagle Scout in the troop was a boy named James Francis Burshears, who loved Scouting, archery, and antique stores which sold old things. When Ralph was transferred to Amarillo, no replacement was found to be scoutmaster, so Burshears, then Senior Patrol Leader of the troop, took on the role and kept it going.  That begins another fabulous story called the Koshare Dancers.

1935 – First National Scout Jamboree was planned in Washington, D.C. to celebrate the 25^th Anniversary of Scouting was delayed until 1937 due to a polio outbreak. In 1937 Hubbard created the Indian program for the Jamboree.

1938 – Scoutmaster Bill Jewitt of Troop 9 in Amarillo decided to retire after several years of service. Ralph Irelan became Scoutmaster of Troop 9. 

1940 – Troop 9 moved an old building from the Amarillo Army/Air Force Base and relocated it at 24^th and Taylor. Much of their activity was conducted there, across the street at the Jewish Temple (the troop’s sponsor), and at Ralph Irelan’s nearby home.

1944 – Forensic Medical Doctor, Charles E. Colgate, a navy Lieutenant with the Veteran’s Administration, enlisted as assistant scoutmaster in charge of the Senior Patrol, a group of scouts 14 and older.

Oct, 1944  Troop 9 Senior Patrol inspired by Dr. Colgate decided to do an Indian dance as their campfire presentation at the Scout Field Day competition in Elwood Park.   Charles Schmidt said, “When Colgate opened his suitcase of fine Indian regalia, we were all hooked!”  Learning about dancing and crafts soon followed through the winter of 1944-45.

March 1945   Senior Patrol began focusing intently on competition skills and the dance routine for field day competition. A drum was constructed out of an empty nail keg covered with old rubber innertube for the drum heads.

May 8, 1945  Axis powers surrender unconditionally to Allied Forces. World War II in Europe ends!

The Early Kwahadis

1944 – 1947  Ted Abrahamson, youth troop leader, was the first informal Head Chief.

May 19, 1945   Troop 9 Senior Patrol presented the first dance at Scout Field Day in Elwood Park, Amarillo. Dancers were Jerry Abrahamson, Ted Abrahamson, Henry Bates, George Cunningham, Dan Ferguson, Tom Fotheringham, Jack Rogers, and Charles Schmidt. Walter Wolfram, having just become old enough to be in the Senior Patrol, became the drummer. A few days later in 1945 someone from the Downtown Lions’ Club called Ralph Irelan and wanted the troop to do their dance for the Lions.  Then someone from the Amarillo Rotary Club called Ralph and wanted the troop to do their dance for a meeting of the Rotarians. That was three shows and would be the end of the story except the phone kept ringing – over and over – over 4000 times now!!

1945-1947 The group doubled in size to 16 senior scouts and presented numerous programs from 10 to 25 minutes in length.

1947 – 1949   Arthur Garner was the 2nd Head Chief.

June, 1947  Dr. Colgate resigned as assistant Scoutmaster of Troop 9.  Ralph Irelan continued to lead the dance activities.

October, 1947   With help from enthusiastic parents, the group was formally organized and became the Kwahadi Indian Club. Inspired by the Silver Jubilee edition of the Amarillo Globe News, the name “Kwahadi” was chosen after the Kwahadi band (translates “Antelope Eaters”) of the Comanche people who lived in the area and had their favorite wintering camps in the Palo Duro Canyon.

During the post-war years Troop 9 prospered under Scoutmaster Ralph E. Ireland. He had turned his living room into a Scouting office. 

1948 – The Kwahadis chartered with the Boy Scouts as Explorer Post 9 with fifteen scouts and with Ralph Irelan as advisor. A group of hard-working parents served as the post committee. Ted Abrahamson became the first informal youth leader or Head Chief of the Kwahadi club.

February, 1949  Troop 9 chartered a bus and traveled to Laredo, TX to perform at the Martha Washington Celebration.

1949 – 1952  Edward Irelan, 3^rd Head Chief

Fall, 1949  Plans were made to attend to 2^nd National Jamboree in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.  Through the fall and winter many long hours were spent preparing the Kwahadis’ first publicity brochure. Three more tipis were sewn and painted in Ralph’s back yard.  (Ruby Irelan was impressed with the paint smears on the grass. Her lawn was part grass and part paint for a long time afterwards.) A new four-foot diameter drum was constructed, and the Kwahadi Shield was painted on the drum hide.

Fall, 1949  The Kwahadi Shield was designed by Mr. Joe Abrahamson with ideas and approval from the committeemen. The shield design was not only painted on the new big drum, but was also used to decorate the corner of the cover of the first brochure. The design of the Shield is specific: Round, made of buckskin for protection, with the Laurel of Victory crossed with Pipe of Peace as the central design. A drawing of the head of an antelope is placed in the upper quarter between the Laurel of Victory and the Pipe of Peace. The antelope is native to the High Plains and relates to the Kwahadi name. Seven stars of wisdom (Indian design for a star as a cross) are placed at the top and on either side of the shield. Seven eagle feathers are suspended from the bottom of the shield denoting the seven stages in the life of a man from birth to death. The shield is bound by a leather thong binding the many members of the Kwahadi into one lasting body.

May, 1950  First Kwahadi brochure goes to printer and tells the Kwahadi story. The brochure helped the Kwahadis to get even more shows. The show grew to an hour in length.

July, 1950  Arthur Garner became the first elected Head Chief of the Kwahadis. Ted Abrahamson had served to this point as the informal Head Chief. At this time five girls, sisters of Kwahadi members and their class friends, were approved to be members of the Kwahadis. They built regalia and took part in the dances as needed.

July, 1950. The disruption of WWII delayed the second national scout jamboree until 1950. Ralph led the council contingent to the National Scout Jamboree in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, June 27 – July 6. The group of 36 scouts, 16 of whom were Kwahadi senior scout dancers, traveled by train from Amarillo all the way to Pennsylvania to join over 47,000 Scouts at the jamboree. They set up tipis, rolled out their new their new large drum, and danced at regular intervals on the troop site.   (Bill Dillahunty, leader of the Sahawe Dancers in Uvalde, TX, says his troop was camped next to the Kwahadis and the dancing was part of what inspired him to devote over sixty years to leading the Sahawe!)

    Ralph Irelan’s words: Over the next six years a Continental Trailways bus was often chartered to transport the Kwahadis to many towns in the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandle to present their now longer one-and-a-half-hour performance to civic clubs, children’s groups, schools, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, etc. At one appearance before the Convention of Insurance Women’s Organization in the Herring Hotel in the summer of 1951, a Mrs. Moore from Laredo, Texas, was impressed with the club and proceeded to make arrangements for them to come to Laredo. The Kwahadis traveled in 1952 to Laredo and danced at the Martha Washington Celebration, an elaborate international celebration with citizens of Mexico which is held in connection with George Washington’s birthday. Moke Davenport drove the bus on the all-expense paid trip to Laredo where about 2000 people enjoyed the show immensely!

    Among other notable performances was a twenty-minute halftime show in Dick Bivins stadium on August 19, 1951 for 15,500 people for an exhibition game between the Washington Redskins and the Detroit Lions! The Kwahadis chartered buses several times for various show trips, to attend the Gallup Intertribal Ceremonials twice, to go once to Anadarko, Oklahoma to the American Indian Exposition, and for several trips to La Junta to watch the Koshares perform.

    During 1956 many difficulties beset the club, interest declined, and the program died on the vine. Attempts to revive the program with other boys and parents produced little response.

August, 1956   First wave of Kwahadi scouts had grown up and left for college or the military. Ralph reports meetings to practice dancing had stopped. Ted Abrahamson and Walter Wolfram report they tried to find ways to keep the program going.

Troop 80 Days

Fall, 1957  Troop 80 of the Elks Lodge in west Amarillo needed to find someone to fill the vacant Scoutmaster position. Jack E. Bryant was persuaded to take the job “temporarily” until a Scoutmaster could be found. He served until 1987!

1957 – 1959   Summer trips of Troop 80 under new Scoutmaster, Jack Bryant, visited the Koshare Museum in La Junta, Colorado, a dream of Troop 2230 which had opened in 1949.   The Koshares had emerged under the guidance of Scoutmaster, James Francis Burshears. Their amazing show stirred the interest of the boys in Troop 80 in crafts and dancing.

1959   Inspired by the Koshare Dancers, Troop 80 begins a dance program for their older Scouts. Walter Wolfram and Ted Abrahamson, former Kwahadi members, were involved with Troop 80 as assistant Scoutmasters and helped with the dancers. They invited Ralph Irelan to see the Troop 80 dancers. Ralph liked what was going on in Troop 80 and was inspired to give his blessing to the group. The Troop 80 Dancers became the Kwahadi Dancers and inherited the Kwahadi legacy. Ralph continued as a leader and helped to teach the old dances and drumming.

Early 1960’s   The Kwahadi program under Jack Bryant grew in membership and presented many shows throughout area. Jack, a talented square dance caller, added native songs to the dances. Until that time the Kwahadis had danced only to the sound of the drum! The troop began summer shows at Potter County Stadium, and also began to dream of building their own Scout building.

The New Wave

August 1959  The Kachina Dancers emerged from their beginnings as the championship Golden Eagle Dance Team of the Palo Duro Lodge of the Order of the Arrow, the lodge of the Llano Estacado Council of the time. The team formed Explorer Post 62 and met at the Moose Lodge in north Amarillo under the leadership of Jerry Spencer.

1962 – 1963   Joe Riggs, 4th Head Chief, Sioux

1963 - 1964   Rick Jensen, 5^th Head Chief, Sioux

1964 – 1965  Rick Poppe, 6^th Head Chief, Sioux

Summer 1964  Jerry Spencer’s youngest brother, Ronnie, taught handicrafts at Camp Don Harrington. He and many others danced at the Friday night campfires.  He inspired the interest of Dumas scouts.  The Kachina Dancers helped the new Shoshoni Dancers in Dumas, TX to get started in August of 1964.

December 1964  In December of 1964 about thirty boys from the Shoshoni and Kachina groups traveled together to see the Koshare Dancers winter show. The scouts saw 120 dancers of the Koshares perform their Winter Night Ceremonials in La Junta. The group was inspired by the amazing show and by the discovery of a different form of dancing – a non-competitive style which was so different from the powwow styles of dance.  It also inspired a new vision to find a way to unite the various dance groups of the Amarillo area into a large team!

1965 – 1966  Jack Seeds, 7^th Head Chief, Kiowa

Many of the future Kwahadis who were to come from outside of Troop 80 first met Jack Seeds at the OA Conclave in 1964. He was a very friendly and strong personality, and he first told us about Jack Bryant and Troop 80.

May 1966  Members of the Shoshoni Dancers from Dumas who were off to college met Jack Bryant, Scoutmaster of Troop 80 and the Kwahadis. Jack invited the Shoshoni to come visit practice and dance with the Kwahadis! It was the first time he had opened membership in the Kwahadis to Scouts outside of Troop 80.   Many area dancers and scouts subsequently joined in with the Kwahadis as a step in the unification of the groups.

June 1966   Kwahadis performed their only show of 1966 at the State Society of Electrical Engineers Convention in Amarillo. 

1966 – 1967  Joe Dickson, 8^th Head Chief, Sioux. The Comanche Dance choreography was worked out in Joe’s backyard going back and forth under clothes lines.

August, 1966   Kwahadis gathered on the stage of the amphitheater in Sam Houston Park on a Sunday afternoon to photograph the dancers and dances.

August 1966   Kwahadi older chiefs traveled to Gallup and spent four days exploring the craft booths and stores, and watching daily dancing in the arena. This became an annual tradition for many years. Hundreds of fine old pieces of beadwork, silverwork, carvings, pottery, etc. began to be collected by high school and college age Kwahadis.

Spring, 1967  Construction began on Troop 80 Building.

1967 – 1968  Larry Rhea, 9^th Head Chief, Kiowa

August, 1967  Although the building was still under construction, the Kwahadis conducted the first meeting in the building, a rehearsal, amidst the debris and power tools to prepare for a performance at the Dalhart XIT Rodeo.

November, 1967   Building opened as the Jack E. Bryant Scouting Center. The Kwahadis danced a deer dance at the opening ceremony, a small but enthusiastic beginning of the Kwahadi winter shows.

April, 1968, Kwahadis, inspired by the Koshares, presented a second winter show series, (first multiple dance show) which included a collection of new dances from the Southwest cultures.

1968 – 1969   Guy Giersch, 10^th Head Chief, Kiowa

     Guy was first of new Scouts from outside Troop 80 to become Head Chief. Friday night craft session ran year around to build personal regalia and to work on the wardrobe for the next winter show.

August, 1968   First summer shows were scheduled in Jack Bryant Center instead of Potter Field.

September, 1968   Many Kwahadis served on the staff at Camp Don Harrington and recruited 30 new Scouts from many troops who showed up at the Jack Bryant Center to begin training. 

December 5, 1968. Buck Burshears used Randall County Sheriff office to reach someone in the Kwahadis to let them know Shalako was the following Saturday and invited the group to join the Koshares for the event.

December 7, 1968   Four Kwahadi college guys made the trip to Zuni, joined 80 Koshares in the St. Anthony’s Mission school gym for a bit of sleep, and then got up at 1:00 AM to walk around the village and peered through windows at the amazing masked dances. It was extremely cold and tiring, and we loved it! The trip to Shalako became an annual tradition after that and hundreds of Kwahadis have made the journey and shared the exciting experience. 

December 1968    3rd Winter Ceremonial shows presented in Jack Bryant Center. Steve Zimmer, Navajo Clan Chief, leads move to change clan name to Hopi Clan.

1969 – 1970  Bill Chudej, 11^th Head Chief, Sioux

October, 1969  Thirty Kwahadis rode their bus downtown on a dark and stormy evening to the Herring Building to perform for State Disabled American Veterans Convention on the 11^th floor. After taking turns getting gear and Kwahadis up the small elevator, the Kwahadis presented a spectacular and well-received show. The national president of the DAV was in attendance.

December/January 1968-1969  4^th Winter Ceremonial extended into January, beginning the move away from the Christmas Holidays. Druce Riley, Hopi Chief, builds traditional support frame for the winter drum by bending loops into steel pipe around a telephone pole. The young men of the Kwahadis work tirelessly to expand their dancing and wardrobe.

January 1970  Kwahadi Committee Chairman, Ed Donelson, announced a deal to perform at the National Disabled American Veterans Convention in Los Angeles. Terry Carnes paints first show backdrop for the trip. Bob Mack builds new road show lighting system. Senior Chief, Phillip Tuttle, organizes gear for the summer bus tour.

August 1970  California Show Tour

    40 Kwahadis and leaders traveled all-expense paid in a brand new Trailways bus on the ten-day trip to perform for the Nation DAV Convention and at the San Diego Naval Base Theater. The group visited the San Diego Zoo and Disneyland, toured the aircraft carrier Ticonderoga, and visited several museums. They experienced the cold water of the Pacific Coast and watched the sun rise over the Grand Canyon!

1970 – 1971  Scott Tjernagel, 12^th Head Chief, Sioux

1971 – 1972  Frank Brown, 13^th Head Chief, Sioux

1972 – 1973  John Stich, 14^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1971 – 1974  Kwahadis continued to grow and to perform more shows each year. Winter show repertoire blossomed.

1973-1974  Johnny Wiegand, 15^th Head Chief, Sioux

1974 – 1975  David Emerson, 16^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1975 Summer Tour Across Southwest

1975 – 1976  Kenney Brewer, 17^th Head Chief, Sioux

Fall 1975 – Effort to create another show tour began. Hundreds of potential sponsors were contacted in the eastern states, and the 1976 Bicentennial Tour became a reality.

July 1976  Bicentennial Show Tour

Kwahadis presented 10 shows and performed on the grounds of the Capitol as part of a two week show tour and celebration of America’s Bicentennial. The group met Vice President Nelson Rockefeller briefly, toured the Congress and White House, and toured much of the Smithsonian.

1976 – 1977  Kevin Brown is the 18^th Head Chief, Sioux

April 1977  The Kiva Committee was formed under the leadership of Professor Jack Muthersbough of West Texas State University. Jack was an avid Scouter and friend of the Kwahadis. In the coming weeks Dr. Arthur Garner retained architect Terrance Doane to develop plans to build a theater and museum facility for the Kwahadi program. Walter Wolfram set up the group as a non-profit tax-exempt organization with the IRS. Mr. Gilstrap, a Kwahadi parent, wrote a check for $1,000 to provide the seed money for the project. Terrance Doane developed a beautiful concept, and an architectural painting showing the proposed facility was commissioned. The group met many times, but did not take action to raise the estimated $300,000 needed at the time to build the facility. By late 1979 the group became inactive.

Midwest Summer Show Tour

1977 – 1978  Mark Hobgood, 19^th Head Chief, Kiowa

Southern Show Tour

1978 – 1979  Frank Silverman, 20^th Head Chief, Sioux

1979 California Summer Show Tour

1979 – 1980  Jaybob Shaw, 21^st Head Chief, Kiowa

Grand Northwest Show Tour. First three-week tour! Performed in Moses Lake, Washington just a few weeks after the nearby eruption of Mt. St. Helens. Ash was everywhere and got on everything!

1980 – 1981  Joe Hays, 22^st Head Chief, Sioux.  Joe was a Lone Scout from Kress, TX and the only Lone Scout of the Kwahadis to earn the Eagle Scout Award.

1980 – 1984  John Stich, Advisor of the Kwahadi Dance Program

1981 – 1982  Randy Kinnison, 23^rd Head Chief, Hopi

1982 – 1983  Gordon Wiegand, 24^th Head Chief, Sioux

1983 – 1984  Gordon Wiegand, 25^th Head Chief, Sioux

1984 Summer Show Tour to World’s Fair in New Orleans

1984 – 1985  Kenny Ramey, 26^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1985 – 1986  Jimmy Sample, Advisor of the Kwahadi Program

1985, First International Performance Tour - Jordan Festival of the Arts

    Jack Bryant received a call via the Scout Office inviting the Kwahadis to participate in the International Festival of the Arts in Ammon, Jordan. Jack led the trip planning and accompanied the group. King Hussein and Queen Noor flew the group on Jordanian Airlines from Chicago and provided accommodations in the Hotel Jerusalem upon arrival.

    We remember loading the big airplane in Chicago late at night for the flight to Vienna, Austria. We had to walk out onto the runway to the aircraft. A crew was working with spotlights on one of the aircraft’s big landing gear. It was a bit surreal and began to feel scary. We climbed the steps and were greeted by a civilian security guard who carried Uzi rapid fire weapon! There was much tension in the world, including American hostages being held close to Jordan in Lebanon. This was the first of 26 security checks on the trip with scary guys with weapons.

    We flew to Vienna, enjoyed an afternoon exploring a whole new world, then settled in to hotels. Jack had already gone ahead and was in Jordan awaiting us. The next morning, we explored the streets with free time. Most of the Kwahadis found an ice cream shop operated by teenage fraulein. The Kwahadis ate lots of ice-cream! Then it was time to catch the bus to airport for the rest of the journey across the Mediterranean to Jordan.

     The security at the Vienna airport was again intense with several more security checks and soldiers walking around with weapons at ready. Soon we were aboard of huge Boeing 747, and somehow the incredibly huge aircraft just leaped off the runway and soared off into the heavens with us on board!

    As we approached airport in Jordan, we peered out the windows at the barren brown landscape which stretched as far as we could see. After landing in Ammon Jordan we went looking for our big “thunder drum” which had been air-freighted ahead in its red carrying case. As we came out into an open area it was prayer time for the Muslim population, and they were all owing towards Mecca. Our big red drum case just happened to be on the Mecca side of the large hall. It was a surreal scene to us like one out of an Indian Jones movie of the time.

    Security continued to be intense, and we were escorted into a bus with all the curtains closed. Two heavily armed soldiers sat in the back. It continued to be a scary journey as we sped through the late evening twilight to the Hotel Jerusalem. As pulled into the hotel we noticed heavily armed soldiers everywhere. Soldiers were on guard in foxholes around the hotel. Jack Bryant met us here. He told the leaders he had received a phone call threatening his life, and that we should get everyone into their rooms and stay there. The kinds of scenes we had seen only on nightly news was suddenly all-to-real.

    The next morning our host arranged a bus to take us sightseeing. Once again there were soldiers in the back of the bus and a soldier driving. As we sped down a huge interstate highway, we noticed there were no stripes on the road! Vehicles were weaving back and forth across and around each other! The boys soon noticed our soldier/driver was driving the same way and liberally sending signs to the other drivers. The Kwahadis began to cheer him on! It was like a big video game as we looked out the windshield!  The driver was soon smiling back at the cheering boys. From that point on we forgot about the thought of dangers and security, and just had a good time with the beautiful and interesting people of Jordan who took care of us. The Kwahadis were soon teaching country-western dancing in the bus aisle to our Jordanian host and hostess! We enjoyed performing at the festival, touring the amazing ancient ruins of Petra, and ascending Mt. Nebo. We found out what it is like to try to swim in the Dead Sea!

1985 – 1986  Don Chambers, 27^th Head Chief, Sioux

1986  Eastern Show Tour

      It took two buses to transport the show team on this tour! Our caravan arrived in New York City late one night. Instead of just driving by on the interstate north of the city we decided to exit and take a late-night drive down Broadway! Our Texas kids were amazed as they peered out the bus windows! The driver of the second bus, David Wesley, was heard to say over the bus CB radio, “Who’s bright idea was this?!” He was ready to reach Camp Alpine just across the Hudson River and to go to sleep. As we tried to find a way back north through the city to the interstate, we became lost for a while in the Bronx. Everyone was ready for sleep by that time, but we finally made our way out and headed on to the camp.

1986              Rick Devine, 28^th Head Chief, Sioux

September 1986  First organized program for training new members as a group began. Called the Kit Fox Program, young men began training together as a beginners’ clan. The system continued each fall for 20 years. After completing Kwahadi training, they “walked” to the clan of their choice after the last winter show of the year.

1986 – 1987   Gary Murphey Advisor of the Kwahadi Program

1987              Joe Nelson, 29^th Head Chief completes  term, Sioux

1987  Northwest Show Tour

1987 – 1988   George Wesley, 30^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1988  Midwest/Chicago Show Tour 

1988 – 1989  Aaron Fry, 31^st Head Chief, Sioux

1989  Midwest Show Tour

1989 – 1990  Kyle Hawbaker, 32^nd Head Chief, Sioux

1990  Southern Show Tour

1990 – 1991  Jarrett Wilson, 33^rd Head Chief, Kiowa

1991 Northeast Show Tour

1991 – 1992  Jeremy Weller, 34^th Head Chief, Sioux

1992 - 1993   Guy Giersch Advisor of Kwahadi Program

1992             Jeremy Weller, 35^th Head Chief, Sioux

1993             Shawn Best finishes term, 36^th Head Chief, Sioux

1993 – 1994  Tyson Foerster, 37^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1994  Colorado Show Tour

1994 – 1995   Brad Fansler, 38^th Head Chief, Kiowa

1995  Disneyworld Southern Show Tour

1995 – 1996   Landon Morris, 39^th Head Chief, Sioux

We persuaded the troop to invest in a used Continental Trailways Silver Eagle Bus! We had a lot to learn about such buses.

1996  Canadian Show Tour at Invitation of Canada’s Chief Scout Executive

     The Kossa Dancers of Sulphur, LA, joined us for the first of several tours! John Fruge brought 8 Kossa to Amarillo then helped drive the bus on the tour. This was the first of many partnerships with the Kossa and of many tours where John was the driver!

    We enjoyed the Museum of Man and the Changing of the Guard ceremony at the nation’s capital in Ottawa, and meet Mike Reid in Montreal. Mike became a great friend and brought the Kwahadis back to Canada several times for shows and adventures! We performed at the huge hockey stadium in Montreal and afterwards met George McArtle “Chief Top Leaf,” headman of the Mohawk Nation. He spoke with the boys after their show told them how their interest in native ways honored native people. He told the boys “...always dress your best and dance with enthusiasm!”

1996 – 1997  Heath Janzen, 40^th Head Chief, Sioux 

1997  Northeast Show Tour

    We remember watching “Miss Saigon” on Broadway in New York City, seeing David Letterman afterwards who was doing part of his show in the street outside his studio, and eating at Roy Rogers Restaurant! Don Haley, driving in NYC remembered how hard it was to find a parking place! Getting out of the city in the evening traffic was were challenging, but we made it onto the freeway in the Bronx and headed north to our next-day show in Massachusetts.

   The bus had other plans and on the freeway the clutch slipped (broke) and we coasted to a stop at a convenient pull-out. We found ourselves stranded in the bus at 11 pm in the Bronx on a freeway with no restrooms or services. It turned out the freeway pullout was also a haven for NYC ladies of the night who kept coming up to the bus. Charles went over to a nearby bank of pay phones and fortunately found a charter bus company to rescue us.

    By midnight we were loaded on a charter bus WITH MOVIE SCREENS above the seats! The Kwahadis liked that and a new vision for our bus began. Randal Smith and Don Haley stayed behind, got a tow truck, got the bus repaired, and caught up with the tour two days later!  

Fall, 1997, John and Debbie Stich begin program for girls. Becoming known as the Kwoneshi Clan, they at first participated only during the winter season and winter shows.

1997 – 1998  Phillip Szydloski, 41^st Head Chief, Sioux

1998  Northwest Show Tour

1998 – 1999  Phillip Szydloski, 42^nd Head Chief, Sioux

    David Knorr, a Scouter who had met the Kwahadis at a Philmont performance, attended the Indian Summer performance in the fall of 1998. He brought exciting news that he wanted to take the Kwahadis on a show tour to Europe!

1999 European Show Tour

    63 Kwahadis made the three weeks, 18 show tour! The team performed nightly and toured daily! Landed in Irelan, traversed Scotland via Edinburgh, encircled England, then road the train through the “Chunnel” to Paris for the return flight! We saw the “Changing of the Guard” at Windsor Palace, Hadrian’s Wall, Parliament and Ben Tower, “Riverdance” at the dance troupe’s home theater in Dublin, the Eiffel Tower, the Mona Lisa painting, etc., etc.

1999 – 2000  Ty Barfield, 43^rd Head Chief, Kiowa

2000 - East Coast Show Tour and back across the United States to the Millennium Jamboral in Utah! Kwahadi bus blew a cylinder and David Kandik and Kossa bus rescued the entire crew with 55 people on board and took off to the Gallup Ceremonials!

2000 – 2001  Huntley Almond, 44^th Head Chief, Kiowa

2001   Northeast Show Tour and National Scout Jamboree in Virginia

2001 – 2002  David Sanders, 45^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Heather Stich, first Head Maiden (Winter) and 2^nd Head Maiden (Summer)

2002 Northeast Show Tour and Canadian Scout Jambec near Montreal

August 2002 – Kwahadi Heritage Board of Trustees authorizes construction of Kwahadi Museum and Performance Center 

2002 – 2003  Giles Bowling, 46^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Briar Stich, 3rd Head Maiden (Winter), Kwoneshi program becomes year around and ladies begin to build summer outfits.   Doanh Sanders and Ginny Love share term as 4^th Head Maidens, (summer),

2003 Western Show Tour

2003 – 2004  David Sanders, 47^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Ginny Love, 5^th Head Maiden (Winter), Doanh Sanders, 6^th Head Maiden (Summer)

June 4, 2004 Grand Opening and Ribbon Cutting of new Kwahadi Museum and Performance Center,

2004 Hawaii Show Tour

2004 – 2005  David Sanders, 48^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Kristina Reneau, 6th Head Maiden (Winter), Doanh Sanders 7^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2005 Eastern Show Tour and Canadian Scout Jambec near Montreal

2005 – 2006  Mitchell Cates, 49^th Head Chief, Sioux, Doanh Sanders, 7^th Head Maiden (Winter), Ashely Copeland and Elizabeth Wesley share 8^th Head Maiden role (Summer)

2006 Canada Show Tour

2006 – 2007  Mitchell Cates, 50^th Head Chief, Sioux, Briar Stich 9^th Head Maiden (Winter), Doanh Sanders, 10^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2007 Western Show Tour

2007 - 2008  Dustin Sanders, 51^st Head Chief, Kiowa, Doanh Sanders, 11^th Head Maiden (Winter), Caitlyn Dahl, 12^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2008 Northeast Show Tour and Fall Performance Trip to Busan, S. Korea

2008 – 2009  Dustin Sanders, 52^nd Head Chief, Kiowa, Caitlyn Dahl, 13^th Head Maiden (Winter) and becomes first Kwoneshi to earn Girl Scout Gold Award. Caitlyn Dahl 14^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2009 Eastern Show Tour   

2009 – 2010  Nick Wilson, 53^rd Head Chief, Kiowa.  Caitlyn Dahl 15^th Head Maiden (Winter), Lauren Russell 16^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2010 100^th Anniversary of Scouting Show Tour – 4 shows on regional stages at Jamboree

2010 – 2011  Nick Wilson, 54^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Abby Gibson 16^th Head Maiden (Winter), Madeline Dahl, 17^th Head Maiden, (Summer)

2011 Nova Scotia Show Tour across Northeast – joint tour with Koshare Dancers of La Junta, Colorado. 18 shows, 23 days on the road!

2011 – 2012  Nick Wilson, 55^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Abby Gibson, 18^th Head Maiden (Winter), Abby Gibson, 19^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2012  Midwest Show Tour 2012 – 2013

2012 – 2013  Ryan Fletcher, 56^th Head Chief, Sioux, Lauren Paige Johnson, 20^th Head Maiden (Winter), Aby Cuellar 21^st Head Maiden (Summer)

2013 – 2014  Truett Gibbs, 57^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Melissa Waters, 22^nd Head Maiden (Winter), Melissa Waters, 23^rd Head Maiden (Summer)

2014 European Show Tour – 43 Kwahadis presented 18 shows from Rome Italy to London, England. Visited Pompey, Roman ruins, Florence, Venice, swam in the Adriatic Sea, hiked the mile-long Omaha Beach where America soldiers landed on D-Day – toured D-Day museum and American cemetery, road train across “Chunnel” to London and presented several shows while touring England.

2014 – 2015  Brandon Allen, 58^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Mellissa Waters, 24^th Head Maiden (Winter), Abbie Raef, 25^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2015  California Spring Show Tour and Midwest Summer Tour – Michigan International Scout Camp show.

2015 – 2016  Ben Glover, 59^th Head Chief, Sioux, Abbie Raef, 26^th Head Maiden  (Winter), Callie Thornton, 27^th Head Maiden (Summer), Spring Show Tour to California, Summer Texas Show Tour

2016 – 2017  Ben Glover, 60^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Callie Thornton, 28^th Head Maiden (Winter), Callie Thornton 29^th Head Maiden (Summer)

2017 – 2018  Ben Glover, 61^th Head Chief, Kiowa, Kaitlyn Markley, 30^th Head Maiden (Winter), Kaitlyn Markley 31^st Head Maiden (Summer)

2018 – 2019   Zachary Glover, 62^st Head Chief, Kiowa, Kaitlyn Markley, 32^st Head Maiden (Winter), Elizabeth Holton, 33^rd Head Maiden (Summer)

2019 World Scout Jamboree Show Tour – three shows at Jamboree and shows in Arkansas, Tennessee, Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois. Playtime at Cedar Point Roller Coaster Park in Sandusky, Ohio and Six Flags Over Mid-America, St. Louis, Missouri.

2019 – 2020?

The Eagle Hall of Fame

    The first Eagle Hall of Fame was displayed on a 4’ X 8’ plywood board in 1970. Bob Mack and David Martin, Kwahadi Committeemen, and many helpers crafted the display with all of the pictures they could find of the Eagle Scouts of the Kwahadis. Two beautiful hand painted features, the Kwahadi Shield and the Eagle Scout Badge, were painted by Edward Irelan, an early Kwahadi and son of Ralph Irelan. The two pieces decorated the top corners of the board. The display hung in the Jack Bryant Scouting Center until the late 80’s. Then, as is often the case, a well intending adult took the board apart with the intent of building a better one, and then never did the rebuilding part of the job. The two pieces painted by Edward Irelan were lost to the club, but fortunately the photo files were preserved. Shortly after the Kiva was built, Kwahadi mom, Senora Fansler, took on the job with goal of rebuilding the board and brining it up to date. David Wesley helped with the matting of the individual photos. Senora searched in every way possible and was able to secure 85% of the photos and has worked to keep the board up-to-date. With the addition of the Kwoneshi program, ladies began to earn the Gold Award in Girl Scouting, and both men and women can earn the Summit Award in Venturing Scouting. Gold and Summit Award recipients were added to the board beginning with the first Gold Award earned by Caitlyn Dahl.

Would like to have the list looking something like this instead of an xcel spreadsheet look. I think Janie can hide the xcel grid lines and leave just he list visible for us. Maybe then we could drop it into multiple columns?

     Year     Name                              Unit

1   1944    Lawrence Youngblood  Troop 9

2    1945     Ralph Ireland               Troop 9

3    1945     George Cunningham      Troop 9

4    1946     Charles Lawrence         Troop 9

5    1946     Jack Rodgers              Troop 9

6    1948     Tommy Cleek                Troop 9

7    1949     Travis Tadlock             Post 9

8    1950      Garner Odell                Post 9

9    1951      Tommie D. Majors       Troop 9

10   1951      Bob Kerr                      Troop 5  

11   1952      William E. Glover         Post 9

12   1952      Van Hall                      Post 9

13   1952      Jerry Merchant          Post 9

14   1952     Dan Vaugh                  Post 9

15   1956        Carl Zimmerman          Post 56

16   1958        Dan Ferguson               Troop 9

17   1958        Jerry D. Spencer        Ship 72

18   1958         Larry Spencer            Ship 72

19   1959         Royal T. Abrahamson  Post 9

20   1959        Jack E. Bryant            Troop 80

21   1960         Richard Wayne Jenson Troop 80

22   1960        William Walker            Troop 66

23   1961         Tommy Sides                Troop 80

24   1961        Frederick H. Poppe, Jr Troop 80

25    1961        Jack Seeds                   Troop 80

26   1961        Joe Riggs                      Troop 80

27    1962        Dale Denny                    Troop 80

28    1962       Sam Stennis                 Troop 2

29    1962        Tommy Kuhn                 Troop 199

30    1962        Billy Gene Denny          Troop 62

31    1962         Rick Devoe                    Troop 80

32    1963       Charles Ritchie               Troop 40

33   1963        John Paul Jones             Troop 80

34    1963        Dwight Ray                      Troop 199 

35    1963        Michael Fair                    Troop 5

36    1963        Thomas Roller                 Troop 80  

We hope you will come often and stay long at the Kwahadi Kiva.

May you travel your road in happiness and keep the Kwahadi story alive.

..