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132        REPORTS CONCERNING INDIANS IN          ARIZONA. 
REPORT OF SCHOOL SUPERINTENDENT IN CHARGE OF FORT APACHE 
AGENCY. 
FORT APACHE INDIAN AGENCY, 
Whiteriver, Ariz., August 29, 1904. 
SIR: I have the honor to submit the following report of the affairs of this
school 
and agency as superintendent and special disbursing agent for the fiscal
year ending 
June 30, 1.904: 
The census has been carefully taken, and it shows a population as follows:
Total population (males, 984; females, 1,074)-----------------2,058 
Wear citizen's clothing, wholly. .      ..------------------------------750
Wear citizen's clothing, in part. . .   .    ..----------------------------1,000
Do not wear citizen's clothing.    ..-------------------------------308 
Children of school age (6 to 18 years-males, 301; females, 264)- 565 
Children attending nonreservation schools----------------------14 
Children attending reservation schools------------------------202 
Children of school age not attending school anywhere---------- 349 
Children not physically fit to attend school, estimated-----------150 
Vocation of returned students from nonreservation schools: Farmers, stock
raisers, 
policemen, baker, carpenters, painters, interpreter. 
Most of these so-called students have married wild, uncivilized Indian girls
who 
refuse to live in any sort of house except one made of brush. These marriages
tend 
to cause retrograding from the training these boys have had in school. It
would be 
a progressive step if these Indian boys who are of marriagable age were permitted
and encouraged to marry girls of different tribe while yet in school and
just before 
they leave to make a home for themselves. The English language would necessarily
be the adopted language in the new home, for neither would be able to speak
the 
language of the other. I am sure that it takes a stronger will power than
any pos- 
sessed by these returned students to go against the superstition, habits,
and inclina- 
tions of the camp Indians of this tribe, and the result is that the predominant
force 
prevails. There is not an Indian girl or woman on the reservation who has
attended 
a nonreservation school, and there never will be if the parents' consent
must be had. 
They have the notion that girls need no education or training. 
Young men who have spent several years in good training schools return to
the 
reservation home with little respect for the dignity of common labor. They
are usu- 
ally trying to find something to do for which they are not at all fitted.
They have 
the idea that no education is needed to enable a man to raise corn, wheat,
or stock; 
that an ignorant man can raise vegetables and animals as well as an educated
one; 
that to increase a person's wants increases his sacrifices; that if he does
not want 
much he will not need to sweat or work much. Their view of life is akin to
that of 
the tramp. 
We are making effort to have our boys and girls see and feel that there is
as much 
dignity in the labor of the farmer and stock grower as there is in the work
of the lit- 
erary teacher, the clerk, or the physican; that their true worth will be
known by 
what they can really do and not by what they seem to be able to do; that
the labor 
of the person who acts with both his mind and body is worth a great deal
more than 
the one who acts with his body only. 
The buildings.-The buildings of the agency and school are all made of lumber
except two-the girls' dormitory and the power house. The buildings consist
of 
cottages, shops, shedB, barns, storehouses, and office building. Almost all
of the 
agency buildings are in good condition, having been painted during the past
year. 
The school buildings are all very poor except the girls' dormitory and a
small school 
building. The boys' dormitories, the school and mess building, and the laundry
are 
unfit for the use to which they must be put; they have been patched and repaired
so much that little more can be done to make them habitable. These buildings
were 
made about ten years ago when it was thought to be economy to make a school
build- 
ing of rough or unplaned lumber throughout. 
In 1902 a good beginning was made in the erection of a three-story stone
building 
containing the best of accommodations for 80 girls. Also during that year
there was 
made for the school here a good water and sewer system, and an electric-light
plant 
having sufficient dynamo power for more than 400 16-candlepower incandescent
lamps, which will be ample for a school of 200 children. From a single turbine
both agency and school have water and electric light. The water is taken
from 
White River, and it is forced through a 4-inch steel pipe 4,000 feet long
to a 75,000- 
gallon reservoir, located on the mountain side about 80 feet above the school
buildings