Thursday, 21 May 2020

The Bolo Tie and Culture Clashes in the Southwestern USA




Delving back into the box of my father’s things that I found in my attic when having a Lockdown clear out, I found this thing. I remember it very clearly as my father was very proud of it and wore it often at weekends. I had no idea what it was called, however.

The plaited leather thong is about 2 feet long and ends in two silver tassels. The silver plate takes the form of a stylised dancing woman and is studded with turquoise. On the back is a double ring of silver that allows the silver plate to slide up and down the thong. Father used to wear it instead of a tie at weekends. He tucked the thong under his shirt collar, left the top button undone and had the silver plate well pushed up to sit just below the top button with the neck of the shirt slightly undone.

There are two stories linked to this object. The first is the result of research that I did to discover what it is. The second is, I think, more revealing of the clash of two very different cultures in the Southwest of the USA.  

So first, what is this? It is a “bolo tie” and is considered characteristic of Cowboy wear, particularly from the states of New Mexico, Arizona and [to some extent] Texas. It can be worn informally as my father wore it, or formally with a suit or jacket in which case the shirt top button would be fastened.

According to tradition, it was invented in the 1940s by a cowboy named Victor Cedarstaff of Wickenburg, Arizona. One day he was out working the cattle when his hat blew off. Wary of losing the silver-trimmed hatband, he slipped it around his neck. His companion joked, "That's a nice-looking tie you're wearing, Vic." An idea was born! Cedarstaff spent some time experimenting with silver ornaments, hat bands and such like until he created what was to become the bolo tie. He patented the plate and loop mechanism. The name he chose is derived from the Spanish boleadora, a type of lariat.

By the 1960s the bolo tie had become fashionable in Arizona and New Mexico, and was also being purchased as souvenirs by tourists. My father got his in the early 1970s. Because Cedarstaff’s original hat band had featured a silver ornament made by local Navajo craftsmen, the bolo ties became something of a speciality for the Navajo and other local Native American peoples.

The bolo tie was made the official neckwear of Arizona in 1971. New Mexico passed a non-binding measure to designate the bolo as the state's official neckwear in 1987. On March 13, 2007, New Mexico Governor, Bill Richardson, signed into law that the bolo tie was the state’s official tie. Also in 2007, the bolo tie was named the official tie of Texas.

But back to my father. He bought his bolo tie in Taos, New Mexico, in the early 1970s when he was in the USA on a business trip. It was always eyecatching and if anyone ever commented on it, he would happily tell the tale of when and where he bought it. If the hapless listener seemed interested, father would go on to detail the conversation he had in the shop where he bought it. That tale is a fascinating story of the clash of cultures and of the sort of impact that the advent of Western Civilisation had on the local Native Americans.

According to my father, he bought his bolo tie in a store in Taos that featured a wide range of Native American [they were called “Indians” back then] crafts and products. As well as buying his bolo tie he bought some silver and turquoise jewellery for my mother and a couple of nicknacks for my sister and me. Presumably the shop was not busy as my father got chatting to the store owner.

The store owner was a white man, though a local. He told my father that he spent most of his time in the store selling to tourists, but that every now and then he went out to tour the local pueblos and other settlements to buy stock. He pre-arranged the visits so that the local craftsmen could bring the stuff they had made to sell to him.

According to the man, he had no end of difficulty with the older craftsmen. Remember this was in about 1973, so the older men would have been born not long after the year 1900. At this time the local tribes were, more or less, still leading a traditional lifestyle, worshipped their tribal deities and rarely saw white settlers in the desert lands.

These older men were, apparently, the more skilled craftsmen and could work wonders. The problem was that they valued the items that they made in terms of the skill of the work that had gone into them. They produced the most wonderful works of art, very often highly decorated versions of everyday items used by the local people in their houses or on their farms. The problem was that none of the tourists from New York or San Francisco wanted to buy a pair of painted dancing moccasins, or beautifully beaded leather tool bags. They wanted to buy bolo ties, belts and brooches. 

The store keeper said that no matter how often he asked the old men to make him the sorts of objects that he could sell, they kept on making old style stuff that they valued. They simply could not understand that the tourists did not value things the same way that they did. As a result, the storekeeper would not buy things he could not sell, and the old craftsmen got very angry he would not pay for something they valued highly and had spent days making.

By contrast, he said, the younger men fully understood that the storekeeper would pay only for things that he could sell to tourists. So they came to the meetings laden down with all sorts of craftwork that were the right sort of items to sell to tourists. The storekeeper bought the lot.

That made things even worse. The old men saw the young men being paid for what they considered to be inferior quality goods. There were, the storekeeper said, some terrible arguments and once he had to call the police.

My father found this anecdote absolutely fascinating, and I think he was right to do so. He viewed this as being a prime example of culture clash between the white man and Native Americans. Living in traditional societies without a money economy and dealing only with their fellow tribesmen, the older Navajo valued work for the skill and effort that went into it. But the Europeans valued things for what use could be made of them. Obviously, belts and bolo ties were useful as clothing, but my mother’s jewellery was useful as personal adornment. Western culture uses money to find a value for things, but essentially the value lies in what you do with something, not in how much effort it took to make.

The old men were caught between cultures. They wanted money so that they could buy stuff with it, but could not understand how the White People [who had the money they wanted] valued things and hence decided what they would be willing to pay money for.

Time has moved on now. I guess that if I went to Taos today and visited a craftwork shop, things would be very different. The young men of my father’s time would now be old men. All the local craftsmen would understand the Western concept of money and economy.

At least, I assume so.

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