All my Indian Trader secrets how,when,where to buy authentic quality American and Canadian Indian Art. I have decided to openly disclose 60 years of my Indian Trade Secrets on this forum I like the software in the Reviews and Guides and most of the time it is more user friendly than anything else on the net. With the exception of a few incidents eBay has allowed me freedom of speech or at least warned me when I colored too far out of the lines. I have decided to give everyone on eBay a heads up on what we always called "Indin Tradun" because Native American Trading never quite sounded right.  Most of that politically correct stuff never quite sounds right no matter how you write it or speak it. My Friend Victor Kishigo of Indian Hills Art Gallery confronted me several times throughout my life. Actually educating me in his own way since I  first met him at a Odawa work COOP in Petoskey on Christmas Eve Day in 1966. The first time I used the word Native he said." do I look like one of those guys who run around in the Jungle? "He said don't ever call me that name.LOL and he was dead serious. When he and I were finally getting along reasonably well I mentioned we should combine businesses this was just prior to his move from his little Tar Paper Shack Gallery his dad had built that sat on the same place for years in Petoskey where the New Indian Hills Gallery sits . He said ,"O yes then you will be Red Ryder and I will be Little Beaver "LOLOL. "or better yet you the Lone Ranger and me Tonto! "LOL Victor was one of those personalities you meet once in a lifetime. I miss him.

Victor was the first Odawa person who I knew in modern times who actually set up a trading route between the Northern Woodland and Southwestern Pueblo Indians. He would purchase the finest baskets and porcupine quill boxes and trade or sell them to galleries and dealers in the Southwest and then bring a load of Pueblo pottery and jewelry back. He was definately a genuine astute traditional Odawa Trader as well as modern business man.

He is dead now, in that nice place or takin the long "dirt nap" as one of my other Odawa Friends calls it the oneway trip, we all are going to take it some day contrary to popular opinion. I havn't seen Him yet or any other of my friends and relatives who passed. I'm not sure we are coming back as some people believe. We will probably have better things to do.I really miss Vic and all the old timers I knew,they were unique individuals. However if they all come back  I will take a break fix them and myself, a little fry bread and boiled coffee both sweetened with a little maple syrup or basswood honey. 

These new young Casino era Indians just don't seem to be made of the same stuff. Too many of them are what used to be called hanging around thr Fort Indians.Most of them are stuck not realizing they have more opportunity to do exactly what they want,more than any time in history. They just want to do drugs and raise he

 I am going to ultimately share with you my regular readers every thing Victor and the many other of the old traders taught me about Trading. I will attempt to show you in these Guides how you will benefit the most from your own successful Indian Trading experience. You can have a house full of material things but ultimately it will be the memories or experience that will be your real keep sake really the only thing you will value. I am basically just gonna share 50 years or more of trading experience accross cultures right here in America, I think it is closer to 60 years because I  actually began trading with Carl Bailey for arrow heads he was finding near the Big River,Carl a local Ottawa boy from the Thorn Apple Band hmmmmmm everything seems to change. Even that Nation is now called the Little River Band and they have their own Ogema who used to be called a Tribal Chairman, and before that Chief,and then Ogema language always shows where you have been and where you are going,and that is always Circle.LOL Unless you are Hea-oka. LOL Only another Clown will get that!!! LOL

I was 5th Grade and one grade above me there was my recess buddyCarl,Carl  is long gone now too he died in Chicago not too long after he was out of school. Gosh even the word Ottawa has changed since those days, now some say they are Odawa. Did you ever notice how fast a lifetime passes? It is but a blink of the eye.

I am sharing this information for several personal reasons as well to inform you the public. You have seen me write elsewhere that even tho I have several issues with eBay it is probably one of the greatest trading adventures in the world.Mainly because it is actually like putting your trade blanket right down in the world market place,or in a world wide PoWWow.  However  I feel several pop culture newbies are going to ruin it if we old timers don't monitor eBay a bit and confront those who insist on turning it and other auction places  into one of the most unethical places on the Earth. One of those places like the casinos where you go to get screwed out of the few extra dead Presidents you have. I only have a few major pet peeves and  issues that triggers my post traumatic stress. One of them is people who call them self Christian and think or do totally non-Christian acts. In other words, they bend the very easy to understand 10 Basic Commandments in every direction to suit their own purposes. An then walk around saying they are Born Again.  If they are Born Again they wouldn't they wouldn't have to tell us over and over we would just know it by their good behavior. They wouldn't have to wear a sign that says WWJD. I memorized  the 10  at a early age in Sunday School, in Sabbath School, and Bible School. The  born again Commandment benders appears to think it is ok to lie and steal a bit here and there maybe to get ahead. Perhaps do anything to get what they call AHEAD.  Every President since Jimmy Carter who seemed like the only truely Born Again President we ever had, has told some serious whoppers including the current President, it appears that the personal ethics have declined on His watch more than any other time in this Country's history.Nearly everyone thinks oh well those little lies just won't hurt anyone, but they always hurt someone. Mostly the person telling them. I also get sick and tired and just plain worn out watching pure junk made by other folks with their own nice culture who practically know nothing about the American/Canadian Indian Culture craft etc and sell  their Art under the guise of being Indian and market it with the American /Canadian Indian label on it.Everyday in this market place I see Moccasins, basket, beadwork,or sculpture,or arrow heads,you name it, that I know was not made by a Indian.

Oh well back to the main premise, where to go to buy Southwestern Pueblo pottery. Why the Southwest of Course LOL Where do you go to sell it?eBay now of course.

I used to make a wholesale buying trip out there during the Christmas Holiday. I taught school for a number of years and that always seemed like a good place to travel and trade during the Christmas Holidays. You havn't lived until you do Christmas Eve in Santa Fe.  I would pick out a specific Pueblo and focus on that destination and read and learn as much as I could about the Pueblo and the people prior to my visit there. At that time there was no Zagat's of Indian Reservations LOL After all the Pueblo People consider themselves to be in reality a Nation within a Country, nearly every Indian person feels this way. When you are a guest on a Pueblo you do feel like you are in a different Nation, and you are. Indian Nations are actually considered seperate Nations within the U.S.A.Yet there isn't any other American Nationality that has sacrificed more on Americas battlefields than the American Indian. When I first started trading there weren't as many tourist going out to the Southwest as there are now. Santa Fe was still a quaint little town with a very active historic Indian market on the Plaza of the Governors. The last Christmas Eve I spent there was a gun fight over a parking place and a couple of cowboys ended up with two bullet holes in them. I saw the whole thing. It began with two cars slamming into each other over a parking place,and then squealing wheels of a chase and then,bam,bam,bam!!! New Mexico is still the wild west too, you have the right to carry out there and sometimes the locals get a bit wild with their fire arms after the entertainment ceases,and shoot out a few street lights,and a rear view mirror or two. It is safer to leave before last call. I was eating nice Southwest Cuisine in a nice eating establishment one Christmas Eve when a older Latino man came in from outside and knocked another one the same age right of the bar stool wirth a right hook. The piano player started changed his after dinner music to Muddy River.There s really nothing as fine as a walk through Santa Fe on Christmas Eve among the sparking farolitas and pinion pine aroma. If you keep your eyes open you are going to see Pueblo people rushing about to make a final sale of their art work before the evening ends. Sometimes you could  often find good buys on the Palace of The Governors but when I was there it was more like a flea market and I saw items being sold by Navajo(Dine) Indians that were made in the Phillippines made by that PhillippinoTribe.

The one place that I loved to visit is Sky City or Acoma the road out there from Albuquerque was always filled with a number of pleasant surprizes. I especially liked the old home or tiny trading post attached to a giant bolder on the right or west side of that road. The giant bolder formed one wall while the roof and windows had that vacant look stare of many empty years. Sometimes the Pueblo People would have their car or pickup pulled on the shoulder of the road sellling their wares right off their blanket. You need to take caution buying from those sales people because a person/persons out there selling "indian jewerly" by the side of the road may be a italian in braids selling junk they bought at the Tucson Rock and Gem show. I even had a nice Navajo family sell me some beautiful inlay hearts and She said",he is making  them right back there. "I later found the same little heart inlay pieces for $26.95 cents per 100# At the Rock and Gem show in Tucson. Mom's Navajo (Dine) Son actually must have been taking a few hearts apart filing and polishing finished product. He was good at it I paid $9.00 for each heart and bought a a dozen hearts made offshore for $108.00 per dozen.

The most facinating thing about Acoma is how the village is built far up on the mesa with the orginal narrow winding trail and steps leading up to the top. It certainly provided a good protective entry to Acoma for many,many, years. Now there is a modern road built to take tour vans up there for the non-walking tourist.We walked to the top through the narrow passageway and soaked up centuries of history feeling what it must have been like to be the last person running from a Spanish Soldier with a gigantic sword right behind.

The following is a photo I snapped of the homes on top of the mesa, in the sky,with beautiful ladders even reaching farther into the sky.The edge of the mesa did not have a fence around it and out tour guide said many a citizen of Acoma had fallen over the steep edge to their death. That particular morning I did not put my $395.00 dollar bridge in because my mouth was very sore from some hot southwestern cuisine. I wrapped the bridge in a tissue and put it in my pocket.As the day moved on we visited artists and Traders in their homes. In one I spotted a traditional gourd rattle tucked way up in the log beams. It was just the type of treasure I often looked for. I asked the gentle old trader want he would like for it. He said he didn't really want to sell it. I persisted,and finally he said you can have it for eight bucks. The greed side of my heart kicked in and filled with delight as I handed him the crumpled 8 single dollar bills. I walked back out into the bright sunshine and New Mexico tourquoise sky into the plaza basking inmy GREED. I thought ,what a deal, and for such a authentic religious or perhaps ceremonial peice. I was quite surprized that the old man finally parted with the rattle. I took it out of my pocket to admire it. I rubbed its smooth worn natural surface and shook it, the natural sound was like gentle spring rains, or rustling grass, just right. I thought about returning to give the old man some more money,evn the rattle as I turned it over and over in the sunlight but I became blinded by my greed.

It was like a rare gem,I placed the rattle back in my pocket and it caught on a peice of tissue paper in my pocket that was now unfamiliar to me. I walked over to a trash barrel and threw it away. The next morning when I brushed my teeth I realized I had thrown my $395.00 bridge into the trash on Acoma during my gloating period .LOLOL I called the tourist building at Acoma and told the young lady guide what had happened. I asked if the barrel was emptied? She said yes we have to empty all those barrels every night. I realized that I had just learned another costly lesson in Indian Country. It doesn't pay to be greedy when trading and buying in Indian Country because you will pay one way or another. Especially in a place as Sacred as Acoma. I never purchased another bridge because I felt it to be too expensive for a few extra teeth and I really did not want to forget the lesson. I will certainly never forget Acoma.

 The first Pueblo I visited in New Mexico was Sky City or Acoma mainly because I loved the beautiful Acoma Pottery and the history of Acoma and I knew Lucy M. Lewis was one of the most famous potters there. I wanted to collect some of her work while she was alive. Every collector Trader knows as a artist or potter ages their work becomes more valuable because when they pass,the item they made quickly appreciates. Hmmmm, rather unusual or morbid way to show appreciation. Hopefully some of Lucy's pots will show up over there on the right side of this article before I finish this article.  Then you will know what they are worth today More magic for you via eBay LOL.It is always important to decide why you want to purchase a piece of Indian art or you will end up with a whole house full. Several people I know have. I wish I had the Cartoon Poster that hung in Woodwind Gallery for awhile to show you what could happen if you are not careful. It shows a fairly plump lady flat on her back on the floor in her her house completely filled with every thing imaginable thing called art from the Southwest. You must identify if you are going to be a collector,a dealer, or trader before you begin, or you will simply be diagnosed with a shopping addiction before it is all over. LOL I was always first of all a Trader,secondary a Dealer and X's took care of collections LOL.  I always enjoyed driving to to the Pueblos as a Dealer or Trader to fill up the car and call it a buying trip for Tax purposes if nothing else. I don't care for paper stock cetificates and I tried to get the IRS to call Fine Investment Indian Art a IRA  (Indian Rights Act)but to no avail. I had a small Gallery in the lower level of my house in Interlochen Michigan called  Woodwind Gallery and I leisurely sold my Trading finds throughout the rest of the year. I had developed a fairly large clientele by photographing art objects and sending the mailing list to my Customers four Seasonal times a year. I even had developed something called a Bid and Buy sheet that I mailed out to my Customers who suscribed or bought one item each year. iIt was a crude form manual form of eBay I had put this all together because I knew that there was a group of collectors who like myself who loved Indian Art and their main entertainment was a good Indian Art auction. Boy what fun and the Live Auction stories I could tell!

After all this babble,  actually feel the best place to purchase hand built coiled Acoma pottery is in the city of Albuquerque on a street Old Town. At the same time I am pleased with the fine Acoma pots now listed on eBay see them over there on the right. The large hand built pot above was purchased for $350. from a Acoma Woman who had it wrapped up in a blanket like a child carrying it to market. I orginally thought it was a child. She was on her way to Palms a massive wholesale/retail establishment filled with pueblo goods. If you get to Old Town the day before a holiday and get a room nearby it is absolutely the best place to purchase pottery. On Christmas or New Years Eve place your self on a street that leads to or from the main pottery stores or Gallerys and just wander until you see a Indian with a pot.. Often the stores or Galleries have a surplus and will turn the artist away. They are pleased to have someone else purchase their beautiful wares for necessary frogskins to purchase and prepare food for the seasonal feasts. I always paid a bit more than the wholesale prices than the stores or galleries were paying. I also attempted to establish a relationship with the Artist.The photo pot in the middle sold for $850.00 retail.You must carefully look things over when you purchase this way,carry a flashlight with you,look for mold marks because some artists mold the pottery in a plaster mold over and over and then put the same type of elaborate painted design on it.Those pots usually sell for a lot less thasn a hand coiled pot.Also be alert for cracks or repaired damage and fake signatures. Some people become expert artists at replicating fraudulent signatures of the known potters.

Several things happened to the Indian Art Market after eBay came on the scene. Inflated Indian made baskets and pottery prices dropped. the public now learned there were plenty of baskets and pots to go around perhaps 2 or 3 items for every person in the Country. One of the biggest selling points often made for the woodland ash baskets and the Pueblo pottery is that the artist is getting older and cannot produce as many pots any more. The other myth spread often told is that the young people just don't want to do the hard work it takes to make these items.The other one was that Indians can make more money in there casinos and don't their arts and crafts any more. I don't believe there is much truth to any of these myths and they are allmost to as frequent as urban myths. The middle man and trader has fallen by the wayside as more and more Indian people became computer literate and began selling their own created items on eBay. A few of the tribes I have traded with have begun producing fine baskets again just for the eBay market.The Indian artist no longer had to listen to the endless patter from the muckty,muckety mucks who thought they knew everything about Indians and were cultural experts.

Most of these collectors and buyers barely touched the surface of the culture and they were very insensitive because the textbooks and schools mainly only featured one chapter on the first Thanksgiving,or Plymouth Rock and as a result generations of Americans grew up thinking the only Indian left was the broken defeated Indian on the horse who was near death as depicted by Frazer's well known sculpture and millions of copies  that followed it. I havn't looked  recently but I'll bet if you type the words End of The Trail in a search engine at least one hunderd images of that sculpture will still come up. In those days the Indian Artists/Potters preferred that a middle man sell their art or craft rather than face the gauntlet of inbred racism.eBay removed most of that distraction and very little communication was needed to complete a clear cut a business deal.The Indian Artist,Potters, and craftpersons from every Nation moved on to websites and eBay in droves.

Sleepers also started to disappear as new collecters scoured garage sales,antique stores,etc. Ebay actually became a place where fair price could be established anywhere in the world and people could educate themselves as to the real time value of any givin item.. I had learned years ago when I was seeking high end art or jewerly that the pawn shops near the reservations and border cities had loads of beautiful items turned in for a few bucks. That was the place for a wise greed buyer to look.  The more racist the town or city the cheaper the Indian made product could be purchased. If the tourist trade was seasonal you would always go there in the off season. Actually during this time some well know pawn shops came on to the eBay market quickly and are still on here.The main downside is the grief  or tears that surrounds the object whose owner had to sell something made by a revered,mother, grandmother just for a tank of gas. The public became more decerning and quality came back into the art market which appeared for a time to become quite shoddy. People no longer had to travel long distances to buy a Robert Tenorio or Lucy M. Lewis pot or a pocupinequill box of Yvonne Keshik or Arnold Walker. Some of those that were in fine collections began to show in the eBay market and the very best of the very best even became more popular. The last time I saw my dear Friend Yvonne she told me she was five years behined in her comissions. 

 Several people were fearful of traveling to the reservatios because most were surrounded by signs saying "WHITE PEOPLE KEEP OUT"or" ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK" Actually the greatest danger statistic was getting killed by a drunk driver on or near the reservations or in the border town. My absolute cardinal rule when I traveled in the Southwest on the day of a Holiday was to pull off the the roads or highway by 3:00 in the Afternoon and find a room. I don't know how it is now but we used to watch the death toll climb throughout evening and night from drunk drivers. It was always nice to begin the Holidays early in those places and walk the streets with other people enjoying the Holidays. After doing all of this my wife I I narrowly missed a horrible death or injury because we were buying a Navjo rug from Rosie Man Goats after she stayed up all night to finish it.We met  early one snowey morning near Flagstaff Arizona to complete the transaction only to experience heliocopter after heliocopter flying over us to the expressway later we learned  two semis had crashed  and burned at the highway in a deep caynon  closing the roadway and 40 0r 50 cars piled into them. Killing and wounding several holiday travelers.   

 One specific trip I was driving on the southern route from Zuni after purchasing Inlay jewelry,and was driving from Zuni back to Albuquerque and I met a weaving pickup with about a five year old Indian child  sitting on his laughing Father's lap driving and weaving from one side of the road to the other about sixty miles per hour. We just missed having a head on collision by just a few feet. Another time I was traveling near the Navajo Reservation and Tuba City to buy some nice raised outline rugs from Rosie's mother Bessie Begay and a elderly Medicine person  nearby had hit a Navajo family loaded car and nearly killed everyone in it. I think his trial drug out for two painful years.

The two small pots in the Bid and Buy photo are Lucy M. Lewis pots made as she neared 100 years old and I gave a collector friend and business partner $150. each for them after his very successful buying trip to the Southwest.  Lucy did not have any pots when I was out there. She was getting up in years and actually did not produce as many pots. Her family members were though. I sold these when I had my Clearance sale and closed my Gallery in Interlochen one for $1,200. the other for $550. the latter to a collector friend who had purchased a large number of pots and other fine art from me over the years. It would have easily sold for $1,000.00.

I will title each Trading tip Guide by the place and Nation I was trading at the time. That way if you are going to visit that Nation it will give you some idea on who to see there,where to go,what to look for and what to lookout for. If you will Woody's own Zagats. LOL

Meanwhile if you think you would like to do this, Get the DVD The Ugly Americans with Marlon Brando or read,  the same book which was required reading in all University Cultural studies classes in the 60's, written  by Eugene Burdick and William J.Lederer

Read: Indigenous Protocols for tourists and Colonists by John Two Hawks

Read the Going to a Powwow another  eBay Guide I wrote

 or PoWWow Etiquette 

Check out my recommended reading lists in the interviews.

Most of these will show up if you just type them in the search engine again in the magic place called eBAy.LOL

That is your assigned reading until I get back. When I get back to traveling/tradin perhaps we will visit Santo Domingo, Zuni or Oshweken and try to find some quality dough bowls, carved animal fetishes, Zuni Inlay Jewelry,ash baskets or soapstone carvings. Hey if you don't want to travel just type any of these words in the search engine above and click you will be there.LOLOL The eBay magic.

You might just find what you are looking for at a good price and save your gas for other purposes.

Thanks for readin my ramblin!
Woody

If you have read this far now go ahead and rate this guide as helpful or not and it will give me some idea on how much time to spend here telling you my secrets. let me know if you larned one thing you found helpful. LOLOL

Woody