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Show 24 Ute Lands Along the present border of Utah and Colorado, in the area in and around the Dolores River Valley, dwelt a band called Weeminuche. Surrounded by the Colorado River and desert on one side and the San Juan Mountains on the other, the Weeminuche did not have the defensive problems against other tribes that some bands of Utes did. There were, however, struggles with the Navajo to the south. The members of this band are now found on the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation in the southwestern corner of Colorado. The small town of Towaoc is their headquarters. Dwelling in the high mountains of what is now central Colorado were the people known as the Taviwach or Tabeguache. Later they came to be called the Uncompahgre. Their home was so deep within the Ute land that they had very few contacts with other tribes, either enemies or friends. At certain times, this band went to the aid of other bands who might be in conflict with invading tribes. Usually, however, the band remained in its sheltered and extremely beautiful homeland. To the west, in the region around present-day Moab, Utah, dwelt the Sheberetch. This group seems to have used the same high mountain summer-lowland winter system of the other Utes, but it was far more desert oriented than the other groups. In their existence as a band, they had very little direct relationship with the European invaders. However, the Mormons moved into their area in the 1850s. By the 1870s, the Sheberetch had been reduced by disease and war. It seems probable that the survivors joined the Uncompahgre, Weeminuche, and Uintah bands. Dwelling in central Utah along the Sevier River and the western flank of the Pahvant Mountains was a band known as the Pah Vant. In many of their characteristics they were like the Kaibab Paiutes with whom they were neighbors. They were also like the Sheberetch in their skill at using desert areas to sustain themselves. The Pah Vant also used other food sources â€" the fish and marsh life of the Sevier River, and Fish Lake and its mountain streams. They also farmed. An 1851 newspaper account noted: "Pah-van-te Indians . . . reside at Corn Creek . . . and have there raised corn, beans, pumpkins, squashes, potatoes, etc., year after year for a period that dates farther back than their acquaintance with the whites."2 |
