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UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY This photograph of a Navajo woman and girl was taken by BECKWITH PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, DELTA CITY LIBRARY Frank Beckwith in Delta in 1948. petroglyphs in popular and professional journals such as the Saturday Evening Post, the Desert Magazine, National Pictographic Society Newsletter, El Palecio, and in early issues of the Utah Historical Quarterly. According to Kelly, these articles made Beckwith one of the first people to write about the petroglyphs, as for many years archaeologists and ethnologists had considered them taboo.55 Pursuing his study of petroglyphs gave Beckwith an even deeper appreciation of Indian culture. “Because of his deep study of Indian lore,” Kelly states, “[Frank] was accepted immediately and always enjoyed his visits with these Indians. I believe he learned more of the lore and mental processes of these Indians than any other white man. His great ambition at this time was to be able to forget he was white, and live as an Indian long enough to understand them perfectly.”56 Beckwith is even said to have had an Indian name, Chief SEV-VI-TOOTS, although it is not known if he was given it by the Indians or gave it to himself.57 Because of his time spent with the local Indians, Beckwith eventually wrote a book about them. Titling his book Indian Joe: In Person and in Background, Beckwith focused on the family and culture of Joe Pickyavit and his people. 58 At first he produced six copies of the original manuscript himself, setting the type on an old Linotype and providing his own illustrations and photographs. The book has been called “a grandiose task and a great tribute to his friend Indian Joe and the other Paiutes…The appeal of the book is the personal account of one man’s reaction to the friendship of another.”59 Beckwith’s explorations of the Millard County area in his quest for petroglyphs also sparked his interest in the geology of the region. Delta and the surrounding area were once the bottom of Lake Bonneville, and the ter55 Kelly, “Frank A. Beckwith, Reminiscences,” 2. Ibid. 57 Jane Beckwith, interview. 58 Beckwith, Indian Joe, xiii. 59 Frank A. Beckwith, Indian Joe: In Person and Background (Delta: DuWil Publishing Company, 1975), v. In 1975, twenty four years after the first six copies were published, the grandchildren of Beckwith published a thousand copies of the book. According to Dorena Martineau, a staff member at the administrative office of the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah, this book is still used extensively to answer questions they receive; telephone conversation with Dorena Martineau, December 13, 2012. 56 182