Indian treasures
Retired art teacher gives big collection to museum at the U.

Utahns are getting a wonderful present for the holidays: hundreds of American Indian treasures, from costumes to jewelry, from ceremonial masks to moccasins and baskets.

It is the donation of Anthony H. (Tony) Taylor, a retired art teacher who spent a lifetime building his great ethnographic collection. The collection is undergoing preservation at its new home, the Utah Museum of Natural History on the University of Utah campus.Some of the objects, like cradle boards and dolls, already are on display in the new "Kid Stuff" exhibit, a celebration of Indian childhood. Others will show up from time to time in displays teaching about Indian life. With nearly 1,000 of these handmade objects, there are enough for many shows and traveling exhibits.

Kathy Kankainen, the museum's collections manager, showed the Deseret News a sampling, including a silver flask, shell gorgets, dresses, heavily beaded bandoleer bags, moccasins with intricate beadwork, an old belt with curved silver dollars as decoration (the latest was dated 1921), tightly woven baskets, tomahawks with stone or metal heads, dance objects, masks and rugs with geometric patterns.

Among Utah tribes alone, the collection has objects crafted by Navajos, Utes, Paiutes, Western Shoshones, Northern Shoshones, Goshutes and Bannocks. But Taylor's interests reach far beyond Utah, into the lives and hearts of Indians from British Columbia, the Arizona-Mexico border and many other regions.

Taylor taught art at East and South high schools, Salt Lake City. He lived in the capital until about two years ago, when he retired and moved to Provo.

He is in poor health, and he wanted to give the collection to an organization that would keep it intact and make it available to Utahns. He is working as a consultant on the collection and was present to be honored when the "Kid Stuff" display opened.

Taylor estimates the trove's worth at about $450,000 in today's dollars.

However, he has collected for 50 years -- most vigorously since the early 1960s -- and he bought many for far less than they are worth today. Still, to purchase some items on a teacher's salary he had to put them on layaway.

Focusing on works in traditional patterns, he bought most things in trading posts, stores specializing in Indian crafts, and at the homes of artisans themselves. But he has found them in unexpected outlets, too, including a store in London. Some items he has worked on personally, like some chokers, as he is a fine craftsman and artist.