Navajo County, Arizona
Navajo County offers not only the Monument Valley, but Keams Canyon, part of the Petrified Forest National Park, and one of the largest contiguous ponderosa pine forest in North America. Navajo County has of federally designated Indian reservation within its borders, the third most of any county in the United States (neighboring Apache County and Coconino County are first and second). In descending order of territory within the county, the reservations are the Navajo Nation, Hopi Indian Reservation, and Fort Apache Indian Reservation, all of which are partly located within Navajo County.As of the 2000 census, there were 97,470 people, 30,043 households, and 23,073 families residing in the county. The population density was 10 people per square mile (4/km²). There were 47,413 housing units at an average density of 5 per square mile (2/km²). The racial makeup of the county was 47.74% Native American, 45.91% White, 0.88% Black or African American, 0.33% Asian, 0.05% Pacific Islander, 3.15% from other races, and 55.94% from two or more races. 8.22% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. 24.77% reported speaking Navajo at home, 5.94% other Southern Athabaskan languages, 4.71% Spanish, and 3.23% Hopi.
Colorado River
Beginning in the 17th century, contact with Europeans brought significant changes to the lifestyles of Native Americans in the Colorado River basin. Missionaries sought to convert indigenous peoples to Christianity – an effort sometimes successful, such as in Father Eusebio Francisco Kino's 1694 encounter with the "docile Pimas of the Gila Valley [who] readily accepted Kino and his Christian teachings". From 1694 to 1702 Kino would explore the Gila and Colorado Rivers to determine if California was an island or peninsula. The Spanish introduced sheep and goats to the Navajo, who came to rely heavily on them for meat, milk and wool. By the mid-16th century, the Utes, having acquired horses from the Spanish, introduced them to the Colorado River basin. The use of horses spread through the basin via trade between the various tribes and greatly facilitated hunting, communications and travel for indigenous peoples. More warlike groups such as the Utes and Navajos often used horses to their advantage in raids against tribes that were slower to adopt them, such as the Goshutes and Southern Paiutes.
The gradual influx of European and American explorers, fortune seekers and settlers into the region eventually led to conflicts that forced many Native Americans off their traditional lands. After the acquisition of the Colorado River basin from Mexico in the Mexican–American War in 1846, U.S. military forces commanded by Kit Carson forced more than 8,000 Navajo men, women and children from their homes after a series of unsuccessful attempts to confine their territory, many of which were met with violent resistance. In what is now known as the Long Walk of the Navajo, the captives were marched from Arizona to Fort Sumner in New Mexico, and many died along the route. Four years later, the Navajo signed a treaty that moved them onto a reservation in the Four Corners region that is now known as the Navajo Nation. It is the largest Native American reservation in the United States, encompassing with a population of over 180,000 as of 2000.