This year Intermountain School is the subject of the oral histories we will be collecting for Brigham City Library Oral History Collection. If you attended Intermountain Indian School, worked at the school in any capacity or if you know of someone who was associated with the school; please contact the Library at 723-5850 or me personally at 723-8777.
Hal Reeder taught at Intermountain Indian School in Brigham City from 1962 until the school closed in 1984. During those years he held the positions of coach, teacher of physical education and English, and eventually became Academic Director of the school. In his early years of coaching, the Indian students competed with athletes from the big high schools of Region 1 and had little success. In an oral history conducted last month, Reeder told of memorable experiences as a coach and as an English teacher:
Most Navajo kids that came to the school didn't come from Little League or junior high programs, and Navajos are quite a short people. I never had a player over 6 feet, and the first year we played basketball in the league, we didn't win a game. I decided I was going to get out of coaching, but the next year made it all worthwhile. Our win-loss record was 0 and 9, and we played Logan High whose record was 9 and 0. Rod Tueller, the future coach at Utah State University was the coach of Logan High. We had already played them in one game, and they'd beat us by 30 points. They came to play us at Intermountain. I remember one of my players Andy Charley said, “Coach, do you think there's any chance that we can ever win a game?”
I said, “On any given night, any team can beat another team.” I knew I was lying to him. Well, Logan came to town, and they had the all-state player Robert Lewinsky, 6'8”, who went on to be a college player. Our kids came out to play, and Logan had come to see how many points they could run up against us. We beat them 66 to 61! I left the score board turned on in the gym for two weeks straight. They were so excited I thought the building was going to fall down!
I used to listen to Coach Tueller any time they were talking to him about games. They'd say, “Oh, you should handle this team easily.”
He'd say, “Let me tell you – you can be beat by anybody. We were beat by a bunch of Indians that didn't have a kid over about 5'10”. We had never lost a game, and they beat us.”
It was exciting! I was in sports since I was a little kid, and I loved everything about sports. I played football at the University of Utah for a year, and I lettered in baseball at Utah State. I'd known success, and it was just eating me up to not find a way to win, and so to pull off maybe the greatest upset that's ever happened in Utah basketball was more than I could have hoped for!
They took us out of Class A finally and put us into Class B, and our cross country teams were dominant. Those kids came off the reservation where they walked miles and herded sheep on foot, and they were lean and built to run distances. On the national physical fitness test, the students averaged in the 90th percentile.
In our language arts program we published a book of poetry through a grant. I liked their writing because it came across as honest and reflected their culture so well. I remember one poem that still sticks in my mind. It was called Sister Weavers. It was just a simple few lines, but I'd been on the reservation and had watched the people weave. They had no written patterns. The poem went something like:Sister weavers, sitting in the shade, talking and weaving, but the rug is done already because she's designed it in her mind.
They had an oral tradition because a written language makes the oral tradition not only more powerful, but they're more skilled at it. I loved the creative writing classes that I taught.
I'll tell you how much that school meant to me. For two years after it closed, I had melancholy dreams about the school. I didn't drive around the campus for about three years. The first time I drove around the campus, I cried all the way. In some jobs when you come home at night, you ask yourself, “Have I done any good in the world today?” At Intermountain I knew I could make a difference every day.
Kathy
Most Navajo kids that came to the school didn't come from Little League or junior high programs, and Navajos are quite a short people. I never had a player over 6 feet, and the first year we played basketball in the league, we didn't win a game. I decided I was going to get out of coaching, but the next year made it all worthwhile. Our win-loss record was 0 and 9, and we played Logan High whose record was 9 and 0. Rod Tueller, the future coach at Utah State University was the coach of Logan High. We had already played them in one game, and they'd beat us by 30 points. They came to play us at Intermountain. I remember one of my players Andy Charley said, “Coach, do you think there's any chance that we can ever win a game?”
I said, “On any given night, any team can beat another team.” I knew I was lying to him. Well, Logan came to town, and they had the all-state player Robert Lewinsky, 6'8”, who went on to be a college player. Our kids came out to play, and Logan had come to see how many points they could run up against us. We beat them 66 to 61! I left the score board turned on in the gym for two weeks straight. They were so excited I thought the building was going to fall down!
I used to listen to Coach Tueller any time they were talking to him about games. They'd say, “Oh, you should handle this team easily.”
He'd say, “Let me tell you – you can be beat by anybody. We were beat by a bunch of Indians that didn't have a kid over about 5'10”. We had never lost a game, and they beat us.”
It was exciting! I was in sports since I was a little kid, and I loved everything about sports. I played football at the University of Utah for a year, and I lettered in baseball at Utah State. I'd known success, and it was just eating me up to not find a way to win, and so to pull off maybe the greatest upset that's ever happened in Utah basketball was more than I could have hoped for!
They took us out of Class A finally and put us into Class B, and our cross country teams were dominant. Those kids came off the reservation where they walked miles and herded sheep on foot, and they were lean and built to run distances. On the national physical fitness test, the students averaged in the 90th percentile.
In our language arts program we published a book of poetry through a grant. I liked their writing because it came across as honest and reflected their culture so well. I remember one poem that still sticks in my mind. It was called Sister Weavers. It was just a simple few lines, but I'd been on the reservation and had watched the people weave. They had no written patterns. The poem went something like:Sister weavers, sitting in the shade, talking and weaving, but the rug is done already because she's designed it in her mind.
They had an oral tradition because a written language makes the oral tradition not only more powerful, but they're more skilled at it. I loved the creative writing classes that I taught.
I'll tell you how much that school meant to me. For two years after it closed, I had melancholy dreams about the school. I didn't drive around the campus for about three years. The first time I drove around the campus, I cried all the way. In some jobs when you come home at night, you ask yourself, “Have I done any good in the world today?” At Intermountain I knew I could make a difference every day.
Kathy
