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Yaquis mourn death of a spiritual leader
Members of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe of Arizona this week are mourning the death of a man they called their spiritual leader.
Anselmo Valencia Tori Although his death will leave a seat vacant on the Pascua Yaqui Tribal Council, it was Mr. Valencia Tori’s role as a teacher, tribal historian and leader of ceremonies that his family and peers say they will miss most.
Among the cultural lessons he taught during his Wednesday ”history nights” at the Pascua Yaqui Elder Center were the significance of Yaqui rites such as baptisms, and Yaqui stories about the Zure, whom he believed to be his people’s ancestors.
While the 10,500-member Pascua Yaqui tribe in Arizona has had recent internal problems involving allegations of fraud and mismanagement of casino profits, Mr. Valencia Tori had admirers in all tribal factions, said Cati Carmen ”Everybody respected him. He was a little bit controversial, but in a good way. It was for the people,” Carmen said. ”In the last few days of his life, so many people went out to visit him.”
Mr. Valencia Tori died at his home in Marana. But he and his wife, Kathy Valencia, also kept a home in New Pascua Pueblo, the tribe’s reservation land southwest of Tucson.
New Pascua Pueblo was where Mr. Valencia Tori placed his heart and soul, his son, Rogelio Valencia, recalled yesterday.
”The most important thing that he never got to see happen but worked very, very hard to do was making a Yaqui living museum,” Valencia said. ”It was one of his biggest dreams.”
In 1989, Mr. Valencia Tori founded the Yoemem Tekia ”We haven’t made enough effort to teach our children,” Mr. Valencia Tori told the Tucson Citizen in January 1990. ”Us old men thought only we should have the knowledge and kept it to ourselves.”
Mr. Valencia Tori was well-known to members of the tribe as an elder who was eager to teach younger people about tradition and culture, his son said.
And each year, as spiritual leader, he held a prominent role in the community’s Easter celebrations – an Indian version of the story of Christ’s last week on Earth.
Mr. Valencia Tori in recent years was first captain of the Caballeros – a faction in the Passion play that at first persecutes Christ, then on Friday of Holy Week Mr. Valencia Tori believed a museum could help younger tribal members learn the meaning behind the Yaqui Easter rituals, his son said.
”As leader of the Yoemem Tekia Foundation (Mr. Valencia Tori), saw the importance of working with all levels, from the members of his community, to the state officials, but also with the United Nations,” said Andrea Carmen When workers at a Tucson cemetery razed several Yaqui markers during a renovation, Andrea Carmen said Mr. Valencia Tori believed the grave sites had been desecrated.
Carmen said Mr. Valencia Tori defended his tribe’s use of mesquite crosses to mark their graves and addressed the issue with members of the U.N., resulting in eventual intervention by the Vatican.
His son yesterday recalled that Mr. Valencia Tori was quite upset last week after his tribe filed a lawsuit in federal court naming 14 defendants. The civil suit alleged fraud and mismanagement of at least $5 million from tribal coffers.
In a separate move, Chairman Benito F. Valencia fired 13 tribal government workers.
Mr. Valencia Tori, his son said, ”felt bad that the people could not be unified as Yaqui people . . . (and) that the whole situation could have been done in a more better way.”
Raised in southern Arizona and Rio Yaqui, Mexico, Mr. Valencia Tori adopted his second surname as a young man. ”Tori” is the family’s clan name.
Mr. Valencia Tori did not recognize the political boundaries between Mexico and the United States and waged long battles to gain land and water rights for the traditional pueblos in Rio Yaqui.
He was known, his co-workers said, for frequently arguing that the Yaqui Indians had inhabited the desert Southwest for hundreds of years before an Arizona-Mexico border existed.
Mr. Valencia Tori, who led the tribe through its fight to gain federal recognition from Congress in 1978, also was instrumental in lobbying for the tribe’s expanded status to ”historic.” The designation, which gave the tribe more rights, was granted by President Clinton in 1994.
Mr. Valencia Tori is survived by his wife, Kathy; children Margie Ramirez, Connie Cruz, Andrea Valencia, Rogelio Valencia, Esperanza Valencia, Marylou Valencia and Valerio Valencia A viewing is scheduled for 5 p.m. Friday at the Christo Rey Church on Camino Potam in New Pascua Pueblo. The viewing is expected to last through the night.
A Mass for Mr. Valencia Tori is set for 8 a.m. Saturday at the church, followed by burial at the Monte Calvario cemetery.
The family asks that any remembrances be made in the form of flowers sent to the Yoemem Tekia Foundation. In Yaqui culture, flowers represent eternal life and the triumph of good over evil.
The Yoemem Tekia Foundation is at 7631 S. Camino de Tetavieciti, 85746. The phone number is 883-7565.
(Dated May 05, 1998)
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Record store chain owner Brad Singer dead at 45
PHOENIX – Brad Singer, owner and founder of Zia Record Exchange, Impact Music and Epiphany Records, died Sunday of complications from a viral infection and lupus. He was 45.
A music fan from childhood, Singer tried to form a band once, his mother said.
After working at a record store, he decided to branch out on his own. The first Zia store was stocked entirely with records from his own collection. There now are eight such stores in Phoenix and Tucson, employing about 160 people. They offer used products guaranteed to be in like-new condition, plus alternative music, local sounds and imports that major chains tended to ignore.
The stores are to be closed tomorrow in his memory.
As Zia grew, Singer launched Impact Music, a wholesale distributor, in 1987. Five years later, he started Epiphany Records, a label devoted to Arizona music. Its first release was the debut album of the Refreshments, a band that since has moved on to the major leagues.
Epiphany is home to several well-known local bands, including the Beat Angels, the Revenants and the Piersons.
Services are scheduled for noon tomorrow at Sinai Mortuary of Arizona. A memorial will be held at 2:30 p.m. tomorrow at Green Acres Cemetery and Mausoleum, Scottsdale.
(Dated May 05, 1998)
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Services set for lifelong Tucsonan Sayre
Artemisa Castelan Sayre, ”who grew up in a very different Tucson,” has died at age 88.
She died Friday. Cause of death was not given.
”She was born here, lived here all her life, and took care of her family,” said daughter Edith Sayre Auslander.
Mrs. Sayre graduated from Tucson High and worked 10 years for the Van Buskirk law firm as a legal secretary.
”She lived a full life devoted to her family, the church and her friends,” her daughter said.
Mrs. Sayre was born Nov. 29, 1909, the 13th of 14 children. Her husband, William F. Sayre, died in 1992.
Visitation is today from 4 to 7 p.m. at St. Ambrose Catholic Church, 300 S. Tucson Blvd. Rosary will be recited at 7 p.m.
A funeral Mass will be celebrated at 10 a.m. tomorrow at St. Ambrose, with burial to follow at Holy Hope Cemetery.
Survivors include two daughters, Edith Sayre Auslander of Tucson and Mary Barrett of Fresno, Calif.; two sons, Federico Castelan Sayre of Santa Anna, Calif., and William F. Sayre of Tucson; a brother, George Castelan of Tucson; nine grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
The family suggests memorials be made in her name to St. Ambrose School or Casa Maria soup kitchen.
(Dated Oct 05, 1998)
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Cowboy ‘Shorty’ Burch was fixture in the area
When Frank ”Shorty” Burch was courting his wife-to-be in the early part of this century, he had one concern: ”Whenever they had a dance at the Sonoita schoolhouse, I had to ride my horse, and hope I didn’t smell of horse sweat when I got there.”
Mr. Burch, a lifelong cowboy and sometime cotton farmer, died Thursday at age 96.
His daughter, Joanne Burch, said he also worked as a carpenter, helped build homes, overpasses and roads (including the original State Highway 83) and drilled wells.
As a bronc-buster, Mr. Burch tamed wild horses to ”raw broke” – enough so working cowboys could get on them.
He occasionally panned for gold after floods to bring in a bit of extra money, and once – at the tender age of 16 – followed an old cowboy’s suggestion during Prohibition and drove an illegal load of tequila up from Nogales.
Mr. Burch was born in Oklahoma in 1902. He moved with his family to Cortaro in 1916 to try to make a living farming cotton.
His daughter said he decided at age 15 he preferred the life of a cowboy to that of a farmer:
”He said, ‘I just stuck my hoe in the ground and started walking.’ ” Joanne Burch recalled.
Mr. Burch ended up in Sonoita, working for the Chiricahua Cattle Co., whose holdings stretched in those days from Vail to the Empire Ranch near Sonoita.
He later worked for the Larrimore Ranch and others, spending much of his time living in line camps keeping an eye on cattle and fences in remote areas of major ranches.
His father, Dolph Burch, followed him to the Sonoita area after a time, and the two became partners on a ranch in Box Canyon north of Sonoita.
Mr. Burch explained his nickname, ”Shorty,” this way:
”When I was a boy, there were mountain lions around our place. At night, I always took my younger brother with me to the outhouse. My dad asked me why and I told him, ‘Because George is softer, and if a mountain lion comes, he’ll eat George first, and I can run to the house.’
”My dad hit me on the head. He hit me on the head whenever I did something stupid – that’s how I got so short.”
While living in the Sonoita area, Mr. Burch fell in love with and married Grace Douglas, whose family homesteaded the Yucca Ash Farm near Gardner Canyon Road.
His father was restless, moving back to Tucson to operate a rooming house in the Sam Hughes neighborhood, and later to Casa Grande to another cotton farm. The younger Burch was a partner in those ventures.
After his father died, Mr. Burch moved his family to the Elgin area, once again taking up the cowboy life on the Low Ranch.
The year 1941 found him once again in Tucson, working as a carpenter. Soon after, during World War II, he joined the Navy SeaBees, building bridges, landing strips and military quarters in the South Pacific.
After the war, he worked in construction throughout the Tucson area.
In 1960, Mr. Burch and his wife retired to Yucca Ash Farm, living there until her death in 1979. He later moved to Washington state, where he met his second wife, Irene.
They returned to Sonoita, living there until health problems forced them to move to Tucson to be closer to medical services.
A private family memorial is scheduled at El Mesquital, a Three Points restaurant owned by longtime friends, Chuck and Tonita Dellinger.
Mr. Burch, who had only eight years of schooling, valued education, declaring, ”Without an education, you are nothing – no matter how smart you are.”
Because of this, the family suggests memorials to the Frank Burch Memorial Fund, Educational Enrichment Foundation, 1661 N. Swan Road, Tucson, Ariz. 85719, or the purchase of flowers for a living parent or loved one.
Burial will be at Black Oak Cemetery, next to his first wife, Grace, on Parker Canyon Road south of Elgin.
Survivors include his second wife, Irene; four daughters, Wanda Evans, Norma Burch, Lila Schmitt and Joanne Burch; two sons, Bruce and Frank K. Burch; a sister, Betty Burch; 26 grandchildren; 41 great-grandchildren; and four great-great-grandchildren.
Besides Grace, Mr. Burch was preceded in death by a son, Joe Burch; two grandchildren, Polinadio Burch and Mary Roberta Lee Proctor; and two siblings, George Burch and Bessie Ross.
(Dated Oct 21, 1998)
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Myra Boyd, longtime pharmacy operator
Myra Carter Rayfield Boyd, who with her husband operated a Tucson drugstore for many years, has died at age 96.
Mrs. Boyd died Monday in her sleep.
From 1927 to 1951, she worked the ”front end” of Rincon Drug Store, at North Campbell Avenue and East Sixth Street, while her husband, former Pima County Board of Supervisors Chairman J. Homer Boyd, operated the pharmacy.
Later, they operated a pharmacy at North Tucson Boulevard and East Sixth Street.
Daughter Mary Alice Boyd McDonald recalled the store at Campbell was ”one of those old drugstores that was a Tucson establishment at the time – the kids all hung out at the fountain.”
”When they opened the drugstore there, people all said they’d never make a go of it – it was too far east, at the east edge of town.”
Homer Boyd, who died in 1966, was elected to the Pima County Board of Supervisors in 1944, serving as chairman from 1946-52 and 1954-56.
”She was never active in politics,” McDonald said of her mother. ”She was my father’s wife and the mother of her children.”
Born in Piedmont, Mo., Mrs. Boyd came to Tucson in 1925. She had met her husband-to-be in St. Louis, and he had come to Tucson to work as a pharmacist at University Drug Store in 1923 before opening his own business.
Mrs. Boyd was a member of St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church.
A private graveside service is scheduled.
Survivors also include son David Carter Boyd of Tucson, seven grandchildren, 12 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren.
The family suggests donations be made to the University of Arizona Cancer Research Center, 1515 N. Campbell Ave., Tucson 85724.
(Dated Oct 30, 1998)
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