Thomas Varker Keam, Indian trader

Summary: The career of Thomas Varker Keam, Indian trader, belies the stereotype of the opportunistic trader extorting wealth from Indians. As Laura Graves demonstrates in this biography, Keam revised the Indian trade so that he and his Indian clients pofited. Thomas Keam, who owned and operated a trading post in Keams Canyon, Arizona Territory, from 1874 to 1902, was the first Indian trader to develop arts and crafts as a part of his business. The first to suggest that native artists modify their technique so as to increase the salability of their work, he had a major impact on the evolution of Hopi pottery. An advocate for the Indians, Keam represented the Hopis and the Navajos in their confrontation between 1869 and 1902, when the Indians tried to maintain their political and culutral independence in the face of federal "civilizing" programs. Keam left Keams Canyon in 1902, his health broken, but his legacy remains in the business style he pioneered as well as in his contributions to anthropology in the region and to the Hopi and Navajo struggle to maintain their lifeways.