AMERICAN EXPERIENCE ARIZONA MUSEUM PUTS GOOD AND BAD ON DISPLAY.

Byline: Eric Noland Travel Editor

PHOENIX - It's called a museum, but ``treasure trove'' might be a better description. All because a couple driving through the Southwest in 1894 grew enchanted with the beauty of American Indian art, craft and everyday items, and began amassing them soon after settling in Arizona.

Today the Heard Museum is one of the most important repositories of Indian culture in the West, but it ventures beyond the static exhibition of artifacts to relate many facets of the Indian experience.

A current exhibit is one such example. Titled ``Remembering Our Indian School Days,'' it chronicles a controversial government program of the late 19th century that sought to solve ``the Indian problem'' by subjecting native kids to an accelerated assimilation of American culture. Indian schools were established around the country, including one in Phoenix (a major street is still named for it).

Through oral histories, photographs, artifacts and mock-ups of dormitories and classrooms, this poignant tale is told here in excruciating detail.

``People always come here (to the museum) to see the usual things, the katsina dolls and baskets; they're not aware that this whole experience happened,'' said Heard Museum spokeswoman Dana McGuinness. ``I was leading a group from Yugoslavia, and some of them were moved to tears by this.''

The boarding schools were begun by the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1879. Some kids were forcibly taken from their families. Others were willingly handed over by their parents because the adults believed the children would be properly fed and clothed at the schools - a marked improvement on reservation life.

As visitors peruse vintage photos from the early 20th century, first-person accounts are heard from speakers overhead, and the stories are heart-rending - the terror of taking a train ride far from home, girls recalling weeping in the barber chair as their flowing locks were snipped off. (In some native cultures, long hair is spiritually symbolic and is cut in special ceremonies.)

They were robbed not only of their hair but of their native garb, their language (forbidden to speak it), their cultural expressions, even their names. Being scrubbed with lye soap at the outset probably only heightened the indignity.

A photo comparison chronicles the transformation of Navajo Tom Torlino from 1882 to 1885: In the first photo, he wears long hair, earrings, necklace, woolen blanket; in the second, his hair is short and plastered into a severe part, and his dress suit looks about as comfortable as a straitjacket. It's impossible to miss the sense of a broken spirit in his face. A proper American at last, some BIA bureaucrat undoubtedly concluded.

What a difference 100-plus years make. Today at the Heard Museum, Indian culture is celebrated and showcased, and the people behind the work are consulted about its display and interpretation.

No visit would be complete without an unhurried, meandering walk through the Lincoln Gallery, where some of the most important works of the museum's 35,000-piece collection are displayed.

From ancient times are Hoohoogam stone axes and pottery, as well as stone-and-shell jewelry made by Pueblo people - well before the Navajo started using silver in their creations in the mid-1800s.

And so much more: dozens of katsina (sometimes known as kachina) dolls, collected over a 20-year period by former Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater; Hopi bracelets, rings, necklaces and belts; simple, functional Tohono O'odham baskets; and dazzling Zuni turquoise-and-silver jewelry.

This is the Heard Museum's mother lode, and it attracts crowds to match. During my visit, no fewer than four tours were being conducted concurrently - school kids, senior groups - such that it can be disruptive if you're perusing the works independently, especially when an entire case is blocked by a group listening to a guide describe what's inside.

The museum began modestly, when Dwight and Maie Heard drove through the Southwest from Chicago in search of relief for Dwight's lung infirmities. They settled in Phoenix and used the profits from a successful ranching and farming spread to collect artifacts - even purchasing land that held an extensive Hohokam residential ruin.

Artworks were exhibited in their home before they decided to open a tiny museum in 1929. Ever since, its display space and reputation have grown concurrently.

IF YOU GO

GETTING THERE: The Heard Museum is at 2301 N. Central Ave., Phoenix.

HOURS, COSTS: Open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $10 for adults, $9 for seniors (age 65 and up), $5 for students with ID, $3 for children ages 6 to 12. Free tours offered.

SPECIAL EXHIBIT: ``Remembering Our Indian School Days,'' originally scheduled to close Jan. 1, has been extended ``at least through 2007'' because of the response it has gotten, according to a museum spokeswoman.

INFORMATION: www. heard.org; [phone] (recorded information).

CAPTION(S):

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Photo:

(1 -- 2) Art and history intermingle at Phoenix's Heard Museum, where, at top, the grounds feature Nora Naranjo-Morse's ``Khwee-seng'' sculpture, and the museum itself, above, displays as many of its more than 35,000 artifacts as it can.

Eric Noland/Travel Editor

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IF YOU GO (see text)