The Ghostway (1984)

The term Pueblo refers to a diverse range of Native Americans living in pueblos in New Mexico and Arizona. These groups share similar world views and historically have participated in intensive agriculture, growing corn, beans, chile, and squash, yet each group is distinct and autonomous from the others. Generally, the Pueblos are divided into two groups: Western Pueblos, who live in canyon and mesa country along the Colorada Plateau, and the Eastern Pueblos, who live along the Rio Grande, a river running north-south through almost the entire length of New Mexico. There are four distinct linguistic stocks in the Pueblo community, including Tanoan, Keresan, Uto-Aztecan, and Zuni, which is a language isolate. These differences suggest that these groups have different origins.

A ponderosa pine is a large coniferous evergreen tree, with long pine needles, that can grows over 70 feet in height. Ponderosa are found throughout the western United States and in Canada. The tree is easily identifiable by its bark, which is often yellow or red with large plates separated by crevices, making ponderosa bark look kind of like puzzle pieces. Ponderosa pines are generally found in mountainous regions, and in the U.S. Southwest, ponderosa can be found in open, park-like stands above 6,000 feet in elevation.

A drum that is made by filling a ceramic pot with water and then covering it with a buckskin. A pot drum is played by hitting the stretched hide with a looped drumstick made of branches. The pot drum is used during ceremonies, such as the the Navajo Enemyway.

Porcupines are large herbivorous rodents with a coat of sharp spines, also known as quills. These quills are actually strands of hair coated with layers of keratin, a form of protein found in skin. The quills function both as camouflage but also as protection, as the hard sheath of keratin tapers into barbed points, making the porcupine appear sort of like an elongated pincushion.

Unless stated otherwise, Hillerman's use of "pollen" refers to yellow corn pollen (or tádídíín in Navajo), which is a sweet tasting, yellow-colored powder that is collected from the tassels of mature corn plants. Because corn, or maize, has traditionally been a life-giving staple of indigenous groups throughout the Americas, the pollen, which is necessary for corn's own survival via pollination, has attained a sacred, life-giving status of its own. Often kept in small leather pouches, corn pollen is used in ceremonies as a blessing and offered in prayer.

A type of photography where light is used in combination with special paper to create instant photographs. The Polaroid camera was invented by Edwin H. Land, who studied synthetic polarizers. In the 1940’s, at the behest of his 3-year old daughter, Land industrialized a way to instantly develop a picture. The first Polaroid camera, known as the Land Camera, was put on the market beginning in 1948.

A brand of American car, first introduced by the Chrysler corporation in the 1920s as a low-cost sub-brand that would compete with Chevrolet and Ford, the two-most popular car makers that were dominating the market. Over the decades, Plymouth gained significant popularity, although never successfully matching its rivals.

An elevated, fairly level expanse of land raised sharply above adjacent land.

A mixture of lime or gypsum, sand, and water that is applied to the walls of structures as a sealant. In the Southwest, many pueblos are made of adobe, which comes from the Spanish verb adobar, meaning “to plaster.” Part of the annual maintenance cycle of pueblo structures can include the ritual of whitewashing, or plastering, interior and exterior walls with a local derivative of plaster.