This simple ghost sign is all that remains of the storied Bruchman Indian Trading Post that operated in Winslow AZ from 1903 to the 1980s. The famous "Standin' on the corner" park is a half of a block east of here.
What began as a remote (but well-known and profitable) trading post "on the Rez" at Bird Springs beside the Colorado River in 1903 became an extremely successful and renowned source of quality Indian goods and jewelry along old Route 66.
In 2014, both of the old trading posts are long gone. Only this ghost signs remains to recall the history of a famed Winslow business, and he history of the family that owned and operated it. The space is occupied by a local restaurant.
The full fascinating and often tragic story of the Bruchman family and their trading posts can be found here (it is WELL WORTH A READ): (
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""[EDITED FOR LENGTH BY BMB]
TRADING POST DAYS
My grandfather, Richard Max Bruchman worked for Babbitt Brothers in Winslow for three years before buying the trading post out at Bird Springs about 20 miles north of town on the Little Colorado River. He made the purchase in 1903 and three years later took his bride, Corinne Lynn Bocklett. The home and trading post were nice but was situated on the muddy Little Colorado . . . Dick bought, sold and traded goods with the Navajo and Hopi Indians, traveling in a wagon drawn by horses. He would take a trip once a month and would be gone for a week at a time.
Early on, Pendleton Woolen Mills contacted him and he was soon selling or trading Pendleton Robes and Shawls to the other traders and the natives in the area. He would trade for jewelry, rugs, baskets, kachinas, cattle and sheep. Cora was left at home to man the trading post, which was adjacent to their home connected by an open porch or breezeway area. . . Their first babies were born on the reservation, the first two being boys. Both of them died shortly after birth. . . . [they would eventually lose four of their five children before the children reached adulthood -- BMB]
[Dick] would come to town in a horsedrawn wagon to get supplies from the railroad. Then he would ride horseback across the reservation to Indian camps to trade the supplies for sheep and cattle and rugs, jewelry and baskets and other arts and crafts that the Navajo women produced.
. . .
THE MOVE TO WINSLOW
Around 1920, the family moved into Winslow, to a wooden frame house on the corner of Second Street and Warren Avenue. Living in Winslow was much easier than reservation life. . .
. . .
The business was conducted in the living room of the home on Second and Warren. Route 66 passed by the house and business was picking up. Word was out that Bruchmans had quality Indian Arts and Crafts and there was a growing clientele. They sold moccasins, material—velvet and plush and satin—for the Navajo and Hopi women to make their traditional clothing. Traders would come to buy the Pendleton blankets because there was a much larger selection than Dick could carry in his car. And they sold the turquoise and silver jewelry and Navajo rugs, Hopi pottery and Kachinas, plus groceries and household items to trade with the Native Americans when they brought goods in that they had made. It was a real show place for the ever-growing tourist trade.
. . . .
[During the 1950s and 60s now -- BMB]
Grandpa was “at the helm” in the store. He started taking pawn from the Hopi and Navajo Indians. He had to approve every item that they wanted to borrow money on. We had rows and rows of boxes of pawned items. . . .When the first of the month rolled around, the pawn all had to be sorted and dates checked to see which had been held long enough, usually a year, without any payment having been made on it. Grandpa was very fair with the Native Americans and would hold some of their stuff for years, if they made payments on it. . .
People would wait outside the door of the shop until we opened at 9 AM to see what was coming out of pawn. Philip [their only surviving child -- BMB] came to work about 1960 and then I came as bookkeeper in 1972, when my youngest child started kindergarten. I worked the hours he was in school and it soon became a 9-5 job. . . . I
n 1980, Grandpa fell at the store and broke his hip. . . . he began to develop dementia and didn’t recognize any of us. . . . He finally passed away on May 30, 1986. He was buried in Desert View Cemetery, next to Cora Lynn, his wife, and four of the children.
Meanwhile in 1984, we had to give up the Pendleton business to our salesman, Bob Bolton . . . He purchased the Trading Post out on East Second Street from George Baker and worked a thriving pawn and trading post trade for many years.
With Phil gone and no Pendleton business left, we began a downhill slide. The Highway no longer passed our shop since I-40 opened in September of 1978. We still continued buying arts and crafts from the local artists. And so……it wasn’t too many years before we were forced to close down the shop. . . . [After opening a restaurant in the building that failed in 1995] We put [the shop building] up for sale and it wasn’t but a few days before we had it sold to two local men. Today it is Bojo’s Bar and Grill and has been open with them since April of 1996. A huge success!"