Bruce's Personal Homepage

www.coastalwebweaver.com

Then . . .

Bruce C. Belknap

Public School Science Educator
1959 -- 2000  Now retired . . .

Later on . . .

AS STUDENT:

• Occidental College (Homepage)
• Occidental College (Physics Dept.)
Eagle Rock, Los Angeles, CA
B.A. in Physics

• San Francisco Theological Seminary
San Anselmo, CA
Philosophy & Languages

• Stanford University
M.A. in Science Education
Supervision Credential
Life Standard Credential

AS TEACHER:

• Franklin High School
Highland Park, Los Angeles 54, CA
Physics & Mathematics (3 years)

• San Quentin State Prison (CDC)
• San Quentin State Prison (Wikepedia)
Marin County, CA
Biology & Mathematics (5 years)

• Pacific Grove Middle School
Pacific Grove, CA
Earth, Life, Physical sciences (30 years)

AS RETIREE:

• Learning and Teaching Weaving the Traditional Navajo Way

• Advocating community and environmental issues

• Designing websites for friends and clients

• Photographs of family and friends and places, including closeup digital images of local (endangered) wildflowers

Weaving in Del Monte Forest continues at the weaving line toward the middle of a 60" long tapestry using a "down and under the pipe" warping technique.
circa 1978.

Weaving Biography and History

I was sharing a lunch of crackers and a peach in the sparse home of a Navajo Woman in Kayenta in 1975. Several Navajo women came to visit. One spoke in Navajo then in English asking, "How did you learn to weave?" I paused respectfully, then blurted, "From a book." They grinned, then giggled. I felt so awkward having made this implausible disclosure.

Working With The Wool had come into our lives sometime in 1973. Pati preferred weaving on a large floor loom, so I just began to read the pages. What efficient and magnificent loom and tapestry design! I followed the text and diagrams by Noël Bennett and Tiana Bighorse. To the letter. Made a large loom plus several forks and battens from beech, teak and charred oak planks, all driftwood found along Monterey Bay, committed to using only "found" sources and hand tools.

Shortly after meeting Jim and Marilyn Brandon, with Leo and Sarah (Begay) Natani at the 1974 CNCH conference, the Ashtl'o Guild was formed. Noël shared weaving-specific ceremonies, traditions and taboos during workshops at the home of her mother, Merton Kirkish in Aptos.

Carol Lane and I traveled by train to the Natani's first Workshop in October 1982. Our group stayed with Sarah and Leo Natani and family in their hogan at Table Mesa, N.M. I felt ecstatic and meek in Sarah's skilled hands, guided by her wisdom in beauty as we wove with close adherence to tradition.

During the early 1980s I taught Navajo Weaving classes at Monterey Peninsula College, the Pacific Grove Art Center and the Monterey Museum of Art. Then I was asked by the Anthropology Department of the California Academy of Sciences to weave a tapestry with a historical design for the Navajo Weaving Diorama in the Wattis Hall of Man in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park,now cataloged in their database.

During the 1990s I first designed the Original Ashtl'o Guild website and served for more than a decade as webmaster.

Warm memories emerge as I regularly card fleece then spin on a Navajo spindle. Yet I admit having lapsed at times from the difficult process of spinning and weaving to the easier process of writing about weaving as publisher of the Original Ashtl'o Guild Newsletter.

Click to see a photo gallery of Bruce's weaving on the Navajo Values website.