Toistoto

Tositoto was a Navajo (Diné) man of the Northern Navajo District, Shiprock, NM

Source: Wagner, Dan. “Exploring Ship Rock.” Great American Hikes, 2 Dec. 2022, www.greatamericanhikes.com/post/ship-rock-the-legend-of-tse-bit-a-i. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Source: Pennington & Rowland, Copyright Claimant. Near the base of Old Shiprock. Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/90708131/>.

In 1898, forty Indian agents answered an inquiry from the Committee on Indian Affairs concerning the presence of insane Indians within their areas of supervision. Among all forty agents, they found only fifty-five insane Indians and perhaps fifteen to twenty who were “idiotic.” The agents’ replies were very similar:

“I would state that there is now but one insane Indian on this reservation. We have, however, two Indians from this reserve now inmates of the Government Asylum for the Insane at Washington, D. C. I do not think that insanity is any more common among Indians than among whites.” Chas. E. McChesney

“There is only one hopelessly insane Indian on this reservation at present. One died last winter. There are others more or less weak-minded, but they are not so insane that they can not be cared for in some way by their relatives or Indian friends.” J. W. Watson

“I have about 8,000 Indians under this agency; there is no insanity among them.” J. Roe Young

“I have to advise you that there are 1,283 Indians under my charge at this agency, none of whom are insane, and it is my observation that this affliction is much less common among the Indians than whites.” Luke C. Hays
---. “Indians, Insanity, and American History Blog | Asylums and Insanity Treatments 1800 – 1935.” Cantonasylumforinsaneindians.com, 2013, cantonasylumforinsaneindians.com/history_blog/. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Shiprock Trading Post, Shiprock, New Mexico c. 1912, The Navajos are threatening to revolt against U.S. rule, but here the Navajo Indian girls are going shopping on a Saturday afternoon at the local trading store on the reservation.

Biography:
Toistoto was a northern Navajo man born c. 1876 to unknown parents. When he was a youngster he attended the San Juan Boarding School in the Shiprock Agency, NM, and it was from there that he was admitted to the Canton Asylum on an unknown date. According to Carla Joinson in her book Vanished in Hiawatha, he was diagnosed with Spastic spinal paralysis (Spastic spinal paralysis can refer to a group of inherited disorders called hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP), or spasticity caused by a spinal cord injury or stroke) which was in 1910 revised to chronic dementia (Dementia is a chronic condition that causes a loss of cognitive functioning that interferes with daily life.). He died of consumption at the Canton Asylum on May 17, 1908, at the age of 32.

In the letter dated February 17, 1934, to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Dr. L.L. Culp advised that Toistoto was admitted from Shiprock, New Mexico. He died at the Canton Asylum and was buried in the Canton Hiawatha Cemetery, tier 4 plot 38.

His profile is part of the The Canton Asylum One Place Study.

Research Notes:
-Minimal information is available on the Navajo pre-1929.
-Asylum census reports were NOT kept by Oscar Gifford 1903-1909
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Sources:

1908 May 17 - "South Dakota, Grave Registration Records, 1940-1941", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:CY8C-34T2 : Sun Mar 10 18:07:50 UTC 2024), Entry for Toistoto.
Name Toistoto
Sex Male
Age 32 years
Birth Year (Estimated) 1876
Death Date 17 May 1908
Event Type Burial
Event Place Presho, Lyman, South Dakota, United States
Cemetery Indian Asylum Cemetery

1908 May 17 - Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14493826/taistoto-unknown: accessed May 10, 2024), memorial page for Taistoto Unknown (unknown–17 May 1908), Find a Grave Memorial ID 14493826, citing Hiawatha Asylum Cemetery, Canton, Lincoln County, South Dakota, USA; Maintained by Graveaddiction (contributor 46528400).

1908 May 17 - Hilton, M. (Ed.). (2023, July 10). Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians Historical Marker. Historical Marker. https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=183486 Photo by Ruth VanSteenwyk, July 10, 2023, courtesy of HMdb.org

Nadesooda 2-8-08 · Toistoto 5-17-08 · James Chief Crow 10-24-08

1910 Aug 12 - Camp Verde School: 1910-27; Canton Insane Asylum: 1910-22, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155854182?objectPage=675, line 84, Table 7 Form of mental disease of those admitted since opening of Asylum