Historic Ignacio Chieftains date back to early 1930’s 

In June 2021, the Southern Ute Drum Archive received a donation from the Ignacio Community Library of historic Ignacio Chieftains from the 1930’s to 1973. 16 boxes were donated in total and included hundreds of physical newspaper issues of the Chieftain, as well as two rolls of microfiche of the Southern Ute Drum from 1970 through 1975.  

Additionally, in the month of July, the Archive received another donation from the Pine River Library which included large books of bound issues of the Ignacio Chieftain from 1930 through 1940. Both donations from two local libraries will help complete the holes within physical archives inventory from 1925 to 1959, especially during the 1930’s.   

Along with this donation, the Archive also received a private donation of 21 issues of the Chieftain from Malcolm Jones, a former Ignacio resident who grew up in region. Jones’ family were previously owners, editors and publishers of the Ignacio Chieftain from December 1934 until July 1963. Jones also helped work on the paper with his family during his summers at home while attending the University of Colorado in Denver before serving in the U.S. Army and pursuing his career at NASA as an aerospace engineer. Jones currently resides in Texas, near the NASA Space Center.  

With the donations from the Ignacio and Pine River Community Libraries and Jones, the Southern Ute Drum Archive is nearing completion of having most of the physical newspapers in the Chieftain File from 1930 to 1972. Now the Archive is better equipped to handle any research request from any Southern Ute tribal members, tribal entities, scholars or community members that wants to research the vast history Ignacio and the surrounding region from the Great Depression to the post-Vietnam War era.  

The Chieftain Archive File is still missing newspapers from the creation of the Chieftain newspaper in the 1910’s to 1925. Any donation of Ignacio Chieftains during that time, Southern Ute Drums from 1969 to 1975, or the Southern Ute Drum Newsletter predating 1969 will be graciously accepted into The Southern Ute Drum’s archive collections.   

The Southern Ute Drum Archive would like to thank the Ignacio Community library and the Pine River Library for their gracious donations to the collections. The Archive would also like to personally thank Malcolm Jones for his donation and sharing his personal history of the Ignacio Chieftain with our staff. Their contributions have been vital to helping preserve local history for future generations to come.