Bill Toledo - Navajo Code Talker - Living History

No courier that won't want to call breaker in their world there's Japanese so then never broken I didn't want to work my dad was pretty strong you know he's a pretty strong man you know physically mentally emotionally my name is Bill Toledo my plan is kinda sunny assist neighbors change nor coordinator she changed can your honor additionally while I wasn't hurting sheep one day I saw an airplane going way up in the sky ain't no going cold on the cross keep looking at it you know always wonder what it feels like to be an airplane you know and to be there high up in the sky bill a nut named Gina dip at this chair 1924 yeah Don Dean started up and days at the end on the model there's your Abbott's on it then a car bomb Isana door the che benissa mr. Dettman up in the morning you know the Don bricks I had to go out and pray with my grandparents I saw a fish and East was there kampala you know and I saw and then the latent somewhere in that little October you know when I first know I had to get up earlier in the morning or the snow dark every about trees of snow on there on the ground and a lot side there they make me take my clothes off and rolled in the snow this fall or maybe they were not even half a minute this roller will go wrong for a few seconds then come on race back into the house that's how they did they raise you like that you know and later on I found out that my grandma told me that Tom there's no earlier breathe it being that early you know you stay young you know you know if they're real old you know when you grow up and also you're going to wrinkle on their face my grandpa will come around on horseback you know and then he said grandson you say well how come you is this sitting the wrong you should be running around you know you want me to exercise this what do you want to do so one or go go run down to our oil take their shoes off and run in the sand you know or the sheep are grazing real nice you know and then I've gotta run with no grandpa grandpa always won in about five years old me now yeah well now ronnie was no grandpa Oh bah half a mile they were human races the delivery behind way behind what it was real running with head of me I finally catch up with him you know then when I grew up with a little older and I leave him behind I guess at that time he didn't know that he was training me for boot camp - okay my real good I went to a disco tutorial and I was about six years old there's a bus that goes around pick up to your students you know that area small bus you know take us to school we will move around with the Sheep you know a trip cap so that bus has to come around wherever we're at I have a long hair longer than your hair we're done to my wish you're seeing some day that one was they haven't ever bounced back here I would like to have wearing a hair bun you know I'll be herding sheep now one day or they're the summer my grandpa probably a straw hat and I was still small and the hardened sheep you know we had a bun back here and I bought me a straw hat you know we're done there one day - call me Tony say I look like a Mexican now when I taught in the school you know a six year old I have big hair bun back there when I'm in the school and then they're government official you know I said cut my hair bun off silly don't need this in school they told me so that's how I lost my hair my hair bun they saved it but I don't know what happened to it it was pretty straight except you can't speaking down your language in our school get punished for it I'm telling they're watching what I was so I was in the critically low logano worse when I went to grade school I was in sixth grade on up to eighth grade we speak our language and we'll get punished you don't wanted to speak a language that's how they used to wash our mouths or soap laundry so there's a yellow one single no that's what I went through down there they're wrong I grew up and then they came around I said the government came Ron said we want to use your language to be used in the war say beat Donna hi aunt don t suppose in dashikis you're the adjust Huckle it's a laugh so I thought Nia I was 18 years old who knows or they are volunteering to join the Marines the reason I joined the Marines is all you see young we heard that to help that Japanese were breaking all the code that was used against them and now they they will they break all the coast they know what it's all about they know so Marines decided to use Navajo language as a code when now when this code talkers I think our school his name was John Johnny man or little and there was old testimony blues and on real sharp you know and we all wanted to be like him you know I walk around real straight you know and they talk to us about marine life you know oh it's quite a slide to be in marine you know at the time we didn't know that he was a Marine he was a code talker father was real after his stroke his speech you know he talked to us about 45 minutes and then five of us got together at the school I had a cousin now and I'll call a man from Torian and through other brothers there are Morgan brothers from Crown Point area so we got together and we talked about joining Marines as a real when you decided that we're joined so that's how we got in and they sent us the wrong another school law won't we get there was a recruiter over there it took our physical and there's a lot of questions and no no allowed I got to talk real good real good in English there real good Navajo and so we went in they sent us through our Phoenix or we're officially joining the Marine over there then from there we went to send us to San Diego or we went through boot camp always rough yeah there's di that they're level kind to you can even make a loss small mistake you know they're come and are you put your faces they faced up to you that almost of your nose you can see doctor either frozen or with your custody yeah there are real roughly now at home you know when I was raised by my grandparents you know when I make restate above that mean whole night I get I get real schooling over on her mama grandma it was kind of kinda rough learning the cold you know you got a little right you know the Kansas you had to pronounce these cool cause you know real we're supposed to be pronounced cold constant law animals to birds like crows eagle and small animals like prairie dogs and rats Fox Tigers owners hotel names and the cold come from the sheep without whether the first letter s sheep they call it the bed and then the horse the letter H you call it king so and then there's other world all different like a like alphabet you know very a has a about three three names the first one is red and Wenatchee the second one is X sendeth and then the other one is Apple lisanna so letters have three code names my java results this isn't using the code that we learned see ya we've we make the rounds on the battlefield what the commander whatever the troop needs if they need more ammunition more a grenade more ration or water and law he will write it write it all up on the message tablet and English we tell radios and I also call the other code talker on the other end how to higher up here were very long what's another commander over there so I translate this in this code says we memorize the code so translate this message into koa and - well code over the radio I called another coat on there or tell him that I was an error message and I know he'll be ready for it you know that's not I said this in lesson two code over the phone over the radio the way I got a bodyguard is where we landed on Bougainville as well into the jungle the front line shoots were already ahead of us and one of their frontline men was our guest reward behind us after all what he was doing back there going into the thick jungle of a sudden somebody poked me with a rifle the back the back told me to raise my hand so I raised my hand and turn me into a commander commander was right there and the totally con man here says we found this it's Japanese walking with a communication group sir course I like question a lot of doers all right so I'll do with him Sir shall I go ahead and shoot him so then I'll let him ago he said he's won over old man what are you doing back there get your butt back on the front line that's when he assigned my foxhole buddy there is a richer bottom without me knowing he was assigned to me as my body got the Oba kitchen Albuquerque Indian School did not G stuck when he would be out herding sheep he would see Mount Taylor and he would wonder what's on the other side of Mount Taylor you know one of these days I'm gonna find out well after he went to boarding school he met my mom and she lived on the other side of Mount Taylor so he found out what it was and he lived there for a long time I went to Rahl turn it up to the school office I went over there for some one I wanted some kind of information you know so I went over there coming back I was almost at the boys building then somebody hit me with our snowball and the the back you know and I look back and here she was she's worth us no boy so I'll run over to run after her and I got one of the snow were you know and and I put it right back behind her Nannette kennel and these girls over there is a holler and all not so this how we got to know each other my mom you know was cleaning the bedroom and I decided to help her and she had a picture of my dad he was in his dress blues and I took it and I was cleaning off the picture frame and cleaning the glass and everything and I decided to take off the back of it and so his dd-214 fell out and there was another piece of paper that fell out and then I was reading the the picture because he had signed it to my mom and I was teasing her because you know he put - my darling Louise I thought it was so cute and anyway then I opened up the dd-214 and I looked at it and I said mom what's a code talker she says I don't know I said well I think that's what Dad was and he was at work and coming home maybe in about three hours or so so when we you know figured he'd be coming up the road we all went to the door you know and we're standing there at the front door waiting for him to come in nobody said hi he just opens to the door dad what's the code doctor he just looked at us like where did you hear that so we let him get everything that he had put away and then I think he sat us down and told us it was something he did in the war you know you spoke to alcohol so we moved to all Laguna after we got back and then I got with job with got a job with the uranium mine in a company home state money clinic I worked 40 years or hosted mining company first-first long enough 40 years I work for an anaconda mining company first a blue water and I were ten years my dad and I got to travel together back in 1993 I was invited to go out there for the I think it was the year of indigenous people so we got to we got to go to to Japan and we were there for about three and a half weeks or so just speaking to different groups he went down to Hiroshima with another friend of ours they went on the Shinkansen the bullet train and him and Yoko were were you know partner that day and they went to the Children's Peace Center Peace Park and they I think my dad said a blessing down there I think it just really helped to helped him to heal too because at first he was afraid of going because he thought you know people might still hold you know some hostility toward toward the Navajo code talkers but you know once he got there he felt you know he was welcomed you know some of the kids told him you know you look like my grandpa like are always talking about airplane all right this is the airplane up in the sky you know now I get on the airplane from the up cookie and get on that one though it's big plane and I go over to our Michigan or all or other states you know I cover almost all the states talking about the cold I see there I say the country from the air now I wonder first see how it feels like to be in their area now I know know see the country you know we were sitting by the window and if you're all their country from the bottom you know at the top you know the wide area beautiful country station and so well I saw a fun own we're looking at that plane up in the sky here goes never call because on our law also going a horse is kind all retarted on it the car door for Clark so wrong done in a day Edison washing on their cars back or Silla Chile Copa hosel you could say he's a great grandpa they cheered me up it was the minor stuff I'm gonna show you the heating skilled and smart and for fighting still being the lime juice are your allergies yes tell my dad thank you for being here thank you for being the kind of dad that you are thank you for loving us and caring about us thank you for giving us real fond memories thank you for sharing your life with us thank you for being good to our whole family our community we're so happy that you're still with us and we're learning more and more about you I think after after mom died my dad and I got to be a lot closer and now it's like I'm so happy that he lives here with me now because he's right there and I can I can see him and I know you know if he's okay or not and I'm just I'm just so thankful for that and I love you dad you never know how much we love you

Channel: Tom Grier

Views: 12,563

Rating: 4.9466667 out of 5

Keywords: Navajo Oral History Project, Navajo Code Talker, Navajo Nation, Winona State University, Diné College, Documentary Journalism

Id: C5hMPF0qChY

Length: 22min 48sec (1368 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 15 2015