COUNCIL #10762 - ST. PIUS X REMEMBERS
REX REDHOUSE

 

Rex Redhouse, 84, tireless volunteer

For 31 years, he educated and provided solace to people across the Tucson community.

By DANIEL BUCKLEY

dbuckley@tucsoncitizen.com

Services are tomorrow and Wednesday for Rex Redhouse, a dancer and musician who for decades toiled to instill pride in young Indians and teach others about his culture.

Mr. Redhouse, 84, died Friday after a two-month illness.

He was a tireless volunteer who, since moving to Tucson in 1973, spent 31 years working with Indians and others in southern Arizona schools, hospitals, prisons, nursing homes, orphanages, drug and alcohol rehab centers, colleges, military bases, retirement communities, powwows, festivals and arts organizations.

With his Redhouse Dancers and Dineh Drum, he was a mainstay at every Tucson Meet Yourself, demonstrating the broad range of powwow dances and speaking to crowds of their meaning within the American Indian community. His Dineh Drum – a group of drummers and singers for support of powwow dances – was all-inclusive.

Mr. Redhouse was also a notable musician and recording artist, appearing on his self-titled independent label CD, and with his children on Canyon Records’ “Urban Indian” CD.

He was born Ushke Chini Ya (translated from Navajo as “comes out frowning”) to a midwife mother and medicine man father on the Navajo reservation in the Four Corners region Nov. 20, 1919. He spent his early years tending to sheep and growing crops before being shipped off to boarding school in Shiprock, N.M.

There he was initially named Rodney Redhouse (his Navajo last name – Kinlicheeney – means “red house”), but he changed his first name to Rex in the eighth grade. He went through high school in Fort Wingate, N.M., then studied bookkeeping at Haskell College in Kansas.

In the early 1940s he served as an interpreter for the soil conservation office in Window Rock before volunteering for Army service in 1942.

During his tour of duty he was stationed in the New Hebrides near Fiji, and later, in the Philippines, met his wife-to-be, Maria. After the war he stayed in the Philippines, helping internees prepare for repatriation.

When the Korean War broke out, Mr. Redhouse returned to the United States and received an accounting degree from the University of Santa Clara in California.

He worked at Fort Ord in California and at Fort Huachuca in Sierra Vista as an auditor and comptroller before retiring in 1977.

In California and later in Tucson, he created the Rex Redhouse Dancers with his children and wife. Recognizing from personal and family experience the difficulties American Indians faced when leaving the reservation for cities, he used the dancers, and later the Dineh Drum, to instill pride in young Indians, and to educate others about the reality beyond stereotypical cowboy movies.

A deeply religious man, he put himself in the service of the entire Tucson community in many ways, bringing solace to the needy no matter what their background.

Mr. Redhouse is survived by his wife, Maria; sons Tony, Larry, and Lenny; daughters Mary Redhouse and Charlotte Redhouse-Tividad; and 10 grandchildren.

The memorial service is tomorrow at 7 p.m. at Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha Parish, 101 W. 31st St. Funeral services will be held at 1 p.m. Wednesday at St. Pius X Church, 1800 N. Camino Pio Decimo.