Hubbell Trading Post Administrative History

Luis Edward Gastellum 1981-1984

"I left Hubbell Trading Post in May of 1984 and my enthusiasm for the area has not diminished." [4] Ed Gastellum was superintendent at Hubbell Trading Post from 8 January, 1981, to 28 April, 1984. He is presently the Assistant Superintendent for the North Cascades National Park Service Complex, but he remembers the trading post as a "superb" cultural resource where "so much there...talks of times past and yet life goes on and changes...takes place slowly, reluctantly." [5]

Ed's first permanent position with the Park Service was in 1973 at Tumacacori National Monument. However, his seasonal jobs with the Park Service, while he was still in school (BS from Northern Arizona University, social anthropology, business administration), were at Fort Washington National Historic Site and Oxen Hill Animal Farm in 1967; at Lake Powell National Recreation Area in 1971 and 1972; and at Organ Pipe National Monument in 1973, just after college and prior to going to Tumacacori. He stayed at Tumacacori for just ten months, then moved to Yosemite for two years as Administrative Assistant to the Chief Ranger for the Protection Division. In 1976 he transferred to the Albright Training Center, Grand Canyon, for four years as Administrative Officer. He left Albright for the superintendency of Hubbell Trading Post. After three and a half years at the trading post, he moved down to Petrified Forest National Park where he was Superintendent for five years, and from Petrified Forest he transferred to North Cascades, where he arrived in 1989.

Some major and minor projects while Ed was at Hubbell: maintaining the historical aspect of the site while at the same time creating a road surface to the trading post that would not turn into a quagmire in the winter (before that, it was possible to see ruts a foot deep in the road); the Visitor center was reroofed, vigas replaced; the restroom was completed (work on it had started prior to his arrival); major work on the collection storage area, the Hubbell home, the Bread Oven, the covered area for the wagons and farm implements, and the barn; efforts to complete the cataloguing and documentation of the collection; rehabilitation work on the farm equipment, wagons, and farm implements; historic preservation work contracted for and completed; completion of some of the planning documents; outlining what was needed for housing. A lot of this work was done as part of the Park Restoration Improvement Program.

Ed Gastellum, a native Southwesterner and a second-generation NPS employee, lived in and around the Navajo Reservation for thirteen years. As he said about Hubbell Trading Post as a career experience: "A lot happened while I was there. For me, it was a valuable experience that I will always remember with affection and pride." [6]