But not even her children appreciated the breadth of Haslam's collection and after her death in 2003 at age 88, the objects remained in the basement of her home, stored in shoe boxes and Wonder Bread bags. In one of the more serendipitous discoveries in Southwestern ethnography, a University of Utah geology professor learned about Haslam's collection two years ago while on a yard-sale expedition through the Sugar House neighborhood.
Haslam's passion for sharing her treasured objects came to fruition last week with the unveiling of traveling exhibits at a downtown bank lobby. Zions Bank put up the bulk of the $180,000 needed for the Utah Museum of Natural History to buy what is now known as the Zions Bank Four Corners Collection - more than 650 objects produced by craftspeople from the Navajo, Ute, Apache, Hopi and Zuni tribes.
"She didn't concentrate on any one thing. Her objects come from many different tribes and different types of art. The collection is big enough and has enough repetition we can use it in our education programs," said Kathy Kankainen, who directs the museum's anthropology program.
"When you think of the legacy of this collection to our children, it's great to see it preserved and exhibited," said Zions President Scott Anderson at the collection's unveiling at the bank, where Haslam's necklaces, bracelets, hairpins, dolls, rugs - one-third of the entire collection - were laid out on tables in the lobby.
"There's not enough of [exhibits like] this," said Forrest Cuch, a Ute tribal member who heads the Utah Division of Indian Affairs. "I really applaud the bank for its efforts to bring attention to the indigenous cultures of our state, which have been ignored and marginalized."
Marjorie Chan, chairwoman of the U.'s department of geology and geophysics, was the first member of academia to appreciate the potential value of the Haslam collection when she happened by Haslam's home on Oneida Street (2155 East) to visit a yard sale. She noticed a box of old issues of Arizona Highways, prompting her to ask Haslam's son Steven Haslam whether they had any American Indian things for sale.
Steven told her they had plenty, but they were being appraised and the family was not ready to sell them. He invited Chan to come back later to see his late mother's jewelry and other Indian crafts.
"I said right off the bat if they would consider donating it to a museum," Chan said. "I went back with Kathy [Kankainen] to see if the collection was something the museum wanted. It was a no-brainer. It's amazing what one person amassed."
The museum's Collectors Council went to work raising money and secured the Zions gift to make the acquisition possible.
"We were amazed by its beauty, and delighted to find that the Haslams were interested in selling the collection to the museum," Museum Director Sarah George said at Wednesday's event. "We were particularly interested in its incredible educational value - it would give us the opportunity to teach young people about the traditional arts of the first peoples of this region."
The museum will tour selected objects around the state as part of its Traveling Treasures program, while a portion of the collection, called "Connecting Cultures," will make 10 stops at Zions branches around the state over the next two years.
Haslam's collecting forays began in the 1940s, a period when her husband Kenneth was frequently on the road for Phillips Petroleum.
"He was responsible for getting the oil from the wells to the refineries. He was a traffic manager," Steven Haslam said. "She would travel with him on business. Instead of sitting in the hotel room, she would be out doing her Indian thing."
Haslam proved that with collecting, as with most things in life, who you know matters as much as what you know.
"She was on a first-name basis with all the traders," Steven said. "They knew top-quality art and when they saw something really special come off the reservation, they would immediately call Mom. She would say, 'Hold it for me. I plan to be down in a month or two.' Ninety-nine percent of the time she would buy it."
Haslam never sold any of her pieces and displayed only a few things in the home. No paperwork is known to exist to help researchers determine exactly where individual pieces came from or who sold them. But experts have been able to determine some provenance of the pieces just by examining them, Kankainen said. For example, a silver squash-blossom necklace is embedded with distinctive Morenci turquoise, which was available from a single mine in southern Arizona that played out years ago. That fact and the silver work shaped liked pomegranates give clues to the piece's origins.
The Haslam family is pleased Dorothy's labor of love will find a home in the museum and be on display throughout Utah.
"That was Mom's last wish," Steven Haslam said. "She said, 'Steve, if at all possible, please keep it all together.' Fortunately the U. wanted it. That's the bottom line, to keep it together so the people can enjoy it for years and years."
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* BRIAN MAFFLY can be contacted at bmaffly@sltrib.com or 801-257-8605. Send comments about this story to livingeditor@sltrib.com.
Connecting cultures
The Zions Bank Four Corners Collection will remain on display at Zions' downtown Salt Lake City branch, 102 S. Main St., until Feb. 5, before touring the state, stopping at a total of 10 Zions branches. Some of the collection of American Indian art will be on display in the Utah Museum of Natural History, which bought Dorothy Haslam's objects with money provided largely by Zions Bank.
