Chatfield, a non-American Indian from the Midwest, was immediately taken by the young, pure-blooded Shoshone woman - "She was beautiful and smart," he recalls. The pair soon married and made a home in Rose Park where they raised two sons and two daughters. (Grace died in 2006.)

One of the couple's sons, Ross Chatfield, 57, owns and operates Chatfield Construction in South Salt Lake. He started the highway construction firm in 1983 and now employs 20 people year-round and as many as 50 during the construction season.

"I never felt any racism," says Ross, reflecting on his youth in Rose Park. "I have three daughters [who are one-fourth Indian], and they were very well accepted in the community."

Ross' brother, Randy Chatfield, 56, is a foreman at the company. He, too, remembers being embraced by his neighbors, but does recall a day at West High School when a coach split up his class into two groups: Latino and Anglo kids.

Randy was lumped in with the Latinos, and when he got home asked his father, "What am I?"

"You're a 'Windian,' " Randy remembers his father telling him. "A white Indian."

The brothers are proud of their Shoshone heritage, but say they are completely integrated into Anglo society and are better off for it, they say. That stands in stark contrast to some of their relatives who live on the Shoshone-Bannock Reservation in southern Idaho.

"There is a lot of stigma being an Indian in Pocatello or Idaho Falls," Ross says. "There is no opportunity on the reservation and no incentive to leave. It's a terrible situation."

- Christopher Smart