Foreign [Music] Er white and I've spent the majority of My life working in the outdoors as a Soldier Outdoorsman and guide many years Ago I came to a crossroad in my military Career I felt like I was at the point Where I was no longer able to learn About survival from the military so I Searched and I watched as many new shows Popped up like Dual Survival Survivorman And others shows that partnered seasoned Soldiers with primitive living Instructors I watched experienced Soldiers who had amazing skills with Tools fall short without them and I had To look deep within myself and ask why So realizing that something was missing In my training I then formulated a plan I set out to find people with these Skills in my area to find out who they Were where they come from who taught Them and more importantly how could I Learn and master these skills for myself This journey has led me to a place where I have had the privilege of teaching These things that I love to others Skills that now range from Advanced Navigation to primitive fire this is my Journey to primitive this is my story Yeah it's a story that has never really Been about me one of the first people That I met along my journey dependent Was Dave Holliday this is Dave
Holliday's story [Music] Hello I'm David Holliday Uh this is where I live most of the time Uh when I'm not on the trail or off Being on some big adventure with uh Friends or clients I make my living Most of the time Teaching Primitive skills or outdoor living Skills I started off being an outdoor survival Instructor a long time ago In the 70s and uh Begin to add Admire those who thrived and lived on The land As a little kid and thought well I I Don't want to survive I want to Thrive I Want to be here on the land's terms and So my Pursuit For about 18 years as an instructor at Boulder outdoor survival school was uh See what maybe the people before us were Doing here try to mimic their behavior And find a way to actually live here and Not survive here And so that's who I am more than Anything else as somebody who's been Pursuing the idea of living with the Earth enjoying Being here The joke I told somebody who wasn't very
Happy with me once who was a student of Mine who was a doctor and very afraid of Of all the things that could kill a Human being because he'd seen them he'd Gotten lost in the first two hours of a 30-day trip he'd gotten lost three times At least that's what he said I knew Where he was Um but he was angry and he said you Haven't taught me staying found Principles And I looked at him and I said you Better talk to Mike Ryan because he's The one that teaches those principles Things I just teach how to be here in Fact sir I've been trying to figure out How to never have to go back to town My whole thing is how could we Disappear and never go back he didn't Think that was funny I think Mona Dayton my first grade Teacher took us to the University of Arizona's Archaeological Museum When I was a first grader And I Looked through the glass at a Display that was on the second floor of That museum That had a bunch of little miniature Mammoth Hunters taking down a mammoth And then it showed that Mammoth Hunting Site you know a hundred years after the Kill
A thousand years after the kill and ten Thousand years after the kill And there were the little Miniatures That you looked through this window to See you know they were very realistic Well done And then It said that there was an actual place In Arizona And then right behind it you turned Around and you had the mammoth with the Clovis points that were in the Jawbone In other parts of the mammoth in the Pelvis and it showed them in situ Like as if they were in the Dig but it Was the real thing And I looked at some of the mammoth Hunting points the the Clovis points That were backlit That were part of that display with the Sun with the electric light coming up From underneath it with that light Shining through those beautiful agates And as a first grader I said to myself I Want to be an artist when I get big and That's the kind of art that I would like To do So as a first grader I didn't know what That meant I had no idea but I that's The kind of art I wanted to produce so Years later I'm asking everybody Questions I'm living in Guatemala I'm walking to dig some fish ponds with My father and we go through all these
Big archaeological sites pyramids and Fields full of artifacts And I began to ask my dad how did they Produce this stuff And he said something to me that was Interesting because I knew that the Stuff that was being produced in those Days was harder than steel because he Taught me about the mold hardness scale And flints and agates and all those Things were as hard or harder than steel And I said well Without grinding wheels and stealing Electricity how did they shape this Stuff my dad didn't know He's he's a true scientist my father Said we don't really know and then he Would say you know True science is we don't really know and These are the pieces of evidence That we have these are the data that We've collected and where this is what We think based on the data and nowadays They know nowadays people do know how Things were done Uh Uh a lot more clearly because of Practitioners who've actually started Making things like myself and lots of Our friends so that's how it started was Uh me asking but the big jump the big 30 000 year leap Was I was looking in a whole earth Catalog
Access to books and tools The same whole earth catalog that Steve Jobs was looking in about how to find Different ways to present Ideas and calligraphy and stuff and I Was inspired in 1970 As a 12 year old To look into that catalog because there Were lots and lots of pictures of women Having babies in the Midwifery section And I wanted to know where we came from I was curious I was excited I wanted to Be part of that somehow And so I would I would look at that I would I was embarrassed I thought People would think I was being bad or That there was something Improper about it so I would hide in the Medicine closet at the clinic in Guatemala where we were working and it Was a Canadian nurse a really nice lady That brought the catalog and so I would Hide in there and look at the Midwifery Section and one day while turning every Single page because there was so many Amazing things on every page I saw a Book from Brigham Young University press By Larry Dean Olsen Outdoor survival skills and amongst Other things that you could learn in That book was how to Flint nap that's The word I learned the word for it I saw Some of the tools And I went to my father who was a very
Very uh I would say kind of serious dude He was a Marine Corps Colonel who'd Fought in second world war in Korea and Seen lots and lots of action full bird Colonel seen a lot of hard things and Was Somebody who wasn't very funny to most People unless you knew him real well Then you'd realize he's got a great dry You know Welsh Scottish sense of humor but I Asked him For the money it took to order that book Now in Guatemala in those days people Were making 25 a man was making 25 cents A day Working 16 hour days so to ask for the Seven dollars and something for a book Out of a catalog I was really scared and I'd never asked my father for money Before since I never asked for money in My life I didn't even like money but I Wanted that book so I went to my father And I said I'd like to order a book And he looked at me and said I think That's a wise investment So he was surprised that his kid wanted A book and rather than some kind of Weird toy or something so he gave me the Money six months later I got the book And that was the beginning of me Becoming a closet Aboriginal a closet Learner and doer of of the word and so I Became totally enthralled with
Practitioning everything in Larry's book So that's how I got started was Larry's Book and almost everybody I've ever met That knows anything Either learn from that book or learn From somebody that learned from that Book And even the people who claim to have Learned it from Apache grandfathers uh Lied and said that they got it from an Apache grandfather when they actually Got it from Larry Den Olson and and all The things that he That he Somehow collected from lots of other Neat people and lots of Paiutes and Stories and just super neat book that he Produced in 1968 I think it was and that Was kind of the grandpa he's the grandpa Of the white Revival of Stone Age living Skills it spread out a little bit to Other cultures now but I know quite a Few Native Americans that didn't know Anything about that kind of stuff that Learned how to Flint nap From either me or somebody else or the Book And lots of other skills that have been Lost and so Larry went and found Information And people that still knew him how to Make things happen and then the next Book I read so that it was a big part of That the same year my sister-in-law gave
Me ishy an issue of Two Worlds So between Larry's book and ishi and the Anthropologist that saved the Information that she had This skinny little white kid started Thinking he could become a Paiute Or live on the land rather than go out And pretend to live on the land so it Really opened up my heart I wanted to go Off when I got graduated from high School I promised I was going to go live In the wild and never come back to Society What brought me back was the same reason I was looking at the Midwifery section I Kept looking for a woman that wanted to Live in a cave with me and I never quite Found her so my uh My catch 22s wanted to be a caveman and Wanting a girlfriend or a wife and so That that's uh turned out a lot of Middle Ground Uh way worth it But uh still leaves me often aching For time on the trail to go eat wild and Live wild and Feel the Earth Not with a piece of clothing between me And her but right next to her skin to Skin So that's how it started so years later Right down off the hill here about 30 Yards from where I'm sitting I was Living in a Wiki up with my son Juan and
Wescott shows up after I met him a Couple days later and Says show me your handrail I saw a truck go by then I recognized The truck because it was Boulder outdoor Survival schools old Chevy And uh Dave Westcott was driving it And he said hi and he said he heard That uh I could do a hand drill fire And nobody was doing them in those days And I guess he got a call from Larry Dean Olsen that there was a kid Someplace on you know in southern Utah That could do a hand drill fire and I Was him and that's what's gotten I saw Each other and we'd heard each other's Names a lot because he was in the BYU Programs And had been running them for a while With Doug Nelson and running courses Right about the same time I came in he Was moving on David I've been Moving in Parallel paths for a long time David Holliday and I've been married and Married married Yeah David Holliday and I've been moving In parallel paths for for years we had Been moving parallel paths for years and So when I left the survival programs I Went to work for Outward Bound for a Couple years and he came into the
Programs after after I had left and so I Kept hearing Um you know do you know David Holly well It's like this you know everybody says Do you know David Holliday well yeah of Course that's everybody's claiming Famous the way David Holliday so uh Everybody's favorite primitive skills Person so Um So I had heard about him and you know Everybody says you need to meet him you Guys are the same and yeah so it wasn't Until I came back and took over boss About 1980 Well I took it over in 85. And so I think I met him in the summer Of 80s Probably 87 I think was when we finally Ran into each other And um It was just interesting connection you Know there was no doubt about it and so He was teaching at Tucson public schools And coming up to live on his property at Boulder during the Summers with his son And uh And so that's why we never met was Because his travels back and forth and My my travels to Boulder that just Didn't ever drive until that particular Time so Um We finally met and uh it was like we had
This long conversation about um Who really knew what to do you know who Walked the walking who talked to talk And who you know the difference between The two and um so we were having this Big long conversation about who could do Skills and just could talk about them And not do them and so then we got into This discussion about hand drills and They said I could do a hand drill and I Said really he said yeah so he started Doing a hand drilling well It's like doing it on TV you know if Somebody's filming you it's never going To work you're always going to run out Of breath or things aren't going to work Quite right and so you're always Fumbling around whenever you do you can Do it 100 times by yourself and then When you when you have to really put on A show that so that doesn't work and so It wasn't working And um I didn't know as much about David At the time but he's probably the most Bull-headed stubborn person I've ever Known in my entire life I mean he says He's going to do it he'll do it and Which makes him very dependable that way Um So anyway Um so he was doing a hand drill my wife Was there and he finally had done it Long enough to where he developed Blisters on the paws of his hands about
The size of silver dollars and And we've been talking a lot about Ingenuous people who talk a lot about What they know but they really can't do Anything and I didn't know who he was Referring to but I said yeah me too I Hate hypocrisy also and so then after a Long you know introduction to his wife And me uh you know I and him and we we Talk about how we've never met each Other much but we hurt each other a lot I was living with hardly any clothes on I had a son who was four I'd been making Hand drill fires All Summer Long my fire Board was nothing but holes and my Muscles were strong and I was ready to Show off and so I proceeded to fail At making a hand drill fire on a clear Day For about 20 or 30 tries And I don't know how much time it took Because I was so focused but it began to Look different looked like it was Getting darker and finally Paula Dave's Wife Paula Wescott says you know we Believe you can do a fire we can tell by Looking at your hand drill set that You've made a lot of fires but we've got To go And they both kind of looked at me with Pity and took off And I think one of them popped in the Process and got on my wife and and we Finally just said that's nice David this
I believe you you know you can stop now And no no no I can do it and so we we Finally gave up and went back to town Which was probably about seven miles From his house and my son and I were so You know used to going to bed when the Sun goes down this was probably nine O'clock at night in the summertime right So it's still light a little bit but I Was so exhausted and I had such huge Blisters on both hands That I grabbed I looked at that hand Drill and I looked at that hearth fire Board I said I wonder why this didn't Work and I was so discouraged that I Threw it about 15 feet and I remember it Landing and hitting in the middle of a Uh sumac Bush and then dropping into the Sand and I remember laying down And sleeping next to the fire we already Had a fire going because I think Juan Was already cooking himself some food my Four-year-old Well I fall asleep And unlike my normal night I do not wake Up again and when I wake up in the Morning my face is in the sand I'm Breathing in sand and I'm right where I Laid down and the first thing I see 15 Feet away is that hand drill set and That Hearth and I'm thinking to myself I Wonder why that didn't work so I just Walked over there and grabbed it and I Had great big blisters but I powered
Down on that thing Popped my blisters as I was going and I Made a spark on the first time down And I thought I wonder why that didn't Happen while they were watching So then I wake my son up Make an Apache match or a fire match a Fire bundle fire carrying match about This long Put my son on my shoulders and I walk up Over that Mesa right there And I get up on the flats and I walk Across another taller Mesa So I get up on the flats and go up on The the higher Mesa drop in and I save About three miles to get to Boulder Seven miles on the road or seven and a Half from here but it's about three Miles and something through there And I walk to Dave westcott's trailer And by then it's seven in the morning so I must have got up pretty early And I knock on his door and then I blow On my Apache match I called him Apache Match I've not started that I don't know If that's accurate to anybody else's History but I just like the way that Sounds and I like the way the patches Make them but Or made them And I blow on that thing and it comes on To Flame right there on his porch at the Boss trailer when it used to be by the Museum in Boulder Utah
And he is in his boxer shorts he looks At the flame And he goes oh I'll be right there and He goes and gets his clothes on comes Back out and he says show us how you do The fire next morning I got knocked on The door here's David Holliday standing On my doorstep with a Tinder bundle Going see that I can do it he we had Done it after we left and walked to town The next morning to show me that he Could actually do a handrail fire which In today's parlors is no big deal Because hand drill fires are pervasive Everybody's doing them you know it's Like it's like no big thing well in 1988 When we did our first rabbit stick the Only person doing hand drills in the Country that I knew of was Jim Riggs and So when when we did the first rabbit Stick there was 48 instructors and two Students well we sat around all we did Was we would we would focus on a topic Then when we get tired of that we can Move to the next one well Jim Riggs was The man on handrail fires So we go over to the museum to the to The replica of some rooms that they'd Made back in the 70s and we sit down in Front of there and my blisters are Healed again or at least sealed to the Full of water and I go down that spindle First try and it pops that blister and Squirts that white blood cell liquid all
Over the place I think it even squirts a Couple people around me They claim they don't remember that I Remember it being very uncomfortable And I go down the spindle A few times and I got a spark and I said That's how you do it and so Years later I was working for boss and He was introducing me to a class and he Said Uh Dave Holliday is going to be your Instructor you're going to like him it's Your 20 28 day trip and you're gonna Like this guy and it's the first time I Actually sit heard him say something Positive about me because he didn't say Negative or positive he just didn't talk Much so I was like wow he likes me and Then he said And what impresses me most isn't that he Can do handrail fires it's the fact that He'd walk a long ways to keep his word And that was the first like big Compliment he ever made to I mean that Was the beginning of a great working Relationship and um Unfortunately Jim passed away just a Couple weeks ago but he was the one that Kind of got everybody started on that Thing well then then it just spread like Wildfire to where now uh it's just a Common thing and that's that has to do With a lot of these skills I mean a lot
Of these skills we struggled with them For years trying to figure out how to do It but now there are people who are Learning them in a matter of weeks who Are heads and shoulders above what my Skill level is just because there are People who have developed those skills To the point to where they're standing On their shoulders now and saying okay The level of skill that they have now Could they could access much faster than We ever could just because not because Necessarily the information but because Of the level of instruction is available Now So David was one of those guys and so he Was doing stuff that I had never seen Before and and so we brought him in to Be one of our lead instructors at boss When I Own Boss and uh it's just been Kind of one of those things ever since We've traveled all over together we've Done programs together we've worked on Different projects together we've just Been very good friends ever since And I became senior Skills instructor and Senior instructor For outdoor survival skill School Boulder outdoor survival skill school For uh about the next 18 years so that Was the beginning of a really good Working relationship With I think one of the best Men I've ever met
Regardless of what anybody else in the Whole wide world might know about him or Think about him my relationship with him Is wonderful and I think most people That know him agree that he's a man of Integrity And that he's uh Really good Craftsman really good at Anything he decides to do And very honest and that's what I like About him Uh yeah I've been making Stone axes Since I was about 12 since I found Larry's book And here's one that's in the process of Being made It's going to be a long kind of a A grubhoe This is a vericite x which is all it Would work but it's for looks it's just Beauty I don't know anybody that has a Vericide ax so I made this about 15 Years ago soapstone no varicite is a is A strong kind of turquoise-like rock That we have here in Utah This is a really nice piece of it And then this is a hard type of Serpentine out of central Arizona and It'll chop it's good it's It's a really tough piece This is a piece of diorite and that's an Also a grubhoe style that'll you know Chop wood and Bash brush out of the ground when you're
Farming That groove right there is for putting a Wedge in after you've put the handle on We'll put it maybe we'll put a handle on One of these today to show you how they Work okay this is a salt style ax I have lots of those and they go into a Handle And I will show you One of those too That's already put together But these are all Celts for Chopping down trees this is what Woodland cultures use to chop down trees And make canoes and split logs and Build barricades and walls and Everything else it took Back in the 60s and 70s Brigham Young University outdoor education programs Were running uh summer survival programs Down here in southern Utah And a lot of times trips were there were 30 days but they'd go up to 300 and Something miles in 30 days that's a lot Of hiking and a lot of you know minimal Gear primitive primitive survival And uh when they get up in the High Country uh they would often build really Nice shelters because it's colder at Night and there's a lot of materials and So right here in this Meadow Um across the middle they built a bunch Of wiccups which is a Paiute style uh Log and and litter Lodge meaning of
Things like Duff Leaves lots of pine needles whatever it Takes to make them rain proof and uh Make a more dead air space so wikiups Are a pie a Paiute style house this is What the the Utes and the paiuts lived In when they weren't you know using uh Caves or or you know skin shelters or Teepees or whatever so This this style of House was built a Long time ago uh they built up in here They built some Hogans they built some Wikia lots of different shelters and uh As time went on and Their outdoor programs changed hands People started sort of maintaining some Of the older ones that were across the Meadow and then one day back in the 80s Dave Westcott who was the owner of Boulder outdoor survival school at the Time Looked across the meadow and said I Think we should move them out of all Those uh Quaking Aspen Groves that are Falling over and move them over here so We moved them across the way and they Pretty much have been maintained ever Since this one we're sitting by is an Open teaching one and John Olson one of Our great instructors during the 90s uh And and early 2000s he said we need one That's wide open on one side so we can Actually see what we're doing on rainy Days and you know and sit inside not up
To be in the smoke So he built uh the opening in the side Of this one that you now see behind me And he's the last person I know of that Did a lot of real raid major what I'd Call raging refurbishing Of of these wikiups we've we've I Haven't been working around here for a Long time so uh I come here and use them And enjoy them and throw a little Duff On them now and then but I don't know if Anybody's taken really good care of him For a long long time uh by actually Really taking them apart and putting Them back together and fixing them up But people have been maintaining them Ever since the late 60s I I have some exotic materials from far Away this is seep Willow probably from Arizona this is uh some Cottonwood root From down in the lower Canyons maybe About seven miles from here And then uh this is a hot dog stick that Somebody threw down on the ground up Here and this is some bailing twine that Some uh but he took off a bale of hay That were feeding their horse at a Hunting camp about a half mile from here So while walking around up to this Camp I thought well what if we wanted to get A uh a fire going up here from local Materials maybe not local in terms of uh You know They're Exotics but they were here they
Were lying around because so many things Have been left around this part of the World for teaching I got I got the stuff To to attempt A hand drill fire And even if I get a cold I don't really Have a fire yet Gotta take oh by the way this ring helps You uh Lower your IQ Was in seconds Yeah it's pretty good huh nice yeah And sometimes to be a caveman you don't Really need to lower your IQ you just Need to Grunge Okay This is gonna polish before it Catches Any kind of Friction we need So I gotta get it Going first When it gets black And ready to use or seated we call it It's a nice little seat where it's going To stay Okay Now Since I have the tools I'm going to do what it takes to Decrease The amount of energy I got to spend to Make this happen
I'm on the 90-year plan I don't want to Be a Spartan I want to play Low and slow Save my energy for more fun things Not got the right color It's drilling a hole Right through My board But it's making it But you busted a cold The last person to come through here Is nice enough to leave a little bit of Juniper bark here Thank you Oh yeah Pandora You know the whole time I was faking it I actually had stone tools I just wanted To show that I can use steel there you Go Foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Thank you
