Little by little the Navajos became acquainted with the world outside the reservation and learned its ways and advantages. Today their prospects for a better life are brighter. Oil, gas, coal, timber, and uranium deposits on their lands are being developed for the benefit of all the Navajos. Children are more eager to attend school, and many Navajos are now leaving the reservation to put their education to work at jobs in the larger community. The Navajo people are beginning to find a place within the Nation. Despite these changes and prospects, many Navajo families are still seminomadic camp dwellers, following old traditions. Each family’s grazing land covers about 10 to 15 square miles. Within this area they have two or more hogans and corrals, built near suitable grass, water, and wood. In winter the family moves to the foothills or mesa tops to be near a plentiful wood supply, for winters in the Navajo country are severe. The winter hogans, or houses, are constructed with considerable care by the men. Brush shelters are used for cooking and camping in summer. [Illustration: Navajo headmen inside a summer brush shelter, 1898.] [Illustration: A Navajo cribbed (log-cabin) style hogan in the high pine forest in 1908.] [Illustration: A modern hogan built of stone and mud-plaster with a pane glass window, at Standing Cow Ruin.] Several types of hogans can be seen on the reservation today. Some recent ones attempt to copy houses in off-reservation towns, but most follow traditional styles. The earliest type of hogan known is the so-called “forked-stick” hogan. This is a tipi-shaped structure made of three poles with forked ends that interlock at the top. Spaces between this framework are filled with smaller poles; the whole is plastered with mud. Another style of hogan is made of cribbed logs and usually has six or eight sides, a design made necessary by the shortness of the logs available. Circular hogans of stone, adapted from Pueblo Indian masonry construction, are sometimes built. The roofs on both types of hogans are constructed of cribbed logs and appear domed rather than flat. A feature common to every hogan is its door facing east, toward the sunrise. [Illustration: A Navajo forked-pole hogan, traditionally the earliest form used by the tribe. Shaped like a tipi, it is built of heavy logs covered with soil. National Archives] Furnishings of hogans were simple and limited, but today tables, chairs, cabinets, and beds are commonly used. Food was once cooked in a firepit in the center of the floor, below a hole in the roof which allowed the smoke to escape, but today it is prepared on stoves which increasingly are butane gas or electric models. In good weather, cooking is done outside. Iron and aluminum pots and pans have replaced homemade pottery and baskets as kitchen utensils.