These records document the governance and programmatic activities of the Museum of the American Indian/Heye Foundation (MAI) from its inception in 1904 until its sublimation by the Smithsonian Institution in 1990. The types of materials present in this collection include personal and institutional correspondence, individual subject files, minutes and annual reports, financial ledgers, legal records, expedition field notes, research notes, catalog and object lists, publications, clippings, flyers, maps, photographs, negatives and audio-visual materials. These materials span a varied range of subjects relating to the activities of the museum which are more fully described on the series level.
Scope and Contents:
These records document the governance and programmatic activities of the Museum of the American Indian/Heye Foundation (MAI) from its inception in 1904 until its sublimation by the Smithsonian Institution in 1990. The types of materials present in this collection include personal and institutional correspondence, individual subject files, minutes and annual reports, financial ledgers, legal records, expedition field notes, research notes, catalog and object lists, publications, clippings, flyers, maps, photographs, negatives and audio-visual materials. These materials span a varied range of subjects relating to the activities of the museum which are more fully described on the series level.
Arrangement:
The MAI, Heye Foundation records have been arranged into 21 series and 50 subseries:
Series 1: Directors, 1908-1990 (1.1: George Gustav Heye, 1863-1962, 1.2: Edwin K. Burnett, 1943-1960, 1.3: Frederick Dockstader, 1950-1976, 1.4: Alexander F. Draper, 1972-1977, 1.5:Roland W. Force, 1963-1990, 1.6: George Eager, Assistant Director, 1977-1990)
Series 2: Board of Trustees, 1916-1990 (2.1: Board of Trustee Minutes, 1916-1990, 2.2: Individual Board Correspondence, 1943-1990, 2.3: Subject Files, 1917-1990)
Series 3: Administrative, 1916-1989 (3.1: Subject Files, 1904-1991, 3.2: Personnel, 1956-1991, 3.3: Legal, 1900-1989, 3.4: Task Force, 1976-1986, 3.5: George Abrams, 1980-1991)
Series 4: Financial, 1916-1990 (4.1: Ledgers, 1900-1962, 4.2: Correspondence, 1905-1985, 4.3: Subject Files, 1916-1990)
Series 5: Expeditions, 1896-1973Series 6: Collectors, 1872-1981Series 7: Registration, 1856-1993Series 8: Collections Management, 1937-1988Series 9: Curatorial, 1963-1990 (9.1: Curatorial Council, 1973-1990, 9.2: Gary Galante, 1979-1991, 9.3: Mary Jane Lenz, 1974-1994, 9.4: James G. E. Smith, 1963-1990, 9.5: U. Vincent Wilcox, 1968-1984, 9.6: Anna C. Roosevelt, 1973-1988)
Series 10: Exhibits, 1923-1991 (10.1: MAI Exhibits, 1923-1990, 10.2: Non-MAI Exhibits, 1937-1991)
Series 11: Public Programs, 1935-1990Series 12: Publications, 1904-1994 (12.1: Annual Reports, 1917-1989, 12.2: Publications by MAI, 1904-1990, 12.3: Publications by Other Sources, 1881-1990, 12.4: Administration, 1920-1988, 12.5: Archival Set of Official Publications, 1907-1976)
Series 13: Public Affairs, 1938-1991Series 14: Development, 1927-1991 (14.1: Administration, 1979-1990, 14.2: Donors, 1978-1990, 14.3: Fundraising, 1973-1990, 14.4: Grants, 1970-1990, 14.5: Subject Files, 1976-1990)
Series 15: Other Departments, 1914-1990 (15.1: Archives, 1914-1990, 15.2: Conservation, 1972-1989, 15.3: Education, 1921-1990, 15.4: Indian Information Center, 1977-1989, 15.5: Museum Shop, 1947-1989, 15.6: Photography, 1918-1990, 15.7: Physical Anthropology, 1919-1956)
Series 16: Huntington Free Library, 1926-1991Series 17: Museum Relocation, 1969-1992 (17.1: Subject Files, 1979-1990, 17.2: American Museum of Natural History, 1980-1987, 17.3: Dallas, Texas, 1984-1987, 17.4: Smithsonian Institution, 1979-1990, 17.5: U.S. Custom House, 1977-1990, 17.6: Other Locations, 1974-1987)
Series 18: MediaSeries 19: PhotographsSeries 20: Miscellaneous, 1837-1990Series 21: Oversize, 1873-1972 (21.1: Maps, 1873-1975, 21.2: Miscellaneous, 1884-1982)
History of the Museum of the American Indian/Heye Foundation:
The Museum of the American Indian/Heye Foundation was established by wealthy collector George Gustav Heye in 1908. Heye began collecting American Indian artifacts as early as 1897 and his collection rapidly increased over the next several years. Based in New York, Heye bought collections and documentary photographs, sponsored expeditions, and traveled and collected items himself. In addition, once MAI was established he sponsored numerous expeditions across the Western Hemisphere, including North American, Canada, South America and Central America.
From 1908 to 1917 Heye housed his artifacts on temporary loan at the University of Pennsylvania's University Museum, Pennsylvania, in lofts on East 33rd Street in New York City, and at other depositories. In 1917, the collections moved from his apartment to their permanent museum location at Audubon Terrace, at 155th Street and Broadway in New York City. The museum, containing ethnographic and archaeological collections from North, Central and South America, opened to the public in 1922. Less than ten years later, Heye completed a storage facility in the Pelham Bay area of the Bronx, known as the Research Branch. Heye served as Chairman of the Board and Museum Director until his death in 1957. After growing concern about the financial and other management of the collections came to a head, the museum became part of the Smithsonian Institution in 1989 and in 1994 opened exhibit space in the U.S. Customs House at Bowling Green near New York City's Battery Park. The Cultural Resources Center in Suitland, Maryland later opened in 1999 and the main Washington, DC museum opened in 2004.
Please visit the following links for more information about the history of the museum; History of the Collection, Collections Overview, and Significance of the Collection. Moreover, for information about how the museum currently cares for and exhibits the collection, please see the Conservation department and recent entries regarding Exhibitions and Conservation on the NMAI Blog. In addition, see portions of the NMAI Archive Center's collections highlighted in the SIRIS Blog.
Related Materials:
In 2004, the Huntington Fee Library, once part of the MAI/Heye Foundation, was transferred to the Cornell University Library Rare Book and Manuscript Collection. While this collection mainly contained books, it also contained a significant amount of archival materials. The Huntington Free Library's Native American Collection contains outstanding materials documenting the history, culture, languages, and arts of the native tribes of both North and South America, as well as contemporary politics and human rights issues are also important components of the collection. Further information about the collection and links to finding aids can be found here: rmc.library.cornell.edu/collections/HFL_old.html.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Rights:
Single photocopies may be made for research purposes. Permission to publish or broadcast materials from the collection must be requested from the National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiarchives@si.edu.
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Museum of the American Indian/Heye Foundation Records, Box and Folder Number; National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution.
Images depict the Seneca Iroquois Indians on the Cattaraugus Reservation in New York.
Scope and Contents:
The Keppler collection consists primarily of informal portraits of Seneca men and women made in 1900, 1904, 1905, 1908 and 1910. Keppler made most of these photographs on the Cattaraugus Reservation (including a photograph of Edward Cornplanter's Indian and Minstrel show) but also on the Tonawanda, Onondaga, and Allegany Reservations. Aside from the portraits, the photographs depict Seneca dwellings and ceremonials. Also by Keppler is a group of photographs depicting Seneca and Cayuga athletes playing lacrosse and standing for a group portrait. These he made in 1902 at the Crescent Athletic Club in New York City. In New York State, he also photographed Oneida, Onondaga, and Tuscarora individuals. The collection includes several potraits of Keppler and approximately 15 photographs dated ca. 1937 of the interior of Keppler's home. The latter showcase Keppler's American Indian object collection. He also made portraits of Native sitters in his home. There are several photographs in the collection that Keppler did not make. Among them is an 1886 print by Camillus S. Fly entitled "Council between General Crook and Geronimo," and studio portrait made before 1870 of a group of Kiowa sitters, including Lone Wolf and his wife, and full-length studio portrait of a Shoshone or Bannock man dating ca. 1870. Some of the negatives are later copy negatives.
Arrangement note:
Negatives Arranged by negative number (N18567-N18589, N21231-N21314, N21803-N21806, N23071, N23087, N23089, N23091, N23093, N23095-N23096, N23106-N23114, N34852, N36800-N36801, N37887)
Prints Arranged by print number (P00277, P01535-P01536, P01622, P01625, P01652, P01737-P01738, P02640, P10029, P12499-P12518, P13246-P13247, P13252-P13253, P13256, P13258, P13756, P16081, P16084, P16111, P16112, P16114, P25274-P25295, P37581)
Biographical/Historical note:
Udo J. Keppler, who changed his name to Joseph W. Keppler, Jr. in honor of his father, was a political cartoonist for Puck Magazine and an avid collector of Indian artifacts, as well as being an Indian activist. This interest led him to an association with George G. Heye, director of the Museum of the American Indian. Keppler often acted as an intermediary between other collectors and Native artisans, facilitating the expansion of the Iroquois collection of the Museum of the American Indian and others. He was elected honorary chief of the Seneca in 1899 and given the name Gy-ant-wa-ka.
Biographical / Historical:
Born Udo J. Keppler, Joseph W. Keppler (1872-1956), or "Kep," was the son of Joseph Keppler, the great political cartoonist and founder and publisher of the popular and highly influential magazine, Puck. The younger Keppler was born in St. Louis, Missouri and educated in Munich, Germany and New York City. Like his father, he too was a political cartoonist. He became the art director at Puck and, when his father died in 1894, took over as publisher. Joseph W. Keppler ran the magazine until he sold it in 1914. The younger Keppler's two great interests in life were said to be Puck and American Indians. Evidently, Keppler's deep interest in Indians and Indian affairs developed out of his desire to collect Indian objects and his friendship with Mrs. Harriet Maxwell Converse, an early advocate for Native rights. Through Converse, Keppler built friendships with Iroquois living on reservations in New York State and Canada, but especially with Senecas living on the Cattaraugus and Tonawanda reservations in New York. At Converse's funeral in 1903, the 31-year-old Keppler was adopted by the Seneca Nation and made a member of the Wolf Clan. Like Converse, Keppler served as an advocate for Senecas. Most importantly, he worked to help defeat or modify plans to allot Iroquois reservations in New York State. Keppler became a major collector of American Indian objects and his passion to collect led to an association with George G. Heye. In 1901, Heye apparently accompanied Keppler to the Seneca and Cattaraugus Reservations; this trip might have been Heye's first to a Native community. From 1927 to 1942, Keppler served on the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation board of trustrees and for a time was also the Museum's vice president. In 1944, Keppler and his (second) wife Vera left New York and moved to California. Keppler died in La Jolla, California, at the age of 84.
Restrictions:
Access is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment.
Rights:
Restricted: Cultural Sensitivity
Genre/Form:
Photographic prints
Black-and-white negatives
Photographs
Citation:
Joseph W. Keppler, Jr. collction of negatives and photographs, National Museum of the American Indian Archives, Smithsonian Institution (negative, slide or catalog number).
Photography taken by George Heye, Joseph Keppler, David Sinclair and William Stiles during a trip to the Cornplanter Reservation in Pennsylvania and Onondaga, Allegheny, Cattaraugus, Tuscarora, and Tonawanda Reservations in New York October 1939.
Scope and Contents:
This collection includes 22 photographic negatives (acetate) made by David Sinclair, William Stiles and Joseph Keppler in October 1939 during a trip in New York and Pennsylvania. The negatives were shot on the Tonawanda Reservation, Cattaraugus Reservation and Allegany Reservation in Erie County, New York as well as the Cornplanter Reservation in Warren County, Pennsylvania. Many of the photographs include images of the log Seneca cabin donated to the Museum of the American Indian by Nicodemus Bailey (Seneca [Tonawanda]), NMAI object number 20/2211. Some of these photograph also feature images of Nicodemus Bailey and his wife Edna Bailey. There are also images of an elm bark tipi made in 1936, NMAI object number 02/6026, views of a monument to Chief Red Jacket in the Forest Lawn Cemetery and views of the Cornplanter Monument on the Cornplanter Reservation. Joseph Keppler is also photographed with Alice White (Seneca) and Mrs. George.
N21785-N21806.
Arrangement:
Arranged by catalog number.
Biographical / Historical:
In October 1939, George Gustav Heye, director of the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation took a trip with Joseph Keppler, William Stiles and David Sincair to several Iroquois Nation (Seneca) reservations in Pennsylvania and New York. This included the Tonawanda Reservation, Cattaraugus Reservation and Allegany Reservation in Erie County, New York as well as the Cornplanter Reservation in Warren County, Pennsylvania. During this trip many Seneca ethnographic items were obtained, most notably the gift of a log cabin from Nicodemus Bailey (Seneca [Townawanda]). The cabin (NMAI 20/2211) was reconstructed on the grounds of the MAI Research Branch in the Bronx, New York and Nicodemus Bailey was elected a Life Member of the Museum. See the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, Annual Report (April 1, 1939 to April 1, 1940).
Related Materials:
Ethnographic materials obtained during this trip can be found in NMAI's ethnographic collections.
Provenance:
Field collections obtained by the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation in 1939.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Thursday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiphotos@si.edu. For personal or classroom use, users are invited users to download, print, photocopy, and distribute the images that are available online without prior written permission, provided that the files are not changed, the Smithsonian Institution copyright notice (where applicable) is included, and the source of the image is identified as the National Museum of the American Indian.
Genre/Form:
Negatives (photographic)
Citation:
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Field photographs from Seneca Nation Reservations in Pennsylvania and New York, Item Number; National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution.
Photographic negatives and prints shot by and collected Kenneth C. Miller between 1926 and 1943. Miller served as a field assistant to Donald Cadzow on a 1926 trip to Northwestern, Canada and was later hired as an MAI staff member between 1935 and 1943.
Scope and Contents:
This collection includes photographic prints and negatives shot by Kenneth C. Miller as well as photographs and postcards collected and donated to the museum by Miller dating between 1926 and 1943.
The majority of the photographic negatives in this collection are from a 1926 collecting trip with Donald Cadzow to the Canadian Northwest where Miller served as a field assistant. Cadzow was collecting on behalf of the MAI and had taken previous trips to the same area in 1924 and 1925. Cadzow and Miller visited various locations in Saskatchewan and Alberta, Canada collecting among the Plains Cree (Prairie Cree), Assiniboine (Stoney), and Apatohsipipiikani (Northern Piegan) among other communities. These photographs include images of Native community members posing for photographs as well as images of the expedition members, such as Donald Cadzow. Some of these photographs are restricted due to cultural sensitivity. (N13144 - N13150, N23001 - N23047, P11460-P11462, P15351, P16103).
Photographs shot by Miller while he was an MAI staff member include: Negatives (N21568 - N21573) of a mahogany canoe found in an old mill near Brooklyn, NY in 1938; Negatives of Joseph Keppler in Rochester, New York in 1937 with a group of Seneca at an event in Ellison Park (N23115 - N23123); and photographic prints of MAI staff from 1938 (P13057-P13059).
Additional non-MAI photographs include: excavation photographs from the Seip Mound in Ohio in 1931 which was not an MAI sponsored excavation (P11944-P11948); 16 postcards donated by Miller in 1940 which are mostly images of objects from an Exhibition of Modern Art, held at the Museum of Modern Art (P15107 - P15120, P15174, P15205); other miscellaneous postcards and photographic prints from Florida, Michigan, Montana, Rhode Island, California (P13439-P13440, P15310 - P15317, P15323 - P15326, P15934-P15935, P16103, P16566, P21175).
Arrangement:
Arranged by catalog number.
Biographical / Historical:
Kenneth C. Miller (1901-1974) was born in New York in 1901. Miller joined the New York State National Guard in 1922 and eventually became a Major with the Seventh Regiment. In 1926, Miller accompanied Donald Cadzow as a field assistant on a collecting trip to Northwestern, Canada between May and September in 1926 sponsored by the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation (MAI). Cadzow and Miller visited 23 reserves in Saskatchewan and Alberta. In 1935 Miller was hired as a general staff member of the MAI from where he assisted with field collecting and photography until 1943. Miller later became the superintendent of the Washington's Headquarters Historical site in Newburgh, NY in 1956 and served as Vice President of the Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and Highlands. He also sat on the committee of the Hudson River Historical Museum.
Related Materials:
For more photograph from Miller's 1926 trip to Canada see the Donald Cadzow photograph collection (NMAI.AC.001.004).
Provenance:
The photographs in this collection were gifted by Kenneth C. Miller to the MAI in various donations between 1927 and 1943.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Thursday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu). Some photographs restricted due to cultural sensitivity.
Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiphotos@si.edu. For personal or classroom use, users are invited users to download, print, photocopy, and distribute the images that are available online without prior written permission, provided that the files are not changed, the Smithsonian Institution copyright notice (where applicable) is included, and the source of the image is identified as the National Museum of the American Indian.
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Kenneth C. Miller photograph collection, Item Number; National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution
