The collection consists of one (1) drawing on one leaf of unruled paper. The drawing depicts two men wearing breastplates. One of the men is wearing face paint and holding a mirror board. The other man is wearing a set of hairplates. The drawing is inscribed "Drawings Made by a Comanche Indian" and "Presentd by Dr E Palmer".
The drawing was created in Indian Territory (Oklahoma). It was likely collected somewhere between Fort Cobb and the Wichita and Kiowa and Comanche agencies in Eureka Valley (Anadarko, Oklahoma). The date and place of creation were assigned based on information regarding Dr. Palmer's travells in Indian Territory (Oklahoma). This information was drawn from: Rogers McVaugh, Edward Palmer - Plant Explorer of the American West, University of Oklahoma Press, 1956, pp. 35-40. pp. 35-40.
Please note that the contents of the collection and the language and terminology used reflect the context and culture of the time of its creation. As an historical document, its contents may be at odds with contemporary views and terminology and considered offensive today. The information within this collection does not reflect the views of the Smithsonian Institution or National Anthropological Archives, but is available in its original form to facilitate research.
Biographical Note:
In 1868, Dr. Edward Palmer was hired to serve as the agency physician at the newly established Kiowa and Comanche Agency in Indian Territory (Oklahoma). Palmer and the rest of the agency personnel set out in January, arriving in the vicinity of Ft. Cobb on February 19th. The agent, Colonel Leavenworth, dismissed Palmer on May 4th, complaining that he spent too much time collecting zoological and botanical specimens and not enough tending to the medical needs of the Kiowa and Comanche. Following his dismissal, Palmer took up residence at the adjacent Wichita Agency. In early June, Palmer received word that some of the Kiowa and Comanche were plotting to kill him. Consequently, he left the Wichita Agency and travelled to Cherokee Town. From Cherokee Town Palmer made several excursions to collect specimens. He left Indian Territory in September, arriving back in Leavenworth, Kansas on October 10, 1868. In addition to the zoological and botanical specimens Palmer collected during his stint in Indian Territory, he also acquired ethnological specimens from the Kiowa, Comanche, and Wichita.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 127601
NAA INV 08500400
OPPS NEG 91-2261
OPPS SLIDE 91-2261
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research.
Access to the collection requires an appointment.
Rights:
Contact the repository for terms of use.
Genre/Form:
Works of art
Drawings
Citation:
Comanche drawing of two Comanche men wearing breastplates (MS 127601), National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
50 Stereographs (circa 50 printed stereographs, halftone and color halftone)
1,000 Stereographs (circa, albumen and silver gelatin (some tinted))
239 Prints (circa 239 mounted and unmounted prints, albumen (including cartes de visite, imperial cards, cabinet cards, and one tinted print) and silver gelatin (some modern copies))
96 Prints (Album :, silver gelatin)
21 Postcards (silver gelatin, collotype, color halftone, and halftone)
Photographs relating to Native Americans or frontier themes, including portraits, expedition photographs, landscapes, and other images of dwellings, transportation, totem poles, ceremonies, infants and children in cradleboards, camps and towns, hunting and fishing, wild west shows, food preparation, funeral customs, the US Army and army posts, cliff dwellings, and grave mounds and excavations. The collection also includes images of prisoners at Fort Marion in 1875, Sioux Indians involved in the Great Sioux Uprising in Minnesota, the Fort Laramie Peace Commission of 1868, Sitting Bull and his followers after the Battle of the Little Bighorn, and the aftermath of the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890.
There are studio portraits of well-known Native Americans, including American Horse, Big Bow, Four Bears, Iron Bull, Ouray, Red Cloud, Red Dog, Red Shirt, Sitting Bull, Spotted Tail, Three Bears, and Two Guns White Calf. Depicted delegations include a Sauk and Fox meeting in Washington, DC, with Lewis V. Bogy and Charles E. Mix in 1867; Kiowas and Cheyennes at the White House in 1863; and Dakotas and Crows who visited President Warren G. Harding in 1921. Images of schools show Worcester Academy in Vinita, Oklahoma; Chilocco Indian School; Carlisle Indian Industrial School; Haskell Instittue, and Albuquerque Indian School.
Some photographs relate to the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, 1876; World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893; Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, 1903; and Centennial Exposition of the Baltimore and Ohio Railraod, 1876. Expedition photographs show the Crook expedition of 1876, the Sanderson expedition to the Custer Battlefield in 1877, the Wheeler Survey of the 1870s, Powell's surveys of the Rocky Mountain region during the 1860s and 1870s, and the Hayden Surveys.
Outstanding single views include the party of Zuni group led to the sea by Frank Hamilton Cushing; Episcopal Church Rectory and School Building, Yankton Agency; Matilda Coxe Stevenson and a companion taking a photographs of a Zuni ceremony; John Moran sketching at Acoma; Ben H. Gurnsey's studio with Indian patrons; Quapaw Mission; baptism of a group of Paiutes at Coeur d'Alene Mission; court-martial commission involved in the trial of Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds, 1877; President Harding at Sitka, Alaska; Walter Hough at Hopi in 1902; and Mrs. Jesse Walter Fewkes at Hopi in 1897.
Biographical/Historical note:
George V. Allen was an attorney in Lawrence, Kansas and an early member of the National Stereoscope Association. Between the 1950s and 1980s, Allen made an extensive collection of photographs of the American West, mostly in stereographs, but also including cartes-de-visite and other styles of mounted prints, photogravures, lantern slides, autochromes, and glass negatives.
Indians of North America -- Southern states Search this
Citation:
Photo Lot 90-1, George V. Allen collection of photographs of Native Americans and the American frontier, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
![view The National Cherokee Youth Choir - "Orphan Child" [Live at First Americans Festival 2004] digital asset number 1](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/1YG1gHhiKsQ/default.jpg)
