Primarily Meskwaki (Fox) word lists handwritten by Alfred Kiyana and other ethnological and linguistic notes. Topics include medicines; foods fed to sick people; laxatives; names of dogs and horses; ethno-etymology; and ethno-ichthyology. There are also lists of founders of ceremonies and rules governing membership in tribal dual division appropriate to various gentes. Some notes are in Truman Michelson's hand. These materials were collected by Michelson in Tama, Iowa.
With linguistic notes, arranged in catagories based on grammatical elements. Recorded in Department of Interior Blank Book; grammatical categories are entered alphabetically. Includes: "Phonology" for the Peoria language, 4 pages; brief notes headed "Ethnography," 1 page; references to certain page numbers of unstated sources throughout the notebook.
Biographical / Historical:
Date supplied from Bureau of American Ethnology-AR 15, Washington, 1893.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 1516
Local Note:
Informant /?/: Stephen Gorstey, N. E. Brunswick, /Illinois ?/.
autograph document
Topic:
Language and languages -- Documentation Search this
Photostat of letter by Pete Messabie in Timagami Chippewa transmitted by A.P. Taylor. Also a page of Truman Michelson's notes on words and phrases in the letter with English translations.
Shawnee, 48 pages. (3-19; 48-62, even pages only; 72-93). Includes texts with interlinear translation: Story of the fox and the wolf, pages 3-6; story about the end of the world, page 18; Waputhua (great rabbit) story, pages 18-19. Vocabulary includes Shawnee names for other tribes, pages 76-79; Shawnee clans, page 80. Informant for part of data, Blue Jacket, Vinita, I. T.
Chippewa, 22 pages. (23-65, odd pages only). Mainly vocabulary from Jean Baptiste Bottineau, Pembina Band; includes clans of Pembina Band, page 59.
Pottawatomi, 7 pages (22-32a, odd pages only). Mainly vocabulary, from A. J. Toposh, Dowagiac, Michigan. Obituary of Simon Pokagon, Pottawatomi chief (died January 27, 1899), page 30.
Card files containing Truman Michelson's notes on Penobscot grammar and vocabulary. His notes include grammatical tables and a reference to Frank Speck's Penobscot text, by page and line.
Ottawa linguistic notes and stories collected by Truman Michelson from Lillian Walker, age 16. Includes vocabulary, pronominal paradigms, a letter in Ottawa with an English translation, and stories in Ottawa and English. There are also notes on the list of stories known by Walker; information about her family; and locations of the Ottawa.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 2744
Local Note:
Title updated from "Linguistics; legend" 4/25/2014.
Diagram of Meskwaki (Fox) religion dance with notes in Meskwaki and English on two index cards. Information collected by Truman Michelson from Young Bear.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 2745
Local Note:
Title changed from "Diagram of Religion dance Ethnology" 4/25/2014.
Meskwaki (Fox) syllabic text on Swan dance handwritten by C.H. Chuck, with an English translation by Arthur Whitewater, a Kickapoo. On the first page of the Meskwaki text is a note in another hand: "Story told by Mr. Wah-be-neh no swah- or Mr. White Buffalo." The English translation is titled, "Story about one Indian being betrayed by Giant butterfly."
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 2739
Local Note:
Title changed from "Giant Butterfly (?); Swan (?) Legends" 4/25/2014.
Truman Michelson's linguistic and ethnographic notes on the Missouri Sauk and Potawatomi. The majority of the materials are from his work among the Potawatomi in Kansas. Michelson worked closely with Joe Hale, who also served as an interpreter. Among the Potawatomi notes are stories in English about Wisaka (Wisakea). The Sauk notes are primarily ethnographic and from his work with John Wap and Jesse Wap.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 2743
Local Note:
Title changed from "Linguistics; ethnology 1917" 4/25/2014.
Notes and texts on Stockbridge collected by Truman Michelson during his fieldwork in Wisconsin in 1914, with handwritten copies of his notes made by Frank Speck during the 1940s and 1950s. Michelson's notes consist mainly of vocabularies with small amounts of data on the history, population, and racial composition of the tribe and brief notes on the people who knew the language. A few words were collected from a Brotherton informant. The Stockbridge texts include strict interlineal translations and separate free translations. Speck's copies of the notes are in an order different from Michelson's originals. They are incomplete, in part because Speck omitted some vocabulary items when informants agreed as to their form. Speck's material also includes a copy of the report on Michelson's work in Explorations and field work of the Smithsonian Institution, 1914, pages 90-93 (1 page typescript).
All Stockbridge texts are by Jameson "Sot" Quinney, with some translated by William Dick. Other people that Michelson worked with include Lucius Dick (Brotherton), Edwin Miller, Alfred Miller, Sterling Peters, Agnes Butler (previously cataloged as Agnus Butler), and Bernice Robertson (previously cataloged as Robinson; see note below).
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 2734
Local Note:
Regarding Bernice Robertson's surname: In Michelson's notes, Bernice Robertson's name appears with "Robertson" crossed out and "Robinson" written in. According to Ives Goddard (2007, November 20), "Frank T. Siebert, Jr., collected some words from the same woman in 1935, and he refers to her as Bernice Robertson in notes he sent to Morris Swadesh (APS, Swadesh papers, Freeman Guide #2081 or 2083). I also heard him mention her many times, since he liked to point out that she was one of the last speakers of Mahican even though to look at her she was African American. In his own field notes (1937) Swadesh first wrote Robison and Robeson, but changed this to Robinson. (Robison is a possible mishearing of Roberston, if this name is unfamiliar; less likely that Swadesh would not have caught the common name Robinson.) In his typed list of informants, however, he writes 'Bernice Robertson' (APS as above)."
