These are mostly nineteenth-century prints of some negatives in the glass negative collection. Included are a few images made from negatives that apparently have since been broken or lost. Some of the prints were acquired by the Department of Anthropology of the United States National Museum and have accession and/or catalog numbers. Others were apparently made for exhibit purposes. The collection has not been sufficiently studied to allow the positive identification of the print makers but many were probably prepared by Charles Milton Bell, De Lancey W. Gill, John K. Hillers, and Antonio Zeno Shindler. Some of the prints have been hand colored by Shindler.
Arrangement:
Roughly by tribe
Citation:
Prints of Indian Negatives, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
The material consists mostly of photographic prints. A few negatives, photomechanical prints, tintypes, drawings, newspaper clippings, notes, and letters are also included. Much of the material is annotated. In part, the file was assembled for or relates to many accessions and cataloging units of the division.
The material was received from professionals and amateurs, mostly working in North America. The images are of artifactual and skeletal specimens, fradulent specimens, collections of specimens, sites, excavations, site features, ruins, petroglyphs, and field parties. A few are reproductions of maps and portraits of native people. Some of the specimens are in the Smithsonianʹs collections, but many are not.
Included among the many subjects are photographs of Dighton Rock in Massachusetts; many ruins of the 1931 Moundville, Alabama, excavation; Tlingit burial boxes; excavations, specimens, and Aleut portraits taken by Waldemar I. Jochelsonʹs Ethnological Section of the Riaboushinsky Expedition, 1909-1912; Richard Wetherillʹs party in Mancos Canyon, Colorado, and F. S. Hempsteadʹs Archaeological and Topographic Map of Portsmouth," [Ohio].
Some of the material relates to the work of Charles L. Bernheimer in Utah, Burnham S. Colburn in Georgia and North Carolina, Thomas Featherstonehaugh in Florida, Otto William Geist in Alaska, A. T. Hill in Nebraska, Walter Hough in Arizona (for the Gates-United States National Museum Expedition, 1901), George Langford in Illinois, Henry Montgomery in North Dakota, Clarence B. Moore in Florida, Henri F. Pittier in Costa Rica, and F. B. Stebbins in Tennessee. Collections are those of Charles Artes (filed Indiana), Thomas Beckwith (filed Missouri), C. W. Branch (filed West Indies), Burham S. Colburn Cherokee relics (filed North Carolina), James Pillars (filed Ohio), Governor Price (frauds from New Mexico), Ephraim George Squier and Edwin Hamilton Davis (filed Ohio).
The material is from Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas Utah, Virginia, Washington, Costa Rica, British Columbia, Canada, New Zealand, Nova Scotia, South Pacific, and West Indies.
The works of many photographers are included. Among them are John K. Hillers, William Henry Jackson, Sumner W. Matteson, Edgar A. Mearns, Victor Mindeleff, and Timothy H. OʹSullivan.
Indians of North America -- Great Plains Search this
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Place:
Tennessee River -- Archeology
Date:
1880's-1925
Scope and Contents:
Contents: (1) Letter from Francis Densmore to W. H. Holmes describing a Hidatsa "bannerstone," June 6, 1916. (2) Letters received from and copies of letters sent to Gerard Fowke, mainly relative to cave explorations, 1890-91, 1893, 1903-1904. Also reports of "Shell Mounds on Tennessee River & Tributaries," 5 pages, and hematite Indian mine, Leslie Missouri, 6 pages. (3) Letters received by Gerard Fowke from Mark E. Zimmerman and Harry L. Keefe, 1914-1916, 1925. Also correspondence between Holmes and Fowke relative to Zimmerman's archeology. (4) Two copies of a letter from W. H. Holmes to Cosmos Mindeleff, 1890. (5) Three letters received by W. H. Holmes from Victor Mindeleff, 1882-1883. (6) Clippings and letters concerning Matilda C. Stevenson's biography and death including, a transcript of the notes made by Mrs Walker during her interview with Mrs Stevenson, just before the latter's death. (7) Copy of a letter from Clark Wissler to W. H. Holmes, September 20, 1919.
Photograph albums prepared by the Bureau of American Ethnology or the photographic lab, possibly for reference purposes by staff. The use of such albums has been mentioned by BAE photographer De Lancey W. Gill. The albums contain photographs made from the Bureau of American Ethnology's collection of negatives, documenting Apache, Arapaho, Assiniboin, Blackfoot, Cheyenne, Cocopa, Dakota, Flathead, Fox, Iowa, Kalispel, Kiowa Apache, Nez Perce, Omaha, Osage, Ponca, Santa Clara, Sauk, Shoshoni, Spokane Tonkawa, Wichita, and Winnebago people. The bulk of the photographs are studio portraits, made at the Trans-Mississippi Exposition in Omaha in 1898 or during delegation visits to Washington, DC. There are also other photographs made during Victor Mindeleffʹs work in Chaco Canyon, and on W J McGeeʹs expedition to Sonora, Mexico, in 1900.
Photographers include Charles Milton Bell, William Dinwiddie, Alexander Gardner, De Lancey W. Gill, John K. Hillers, William Henry Jackson, Frank Albert Rinehart, Wells Moses Sawyer, Antonio Zeno Shindler, Victor or Cosmos Mindeleff, Julian Vannerson with Samuel A. Cohner. Included are negative numbers formerly used by BAE, but the National Anthropological Archives also annotated them with current negative numbers.
Arrangement note:
Titles of the albums are (1) Omaha and Winnebago; (2) miscellaneous; (3) Sauk and Fox; (4) miscellaneous; (5) Arapaho and Cheyenne; (6) Chiricahua, San Carlos, and Apache; (7) Sauk and Fox; (8) Osage, Shoshoni and Nez Perce, Siouan, Oto; (9) Santa Clara and Flathead; (10) Ponca; (11) Sauk and (12) Wichita and Kiowa Apache; (13) Cocopa; and (14) Assiniboin and Blackfoot
Biographical/Historical note:
The Bureau of American Ethnology was founded in 1879 in part as a result of the federal geological surveys and under the administration of the Smithsonian Institution. Under the directorship of John Wesley Powell (1879-1902), the BAE supported field research by its staff and collaborators, initiated several anthropological publications, and supported the growth of the anthropological discipline, particularly as it related to Native Americans. In addition to its research and publications program, it developed a manuscript repository, library, and an illustrations section that included (in addition to the preparation of artwork for publications) photography and a photographic collection. The BAE commissioned studio portraits of visiting Indian delegates and hired De Lancey Gill served as the its official photographer and illustrator from the 1890s to 1930.
Local Call Number(s):
NAA Photo Lot 60
Location of Other Archival Materials:
The National Anthropological Archives also holds the Bureau of American Ethnology records and the BAE historical negatives, as well as Dinwiddie photographs of the W. J. McGee expeditions are held in (Photo Lot 89 and Photo Lot 144), Charles Milton Bell photographs (Photo Lot 80), and additional photographs by most photographers represented in this collection (Photo Lot 59 and Photo Lot 90-1)
See others in:
Bureau of American Ethnology photograph albums of Native Americans, 1858-1905
Three photograph albums made by Victor Mindeleff documenting pueblo architecture, villages, and people. Some photographs, including those published in the Eighth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, were made by Hillers, according to notations on file prints in Bureau of American Ethnology.
Biographical/Historical note:
In the 1880s, Victor Mindeleff (1860-1948) was employed by the Bureau of American Ethnology to conduct studies of Pueblo architecture. He hired His brother, Cosmos Mindeleff (1863-1938), to be his assistant. They worked at Zuni, Acoma, and Hopi villages, as well as among the Navajo; at ruins at Kin Tiel, Canyon de Chelly, and Chaco Canyon; and at Etowah Mound in Georgia. Victor Mindeleff left the BAE in 1890 for a career in architecture.
Local Call Number(s):
NAA Photo Lot 4362
Location of Other Archival Materials:
Original negatives for some of these photographs held in National Anthropological Archives Photo Lot 14.
Additional Mindeleff photographs can be found in the National Anthropological Archives in Photo Lot 24, Photo Lot 28, Photo Lot 40, Photo Lot 78, and the BAE historical negatives.
Victor Mindeleff's manuscript, Origins of Pueblo Architecture (1887), and correspondence describing his fieldwork can be found in the National Anthropological Archives in the records of the Department of Anthropology.
Aditional Mindeleff sketches, plans, and drawings relating to Pueblo architecture held in MS 2138 and MS 2621] in the National Anthropological Archives.
Location of Other Archival Materials:
Sketches and ground plans, also made by Victor Mindeleff or his brother Cosmos, were sent to the Bureau of American Ethnology with these photograph albums. They now form MS 2926 in the National Anthropological Archives.
