![Atop Empire State- in construction; Chrysler Bldg & [Daily] News in middle foreground. (1931)](http://cdn1.retronaut.co/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Atop-Empire-State-in-construction-Chrysler-Bldg-Daily-News-in-middle-foreground.-1931--199x123.jpg "Balancing on the Empire State, 1920s")
‘In 1896 Walter McClintock traveled as a photographer for a federal commission investigating national forests. McClintock became friends with the expedition’s Blackfoot Indian scout, William Jackson or Siksikakoan. When the commission completed its field work, Jackson introduced McClintock to the Blackfoot community of northwestern Montana. Over the next twenty years, supported by the Blackfoot elder Mad Wolf, McClintock made several thousand photographs of the Blackfoot, their homelands, their material culture, and their ceremonies.
McClintock believed that Indian communities were undergoing swift, dramatic transformations that might obliterate their traditional culture. He sought to create a record of a life-way that might disappear. He wrote books, mounted photographic exhibitions, and delivered numerous public lectures about the Blackfoot.’
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Thank you to the Beinecke Library Rare Book and Manuscript Library
Very interesting, I’d like to learn more about the other 20 years of pictures he must have produced.
I’ll start googling then
Wow, these are excellent!
Oh my, these photographs are so incredibly beautiful.
I now have a much better idea of what it looked like.
The photographs of the teepees at night with the
fire inside are breathtaking.
Thanks for posting this.
Incredibly interesting.
Wonderful photos. What a resource! I have a particular interest in teepees and this is a great addition.
It should be noted that these are hand-colored, transparent, 3 x 5 inch glass lantern slides. “Kodachrome” was invented in 1935, but these look like early Kodachrome slides because of the mounts. Very good hand-coloring on these.
“Siksikakoan”
Blackfootman. What a name.
ahahahaha yeah – was just thinkin’, “Blackfoot Dude” haha Siksika FTW! ^_~
I didn’t even know that someone other than Edward Curtis was documenting the lives of Native Americans. I love the photos. Thank you for this information.
Nice pictures. However, as I grew up on the BLACKFEET reservation I can tell you that it’s BLACKFEET, not Blackfoot. Just substitute BLACKFEET everywhere Blackfoot is written on this page and you will have the gist of it. Thank you.