Edward S. Curtis – Photographing Indian Life
Edward Sheriff Curtis, a name synonymous with the visual documentation of Native American cultures, stands as a pivotal figure in the history of photography and ethnography. Born in 1868, his life’s work, primarily focused on capturing the essence of indigenous life in the American West, has left an indelible mark on our understanding of a rapidly changing era. He was a photographer of the American West, best known for his photographs of Native Americans in the early 20th century.
Curtis’s journey began in a humble setting near Whitewater, Wisconsin, on February 16, 1868. His parents, Reverend Johnson Asahel Curtis and Ellen Sheriff Curtis, instilled in him a sense of curiosity and a strong work ethic. The family’s relocation to Minnesota around 1874 marked an early chapter in Curtis’s formative years. Though his formal education ended in the sixth grade, his innate ingenuity led him to construct his own camera, a testament to his early fascination with the art of photography. By 1880, the Curtis family resided in Cordova Township, Minnesota, where his father pursued a career as a retail grocer. At the age of seventeen, Edward embarked on an apprenticeship as a photographer in St. Paul, Minnesota, honing his skills and laying the foundation for his future endeavors.
In 1887, the Curtis family again uprooted, this time settling in Seattle, Washington. This move proved to be a turning point in Edward’s career. With newfound determination, he acquired a new camera and invested $150 in an existing photographic studio owned by Rasmus Rothi, becoming a 50% partner. However, this partnership was short-lived. After only six months, Curtis dissolved the arrangement with Rothi and formed a new partnership with Thomas Guptill, establishing a studio known as Curtis and Guptill, Photographers and Photo Engravers. This venture marked a significant step in Curtis’s professional development, allowing him to refine his craft and establish his presence in the burgeoning city of Seattle. His goal was to capture the soul of a people and a landscape on the brink of irreversible transformation, a theme that would define his most ambitious project.
The year 1892 marked another important milestone in Curtis’s life as he married Clara J. Phillips. Their union would eventually be blessed with four children. As Seattle flourished into a bustling frontier city, Curtis’s photography business thrived. In 1895, fate intervened when he met and photographed Duwamish Princess Angeline, known to her tribe as Kickisomlo, the daughter of Chief Sealth of Seattle. This encounter proved to be a watershed moment, as it marked his first portrait of a Native American. Beyond the confines of his studio, Curtis found himself increasingly drawn to capturing the majesty of Mount Rainier, the vibrancy of city scenes, and, most notably, the lives of the local indigenous peoples. He also closely followed current events, documenting the hardships faced by prospectors during the Klondike gold rush in 1897. The seeds of his magnum opus, a comprehensive documentation of North American Indian tribes, were beginning to sprout. His keen eye and artistic sensibilities would soon converge with a profound sense of purpose, propelling him towards his life’s calling.
In 1898, while photographing the majestic Mount Rainier, Curtis’s path crossed with a group of scientists, one of whom was George Bird Grinnell, a renowned expert on Native Americans. This chance encounter proved to be instrumental in shaping Curtis’s future. Both Grinnell and Curtis were invited to participate in the prestigious Harriman Alaska Expedition in 1899, with Curtis serving as the official photographer. Following the expedition, Grinnell extended an invitation to Curtis to join an expedition to photograph the Blackfeet Indians in Montana in 1900. It was during this expedition that Curtis witnessed the Sun Dance ceremonies, rituals of pain willingly endured "for strength and visions." This experience, coupled with Grinnell’s mentorship, profoundly influenced Curtis’s developing vision of creating a comprehensive written and photographic record of the most significant Indian peoples west of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers who still, as he later expressed, retained "to a considerable degree their primitive customs and traditions." Although Curtis initially shared the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs’ belief that Indians could only survive by abandoning their traditional ways of life and assimilating into a new culture, his perspective gradually shifted as he witnessed the government’s policies towards Native Americans, eventually leading him to respond with fierce anger.
The year 1906 brought forth a pivotal moment in Curtis’s career when J.P. Morgan, the influential financier, offered him $75,000 to produce a series on North American Indians. This ambitious project was envisioned as a collection of 20 volumes, featuring 1,500 photographs. As part of the agreement, Morgan would receive 25 sets of the series and 500 original prints. Over the course of this monumental undertaking, Curtis captured over 40,000 photographs, documenting the lives and cultures of over 80 tribes. Upon completion, 222 sets were published, encompassing not only photographs but also comprehensive documentation of Native American traditional life, biographical sketches, tribal lore and history, and detailed descriptions of traditional foods, housing, garments, recreation, ceremonies, and funeral customs. In many instances, Curtis’s documentation serves as the only recorded history of these vanishing cultures. His overarching goal was to preserve their way of life before it disappeared entirely. In the introduction to his first volume in 1907, Curtis articulated his sense of urgency, stating, "The information that is to be gathered respecting the mode of life of one of the great races of mankind must be collected at once or the opportunity will be lost."
Beyond his photographic endeavors, Curtis also created over 10,000 wax cylinder recordings of Indian language and music, which were issued in limited editions from 1907 to 1930. These recordings serve as invaluable audio archives, preserving the sounds and voices of cultures that were rapidly fading away. Despite his dedication and artistic vision, Curtis’s personal life was not without its challenges. In October 1916, his wife, Clara, filed for divorce, and three years later, she was granted Curtis’s photographic studio and all of his original camera negatives as part of the settlement. Determined to prevent his life’s work from falling into her possession, Curtis, with the assistance of his daughter Beth, destroyed all of his original glass negatives. Despite this setback, Clara and her sister continued to manage the studio. Around 1922, Curtis relocated to Los Angeles, California, with his daughter Beth and established a new photo studio. However, success was not immediate, and he also worked as an assistant cameraman for renowned Hollywood director Cecil B. DeMille, contributing to the filming of The Ten Commandments in 1923 as an uncredited assistant cameraman.
On October 16, 1924, Curtis sold the rights to his ethnographic motion picture, In the Land of the Head-Hunters, to the American Museum of Natural History for $1,500, a sum far less than the $20,000 it cost to produce the film. Financial difficulties continued to plague Curtis, leading to his arrest in 1927 for failing to pay alimony over the preceding seven years. Although the charges were eventually dropped, the financial strain remained. In 1928, in a desperate attempt to raise funds, Curtis sold the rights to his project to J.P. Morgan’s son. In 1930, he published the final volume of The North American Indian, bringing an end to his monumental endeavor. In 1935, the Morgan estate sold the rights and remaining unpublished material of the series to the Charles E. Lauriat Company in Boston for $1,000 plus a percentage of any future royalties. The sale included 19 complete bound sets of The North American Indian, thousands of individual paper prints, the copper printing plates, the unbound printed pages, and the original glass-plate negatives. The Lauriat Company bound the remaining loose printed pages and sold them with the completed sets. The remaining material remained untouched in the Lauriat basement in Boston until it was rediscovered in 1972.
After completing his magnum opus, The North American Indian, Curtis’s health deteriorated due to the relentless travel, legal battles, and financial struggles that had plagued him throughout his career. He took a passing interest in his Los Angeles studio, which his daughter had been managing, and dabbled in mining and farming. He also wrote, but he didn’t publish much memoir material. In his later years, he witnessed his life’s work seemingly fade into obscurity. On October 19, 1952, at the age of 84, Curtis died of a heart attack in Whittier, California, at the home of his daughter, Beth. He was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Hollywood Hills, California. An obituary published in The New York Times stated, "Edward S. Curtis, an internationally known authority on the history of the North American Indian, died today at the home of a daughter, Mrs. Bess Magnuson. His age was 84. Mr. Curtis devoted his life to compiling Indian history. His research was done under the patronage of the late financier, J. Pierpont Morgan. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote the foreword for the monumental set of Curtis books. Mr. Curtis was also widely known as a photographer."
Despite the lack of widespread recognition during his lifetime, Curtis’s legacy has been reassessed and celebrated in recent years. Exhibitions of his photographs have been mounted, anthologies of his pictures have been published, and The North American Indian has been increasingly cited in scholarly research. A reprint edition of the entire work has also been released, ensuring that Curtis’s invaluable documentation of Native American cultures will continue to be accessible to future generations. The life of Edward S. Curtis was one of unwavering dedication to a cause he believed in. Though his methods have been debated and his personal life marked by hardship, his contribution to the preservation of Native American history and culture remains undeniable. His photographs offer a glimpse into a world that was rapidly disappearing, and his work serves as a testament to the power of photography to document and preserve cultural heritage. His legacy as a photographer and ethnographer continues to inspire and inform our understanding of the American West and its indigenous peoples.