Post by keogh on Sept 28, 2008 17:49:50 GMT -5
Thanks to both Lee Noyes and Rod Thomas for the heads-up on this one.
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Fate of Miller collection up in the air
By ERIC NEWHOUSE • Tribune Projects Editor • August 31, 2008
Former Great Falls Mayor Randy Gray is spearheading a drive to keep the David Humphreys Miller collection in Montana .
"This is a significant collection," Gray said. "It's of great historical importance, and it provides a valuable cultural bridge to our Native American tribes. It's essential that we keep it in Montana ."
The immediate Miller campaign goal will be to raise a $75,000 down payment within the next few weeks, then the remainder of the $1.4 million estate price by next spring, Gray said. The collection previously was independently valued at $3.5 million by an appraiser who called it "essentially priceless."
Once it is purchased, the collection of Indian artifacts, paintings, sketches and notes from interviews with the Indian survivors of the Battle of the Little Big Horn can be gifted jointly to the University of Montana in Missoula and Montana State University in Bozeman . Among the items is the 16-foot ceremonial tepee of Ben American Horse, the last chief of the unified Sioux Nation, who died in 1908.
"Geoff (Gamble, president of MSU) and I have talked, and we both think this collection needs to remain in Montana ," said UM President George Dennison. "And the people who have looked at it tell us it's an excellent collection.
"We think it will enhance the outreach of the universities to the Native American community, but also to all Montanans," Dennison added.
Jim Foley, UM's executive vice president and a former chief of staff for U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., has been designated liaison between the universities, the Miller estate and those organizing the capital campaign, Dennison said.
Some of the collection is literally priceless because of what it contains, including a full-length eagle headdress worn at the Battle of Little Big Horn by Joseph White Bull, a rare Sioux Ghost Dance Shield, a wrapped medicine bundle belonging to Black Elk and the feathered staff that Black Elk gave Miller when he adopted the young historian and artist into his family in 1939.
"We cannot legally sell objects containing eagle feathers, but the estate can and will gift them to a legitimate institution," said Brad Hamlett, a Square Butte rancher and owner of the Wrangler Gallery, which is working with the Miller estate.
Miller was 16 years old when he came to Montana and the Dakotas in 1935 to interview the surviving warriors who had wiped out the U.S. Army forces led by Gen. George Armstrong Custer in 1876.
He interviewed and sketched 70 Indian warriors, then told their stories in his 1957 book, "Custer's Fall: The Indian Side of the Story."
Republication rights to that book and a subsequent one, "Ghost Dance," come with the collection, Hamlett said. So do 100 individual portrait sketches of Indian warriors, 27 mixed-media paintings on board or canvas, and hundreds of photographs and negatives of Indian leaders, each bearing a label identifying the subject and the time and place at which it was taken.
"Three different times we have displayed the bulk of this collection and, each time, different Native Americans have come in and seen images of their ancestors for the first time," Hamlett said.
Faith Bad Bear-Bartlett, an archivist at the Little Big Horn College, instantly recognized four long-deceased members of the Crow Tribe, he said.
"You're looking at a history that is still alive in our memories and stories," said Lyle Heavy Runner, president of the All Nations Pishkun Association. "We spent two hours looking at four Crow portraits that my sister Faith educated Brad about.
"There's a multitude of information out there on each portrait," Heavy Runner added. "This could become a major undertaking by the two universities to create oral histories that would live forever. This could be a gold mine of information."
Heavy Runner pointed to Miller's portrait of his grandfather Eagle Calf, as an example.
"Go talk to my mom," he said. "She's 85 years old, and she'll tell you all about her father."
Historians also could talk with Earl Old Person, chief of the Blackfeet Nation, about Miller's portrait of his father, Juniper Old Person.
"This is kind of like the 'Exalted Ruler' campaign because there's a short-time deadline and a significant risk that this collection will leave Montana ," Gray said last week.
A dozen years ago, Montanans came together to save one of Charlie Russell's most beloved paintings from the auction block. In all, 2,400 contributors — including 81 schools — chipped in to raise $1.1 million to keep the huge portrait of a magnificent bull elk on display at the Russell Museum in Great Falls .
Reach Tribune Projects Editor Eric Newhouse at 791-1485, 800-438-6600 or enewhouse@greatfallstribune.com
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Fate of Miller collection up in the air
By ERIC NEWHOUSE • Tribune Projects Editor • August 31, 2008
Former Great Falls Mayor Randy Gray is spearheading a drive to keep the David Humphreys Miller collection in Montana .
"This is a significant collection," Gray said. "It's of great historical importance, and it provides a valuable cultural bridge to our Native American tribes. It's essential that we keep it in Montana ."
The immediate Miller campaign goal will be to raise a $75,000 down payment within the next few weeks, then the remainder of the $1.4 million estate price by next spring, Gray said. The collection previously was independently valued at $3.5 million by an appraiser who called it "essentially priceless."
Once it is purchased, the collection of Indian artifacts, paintings, sketches and notes from interviews with the Indian survivors of the Battle of the Little Big Horn can be gifted jointly to the University of Montana in Missoula and Montana State University in Bozeman . Among the items is the 16-foot ceremonial tepee of Ben American Horse, the last chief of the unified Sioux Nation, who died in 1908.
"Geoff (Gamble, president of MSU) and I have talked, and we both think this collection needs to remain in Montana ," said UM President George Dennison. "And the people who have looked at it tell us it's an excellent collection.
"We think it will enhance the outreach of the universities to the Native American community, but also to all Montanans," Dennison added.
Jim Foley, UM's executive vice president and a former chief of staff for U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., has been designated liaison between the universities, the Miller estate and those organizing the capital campaign, Dennison said.
Some of the collection is literally priceless because of what it contains, including a full-length eagle headdress worn at the Battle of Little Big Horn by Joseph White Bull, a rare Sioux Ghost Dance Shield, a wrapped medicine bundle belonging to Black Elk and the feathered staff that Black Elk gave Miller when he adopted the young historian and artist into his family in 1939.
"We cannot legally sell objects containing eagle feathers, but the estate can and will gift them to a legitimate institution," said Brad Hamlett, a Square Butte rancher and owner of the Wrangler Gallery, which is working with the Miller estate.
Miller was 16 years old when he came to Montana and the Dakotas in 1935 to interview the surviving warriors who had wiped out the U.S. Army forces led by Gen. George Armstrong Custer in 1876.
He interviewed and sketched 70 Indian warriors, then told their stories in his 1957 book, "Custer's Fall: The Indian Side of the Story."
Republication rights to that book and a subsequent one, "Ghost Dance," come with the collection, Hamlett said. So do 100 individual portrait sketches of Indian warriors, 27 mixed-media paintings on board or canvas, and hundreds of photographs and negatives of Indian leaders, each bearing a label identifying the subject and the time and place at which it was taken.
"Three different times we have displayed the bulk of this collection and, each time, different Native Americans have come in and seen images of their ancestors for the first time," Hamlett said.
Faith Bad Bear-Bartlett, an archivist at the Little Big Horn College, instantly recognized four long-deceased members of the Crow Tribe, he said.
"You're looking at a history that is still alive in our memories and stories," said Lyle Heavy Runner, president of the All Nations Pishkun Association. "We spent two hours looking at four Crow portraits that my sister Faith educated Brad about.
"There's a multitude of information out there on each portrait," Heavy Runner added. "This could become a major undertaking by the two universities to create oral histories that would live forever. This could be a gold mine of information."
Heavy Runner pointed to Miller's portrait of his grandfather Eagle Calf, as an example.
"Go talk to my mom," he said. "She's 85 years old, and she'll tell you all about her father."
Historians also could talk with Earl Old Person, chief of the Blackfeet Nation, about Miller's portrait of his father, Juniper Old Person.
"This is kind of like the 'Exalted Ruler' campaign because there's a short-time deadline and a significant risk that this collection will leave Montana ," Gray said last week.
A dozen years ago, Montanans came together to save one of Charlie Russell's most beloved paintings from the auction block. In all, 2,400 contributors — including 81 schools — chipped in to raise $1.1 million to keep the huge portrait of a magnificent bull elk on display at the Russell Museum in Great Falls .
Reach Tribune Projects Editor Eric Newhouse at 791-1485, 800-438-6600 or enewhouse@greatfallstribune.com