James E. McClees Studio photographs of Native American delegates to Washington, DC
odd: label: Local Call Number(s)
content: NAA Photo Lot 4286
name: label: Creator
content: M'Clees, Jas. E. (James E.) (studio owner and photographer)
label: Publisher
content: Blackmore Museum (Salisbury, England)
label: Photographer
content: Cohner, Samuel A.
label: Photographer
content: Vannerson, Julian, 1827-
index: label: Addl. KW Subj
content: Sioux

Mdewakanton

Sauk & Fox

Meskwaki; Sauk & Fox

Chippewa
topic: label: Topic
content: Indians of North America -- Northeast
label: Topic
content: Photographs
creator: label: Creator
content: M'Clees, Jas. E. (James E.) (studio owner and photographer)
culture: label: Culture
content: Indians of North America -- Great Plains
label: Culture
content: Anishinaabe (Chippewa/Ojibwa)
label: Culture
content: Ponca
label: Culture
content: Cree
label: Culture
content: Potawatomi
label: Culture
content: Chaticks Si Chaticks (Pawnee)
label: Culture
content: Fox
label: Culture
content: Sauk
label: Culture
content: Wahpetonwan Dakota (Wahpeton Sioux)
label: Culture
content: Sioux
label: Culture
content: Sisitonwan Dakota (Sisseton Sioux)
label: Culture
content: Yanktonnai Nakota
setName: label: See more items in
content: James E. McClees Studio photographs of Native American delegates to Washington, DC
bioghist: label: Biographical/Historical note
content: James Earl McClees (1821-1887) trained as a daguerreotypist in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, before opening a studio in Washington, D.C. in 1857.  He was an early user of paper photographic processes and was well-known for photographing delegations of American Indians.  His Washington studio, known as the James E. McClees Studio, operated in 1857-1858 with Julian Vannerson (1827-?) and Samuel Cohner as its most established operators.  The studio was taken over by Robert W. Addis in 1858.  Among Addis's proprietors was Antonio Zeno Schindler, an artist who made copies of photographs for English philanthropist and collector William Blackmore (1827-1878).  Blackmore purchased the McClees Studio's negatives from Shindler, later transferring them to the Smithsonian.  The Bureau of American Ethnology absorbed the photographs upon its formation in 1878-1879.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 32 Albumen prints (mounted)
unitdate: label: Date
content: circa 1850 to 1863
label: Date
content: bulk 1857-1858
custodhist: label: Custodial History note
content: These prints have been in the Archives for an unknown length of time; the broadside was obtained in May, 1968 from the Newberry Library in Chicago, which owns several copies.
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.PhotoLot.4286
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Albumen prints
altformavail: label: Existence and Location of Copies note
content: Digital surrogates for some photographs available online.
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents note
content: Studio portraits made by the James E. McClees Studio and published by the Blackmore Museum, depicting Native American visitors to Washington, D.C.  The series is identified by an 1863 broadside in the collection as "Photographs of some of the principal Chiefs of the North American Indians, made when they have visited Washington as deputations from their Tribes."  Yankton, Sisseton, Mdewakanton, Wahpeton, Pawnee, Potawatomi, Sauk and Fox, Ponca, and Ojibwa people are represented. Three additional portraits depict men (possibly Cree) and were probably made by a different photographer.
relatedmaterial: label: Location of Other Archival Materials
content: Additional McClees Studio and Vannerson photographs held in the National Anthropological Archives in the BAE historical negatives and Photo Lot 4420.
label: Location of Other Archival Materials
content: Glass negatives relating to William Henry Blackmore, including copies of photographs collected by Blackmore, held in the British Museum and in National Anthropological Archives Photo Lot 31 and the BAE historical negatives.
label: Location of Other Archival Materials
content: Artifacts collected by Blackmore held in the anthropology collections of the National Museum of Natural History in accessions 1846, 2371, and 1826.
label: Contained in
content: Numbered manuscripts 1850s-1980s (some earlier)