Correspondence on specific subjects
name: label: Collection Creator
content: La Flesche, Francis, 1857-1932
label: Collection Creator
content: Fletcher, Alice C. (Alice Cunningham), 1838-1923
setName: label: See more items in
content: MS 4558 Alice Cunningham Fletcher and Francis La Flesche papers
label: See more items in
content: MS 4558 Alice Cunningham Fletcher and Francis La Flesche papers / Series 2: Francis La Flesche papers
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1881-1930
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.MS4558, Subseries 2.12
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: The material is arranged chronologically by subject. Dates are non-inclusive. Correspondence is mixed incoming and outgoing.
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: This subseries encompasses items which were separated topically from La Flesche's general correspondence. 

Materials relating to La Flesche's employment reflect his work as a clerk in the Office of Indian Affairs (1881-1910) and as an ethnologist for the Bureau of American Ethnology (1910-1929). Items include La Flesche's instructions for work under both bureaus, records of his field expenses for the BAE (particularly 1910-1912), and updates on his ethnographic work.

La Flesche's fictionalized account of young Indian boys at school, The Middle Five, was published in 1900. Materials under this subject heading include business letters from his publisher and personal letters from friends and fans. Many of the latter items are addressed to Alice Fletcher.

Material under the headings of La Flesche family and Omaha tribal affairs reflect La Flesche's concern about land possession and welfare on the Omaha reservation.

La Flesche spent many years studying Osage sacred bundles owned by museums, private collectors and Native Americans. For more material on sacred packs, see La Flesche's general correspondence with Harry L. George and George H. Pepper, 1915-1916 in his general correspondence (subseries 2.11). Additional materials on sacred bundles may be found among La Flesche's general correspondence (subseries 2.11) and Osage ethnography (subseries 3.22).

In 1916, La Flesche sought the results of George Pettigrew's mound survey in the Sioux Falls region, which had likely come to his attention through Alice Fletcher. Fletcher corresponded with George Pettigrew in the 1890s (these letters are included in this subseries) and La Flesche corresponded with his descendants in order to obtain Pettigrew's findings. Photographs and diagrams of the Pettigrew survey are located elsewhere (subseries 3.25). 

In 1918, the Missouri Historical Society commissioned La Flesche to complete a dictionary of Osage which was ultimately published by the Bureau of American Ethnology in 1932. Drafts of the dictionary are located in a separate subseries (3.22).