Ellsworth Price Bertholf photographs relating to Siberia
odd: label: Local Call Number(s)
content: NAA Photo Lot 130
name: label: Creator
content: Bertholf, Ellsworth Price, 1866-
index: label: Addl. KW Subj
content: Tunguses
place: label: Place
content: Siberia (Russia)
topic: label: Topic
content: Reindeer
label: Topic
content: Sleds
creator: label: Creator
content: Bertholf, Ellsworth Price, 1866-
culture: label: Culture
content: Arctic peoples
label: Culture
content: Japanese
label: Culture
content: Russians
label: Culture
content: Cossacks
label: Culture
content: Yakut (Turkic people)
label: Culture
content: Evenki (Asian people)
label: Culture
content: Chukchee
bioghist: label: Biographical/Historical note
content: Ellsworth Price Bertholf (1866-1921) was Captain-Commandant of the United States Revenue Cutter Service.  Influential in the creation of the United States Coast Guard, Bertholf worked primarily in and around the Alaskan coast.  He began his career as a shipʹs officer with the United States Revenue Cutter Service, graduating from the service's school in 1887.  After two years, he received commission as a third lieutenant and became the first Revenue Cutter Service officer to attend the Naval War College.

After years of service on ships stationed near Alaska, Bertholf joined the Alaska Overland Expedition in 1897.  Between January and July 1901, Bertholf traveled across northern Siberia at the request of Sheldon Jackson and the Bureau of Education in Alaska.  Under orders from the Bureau, he purchased and delivered herds of reindeer from Ola to the Alaskan Inuit people for their use.  During a second expedition, Bertholf bought reindeer from the Tunguse people of the Okhotsk Sea region and again transported them to the Inuit people.  In 1902, Bertholf was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal in recognition of his heroic relief efforts during the Overland Relief Expedition, in which he helped rescue 275 trapped whalers near Nelson Island.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 117 Prints (including duplicates, silver gelatin and albumen)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1901
custodhist: label: Custodial History note
content: Donated to the Bureau of American Ethnology, possibly by Ellsworth Price Bertholf or Sheldon Jackson.
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.PhotoLot.130
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Prints
label: Type
content: Photographs
bibliography: label: Bibliography
content: Photographs published in Sheldon Jackson, Annual Report on Introduction of Domestic Reindeer into Alaska, 1901, Washington: Government Printing Office, 1902.
genre_format: label: Genre/Form
content: Photographs
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents note
content: Photographs made by Ellsworth Price Bertholf in Siberia. Most document his trip by sledge from Irkutsk to Yakutsk, Okhotsk, and Ola.  Subjects include sleds and other means of transportation, towns, reindeer herds, and people that Bertholf encountered along the way including Cossacks, Russians, Tunguses, Yakuts, and Chukchi at Anadyr.

Also included in the collection is a photograph of Chuckchi that may not relate to Bertholfʹs trip.  Instead, it may concern the work of Sheldon Jackson, who used Bertholf's photographs in his 1901 report on the introduction of domestic reindeer into Alaska. There is also a photograph made in Osaka, Japan, that depicts a man making sand pictures, as well as a letter from Romyn Hitchcock, dated September 28, 1894, that describes the image.
relatedmaterial: label: Location of Other Archival Materials
content: Microfilm of photographs made by Sheldon Jackson in relation to the reindeer program are held in National Anthropological Archives Photo Lot R81-13. The originals are in the Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.