Saddle-Trappings
date: label: Accession Date
content: 3 Nov 1881
name: label: Collector
content: Rev. J. Owen Dorsey
label: Donor Name
content: Rev. J. Owen Dorsey
notes: label: Notes
content: FROM CARD: "SADDLE TRAPPINGS OF BIG BEAR, A PONCA CHIEF."
label: Notes
content: After this was given to James Owen Dorsey, it first went to the Anthropological Society of Washington (DC), and was subsequently sent to the Smithsonian by the Society in 1881. Anthropology catalogue card and ledger book call owner of this crupper Big Bear. (Accession records call him Great Bear.) Big Bear might refer to Big Grizzly Bear a.k.a Tim Potter? Dorsey publishes a letter of his in Omaha and Ponka Letters, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 11, 1891, and on p. 100 of that publication says: "Big Grizzly Bear, or Tim Potter, a chief of the Wajaje gens. Taught by the author in the afternoon school at the Ponka Mission, Dak. T., 1871. Subsequently employed by him.", https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015030744125?urlappend=%3Bseq=112%3Bownerid=1082373-110 . Dorsey published stories of his: Dorsey JO (1888) Ponka stories: Told by Tim Potter, or Big Grizzly Bear, in 1872, at Ponka agency, Dakota Territory. Journal of American Folklore 1: 73.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 15 Sep 2025
label: Specimen Count
content: 3
place: label: Place
content: United States, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Ponca
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 010700
label: USNM Number
content: E46475-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Crupper