House Model
date: label: Accession Date
content: 1991
name: label: Collector
content: James G. Swan
label: Donor Name
content: No Information
notes: label: Notes
content: Northwest Coast wooden house model with peaked roof; house frontal totem pole with circular entrance doorway in front. Interior empty / undecorated. Four carved killer whales formerly decorated the front roof line, though one has subsequently become detached. Painted designs in black and red on front and both sides, including killer whale motifs. Has been attributed as possibly Haida? No catalog number visible on artifact, which has also been checked with the blacklight. Object was loaned to Museo Nacional de Antropologia, Mexico City, Mexico, in 1964; loan returned in 2012.
label: Notes
content: Per Robin Wright, Burke Museum, 4-12-2012, this house model is probably Haida, though she is not sure who the artist might be. House frontal entrance pole is a Salmon with a human figure.
label: Notes
content: A photo of what appears to be this house model on display at the Smithsonian circa 1879 (photo may actually date more specifically to 1882 - early 1885) is in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution Archives: Photo ID 2962 or MNH-2962, Smithsonian Institution Archives, Record Unit 95, Box 41, Folder: 4, https://siarchives.si.edu/collections/siris_sic_8263 . House model is one of the small ones, second from left, on shelf in front of house front in back of photo. If this house model does date to this time period, James G. Swan would most likely be the collector. It also appears on the left in an old photo of exhibits at the U.S. National Museum (in what is now the National Museum of Natural History building), Negative # 38121B. It is behind glass and there are reflections, but the exhibit label appears to identify it as Haida and lists James G. Swan as the collector.
label: Notes
content: In James G. Swan correspondence in accession record No. 5260, Swan talks about sending two Haida house models. However, only one was catalogued, # E23547. It is possible house model ET14554/ET24468 or house model ET24565 may be from this accession?
label: Record Last Modified
content: 22 Dec 2022
label: Specimen Count
content: 2
place: label: Place
content: Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii), British Columbia, Canada, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Haida
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 999999
label: USNM Number
content: ET24565-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: House Model / Crest Column Model
physicalDescription: label: Height - House, To Roof Peak
content: 35 cm
label: Height - Door Post
content: 54 cm
label: Width - House Front
content: 60 cm
label: Depth - House
content: 38 cm