Sometimes the curious, behind-the-scenes stories of museum artifacts are as intriguing as the actual pieces. In the little-known story of a painting of Hunkpapa Lakota leader Sitting Bull hanging in the State Museum, the art, the subject, and the artist all share remarkable roles.

Sitting Bull portrait by Caroline Weldon 1890 (SHSND 12319)

I’ve walked past this 1890 oil painting of Sitting Bull, or Tatanka Iyotanke, hundreds of times during my museum career. I’ve squinted behind the glass case at the amateur painting and the scrawled signature of “C. S. Weldon” with no recognition. It wasn’t until artist Caroline Weldon (December 4, 1844–March 15, 1921) became the celebrated protagonist of the 2018 motion picture Woman Walks Ahead that I—and many of our museum visitors—learned the fascinating story of this unusual woman’s courage and determination.

Woman Walks Ahead is loosely based on Weldon’s life from 1889 to 1891, when she traveled twice from her East Coast home to Standing Rock Indian Reservation as an activist to help Sitting Bull and additional tribes resist US government proposals to break treaties. Her lifelong fascination with Native American culture had begun in her teen years, and her passion for Indigenous justice led her to later join the National Indian Defense Association. As a single woman in her forties, she traveled to meet Sitting Bull at Standing Rock Indian Reservation, which crossed the borders of North Dakota and South Dakota.

Breakup of the Great Sioux Reservation, North Dakota Studies (ndstudies.gov)

When she arrived, Weldon served in unofficial capacities as Sitting Bull’s translator and lobbyist, and even lived in his household for a time. An amateur artist, she also painted up to four portraits of Sitting Bull. Her life choices were rare both in terms of 19th-century activism and for a single woman in the Victorian era, and the tribe gave her the name “Woman Walking Ahead.”

Seated: Caroline Weldon, later in life (SHSND 21405 00002)

Not everyone appreciated Weldon’s efforts. Her unconventional Indigenous rights campaign as a single, white, outspoken woman of the late 1800s created a national stir. Criticized by many, Weldon was unjustly vilified in headlines nationwide.

Weldon left the reservation just weeks before Sitting Bull’s death and became a footnote in history. Her painting was hanging in Sitting Bull’s cabin on Dec. 15, 1890. On that morning a gunfight broke out when Indian agency police came to arrest him, and Sitting Bull and others were killed. Shortly afterward, a police officer whose brother had just been killed smashed the painting with his rifle, tearing the canvas. US Cavalry officer Matthew F. Steele stopped further destruction, took the painting, and later purchased it from Sitting Bull’s widows for two dollars. ¹

The canvas was damaged when smashed by a rifle.

Steele’s purchase apparently went unnoticed. In a few scattered mentions about Weldon’s painting over the following decades, historians muse about this painting and her others as being missing. A 1964 article in The West refers to Weldon’s painting as “a picture, now lost, bearing the artist’s sketched initials in the bottom left corner.” ²

I can only guess that State Historical Society staff must have been unaware of the handful of historians still speculating about the painting’s whereabouts, because Weldon’s canvas, with a crudely repaired tear and a replaced frame, had been gifted to the State Historical Society by the Matthew F. Steele estate in November 1953. In a North Dakota History article of 1984, a staff member wrote about the Steele donation: “The location of the only one of Weldon’s Sitting Bull portraits is now known.” ³

Our Caroline Weldon painting can be viewed on exhibit at the State Museum, and a second Weldon painting of Sitting Bull is housed at The Historic Arkansas Museum in Little Rock.

Sitting Bull by Caroline Weldon, 1890, oil on canvas. From the Permanent Collection of the Historic Arkansas Museum, Little Rock, Arkansas

Woman Walks Ahead mentions our State Museum as the location of a Weldon painting, which created a flurry of national interest in her work. We’ve enjoyed welcoming visitors from across the country who have come to view it since the film’s release.

After watching Woman Walks Ahead with their dad, these two Florida girls requested a family vacation to North Dakota to view Caroline Weldon’s Sitting Bull painting. The family made the trip a few months ago.

It’s fitting that this misunderstood woman, lost in history, is finally having her day in the sun. Caroline Weldon is worth remembering as a courageous activist who sought to build cross-cultural friendships and implement positive national changes while knowing her actions would rankle some and infuriate others. I’m enjoying seeing the increased visitor traffic to respectfully view Weldon’s special painting and learn more about a controversial time in our nation’s history. And I’ve gained a deeper appreciation, not only of a piece of art, but of the remarkable artist behind the story.

* Based on continuing public inquiries since this article first appeared, I’m adding information about why I included Weldon’s first name as Caroline and not “Catherine.” The “Woman Walks Ahead” film and plenty of other works refer to her as Catherine. Weldon’s first name, however, is Caroline. History misidentified her as “Catherine” for decades. How did that happen? As a starting point, little-known Caroline signed her Sitting Bull paintings as “C. Weldon,” so her first name is not identified. In addition, years after her death, prolific author Stanley Vestal misidentified Caroline as “Catherine” in his 1932 biography of Sitting Bull. Vestal’s book has widely served as a primary resource for historians, writers, and others. Only a few years ago Caroline’s true identity was discovered.

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¹ “Catherine Weldon, Sitting Bull,” North Dakota History 72, nos. 3 & 4 (2005): 12.
² “Was Mrs. Weldon Sitting Bull’s White Squaw?,” The West, October 1964, 67.
³ Robert C. Hollow, “Portrait of Sitting Bull by Caroline Weldon,” North Dakota History 51, no. 2 (Spring 1984): back cover.

State Historical Society of North Dakota marker at the Fort Mandan Overlook State Historic Site 11.5 miles west of the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center in Washburn, ND. (Photo by Doug Wurtz, 2018)

While investigating archaeological sites and collections managed by the Archaeology & Historic Preservation Division, a question will inevitably arise that requires a trip to the State Archives for more research. For the last three years, I have been researching the little-known story of the “Galvanized Yankees” (1st United States Volunteer Infantry, aka 1st USVI) at Fort Rice, Dakota Territory. Another story I have spent quite a lot of time researching is the 1804–1806 Lewis and Clark Expedition, the “Corps of Discovery.” Only recently, while I was putting some notes together about the Galvanized Yankees, did I notice the similarity between the two stories.

Both are about the westward expeditions of men whose homes were in the eastern United States, far from Dakota Territory. Men from Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, and other states would play key roles in both journeys.

Upon arriving in what is now North Dakota, the Corps would spend the winter of 1804–1805 at Fort Mandan, 60 miles (as the crow flies) northwest of the fort the Galvanized Yankees would occupy 60 years later at Fort Rice in 1864–1865.

Both expeditions traveled up the Missouri River to reach their first winter’s destination.
The Corps left St. Louis and traveled by keelboat, by pirogue, and by foot to Fort Mandan.
The 1st USVI traveled by train to St. Louis and then by steamboat and on foot to their winter home at Fort Rice. Both expeditions were under the orders of a U.S. president; the Corps under orders from President Thomas Jefferson, the 1st USVI from President Abraham Lincoln.
They both spent their first winters in crude accommodations built from cottonwood logs cut nearby.

Each expedition included one woman. Sakakawea, a Lemhi Shoshone living with the Hidatsas, accompanied the Corps of Discovery to the West Coast. Elizabeth Cardwell, the wife of Private Patrick Cardwell of the 1st USVI, accompanied her husband to Dakota Territory. Both women had babies who became a prominent character in each story. Sakakawea’s son, “Pomp” (Jean Baptiste Charbonneau), was born just prior to the expedition and traveled to the West Coast and back with his mother. Cardwell’s baby, a daughter, was born at Fort Rice and died seven days after her birth. Cardwell had been pregnant with the baby on the last 250-mile march to Fort Rice.

Both expeditions included at least one well-known encounter with Native Americans. Meriweather Lewis, co-commander of the Corps, killed a Blackfoot warrior in a skirmish in the Marias River country of present-day Montana on July 26, 1806. If not for the superior firepower of Lewis and his men, they could have been killed by the Blackfoot warriors, and the story of the Lewis and Clark Expedition would have ended much differently. The 1st USVI was attacked on July 28, 1865, at Fort Rice by Native American warriors under Hunkpapa Lakota leaders Sitting Bull and Gall. If not for superior firepower on the part of the military, the fort could have been overrun and destroyed that day, changing the story of the Galvanized Yankees and military forts on the Upper Missouri River.

A portion of the parade ground (right) and corner markers of the post adjutant’s office at the Fort Rice State Historic Site, 27 miles south of Mandan, ND. The winter barracks of the 1st United States Volunteer Infantry would have been located behind the two trees at the center of the photograph. (Photo by Doug Wurtz, 2017)

The mission of each expedition also had some parallels. The Lewis and Clark Expedition was instructed to explore unknown territory, establish trade with Native Americans groups, affirm the sovereignty of the United States in the region, and find a waterway to the Pacific Ocean. The mission of the 1st USVI was to explore unknown territory, establish safe trade routes for immigrants to the gold fields of Montana and Idaho, proclaim the sovereignty of the United States (to the Native Americans), and monitor the waterway of the Missouri River.

When I began to research these topics, I viewed them as entirely separate stories. But anyone who has worked with archival records knows that it often leads to unexpected discoveries and insights. My archival research showed that though the stories of the Corps of Discovery and the Galvanized Yankees were 60 years and 60 miles apart, history was, in many ways, repeating itself.

Every day is a little different when it comes to work in the North Dakota State Archives. We might get requests on how to access marriage records, newspapers, manuscript collections, or state series. Someone may wish to find a publication from 1940, or a photo of their grandparents. We may or may not have these items, but we will see what we do have to help a researcher out!

Within these requests, however, there are some constants. One of these is the request for naturalization records.

The State Archives has early naturalization records, or citizenship papers, from pre-statehood up to around the 1950s. This covers a very important era in the state. These papers were important for immigrants who came to the area because they demonstrated their intention to become a citizen of the United States—something that they had to do in order to try to homestead a claim.

Naturalization records typically consist of two sets of papers, filed successively within a few years. Laws changed frequently, which could be confusing, so occasionally people thought they had fulfilled their responsibilities but had only filed one set of papers. Minors only had to file once. Women and children were typically naturalized under their husbands or fathers, so they did not file on their own with any kind of frequency until years later. Also, some were naturalized with just one set of papers around the time of statehood, and were thus grandfathered into citizenship.

Example of an early naturalization record. The page number is 328, listed at the top left. Below is another similar naturalization record. Some records have more information than others.

Every county is represented in our collection, and we receive requests for documents from this collection almost daily. There is a good index listing here, so you can look for the record of your family member, but you won’t be able to actually access it via the website here.

Type in the individual’s information, and you will see a list of names:

To look up the information, we need the name, county, volume, and page number.

After that, there are three ways that researchers can access local naturalization records.

1. Come to the ND State Archives during our open hours, 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, or 10 a.m.-4:30 p.m. every second Saturday. (We are closed on state holidays.) We will help you look up the records, which we have on microfilm.
2. Send in a research request! We charge $5 per name, and we will send what we have for first or second papers. If both sets were completed and are in our collection, we will send them both under that fee.
3. Look for them at familysearch.org.

If there are any questions, reach out to us! Contact us at archives@nd.gov. We are more than happy to help!

As an editor, I get to geek out over dictionaries, style guides, and book catalogs (such as this one from the University of Nebraska Press). I also try to stay current with a variety of academic journals, and am privileged to work with editor Pam Berreth Smokey on one of the best in our region: North Dakota History: Journal of the Northern Plains, published semiannually by the State Historical Society of North Dakota.

Perhaps you are one of our devoted readers, but for the uninitiated (and newcomers to the northern plains, such as myself), I am excited to tell you about this stellar resource. The State Historical Society loves gathering audience feedback, and we recently conducted a North Dakota History reader survey. Ensuring reader satisfaction is a unique challenge in that we want to present new, credible scholarship in an accessible and visually appealing way.

Well, we were thrilled with the results! Here are five top reasons readers love our journal.

Recent covers of North Dakota History: Journal of the Northern Plains

1. Well-researched articles.
Did you know the State Historical Society of North Dakota has published an academic journal since 1906? While the journal (called North Dakota Historical Quarterly from 1926 to 1945) maintains high academic standards for the historians, professors, and others who contribute well-researched articles, we also attract a broad general readership of folks interested in the history of our region. If we can help the reader think more deeply about an article topic through a new lens or learn a fascinating new tidbit about history, we’re fulfilling our purpose.

2. Enlightening topics.
In our reader survey, over half of respondents* rated the journal “outstanding,” and 79 percent read “most pages” or “cover to cover.” As a bookworm (and the journal’s book review editor), I am excited folks still make time to read an entire magazine! Some of the most interesting feedback relates to article topics: immigrant ethnic history is our most popular subject area, with Native American history and architecture/historic preservation coming in close behind.

From North Dakota History reader survey, January 2018

3. Local history is personal.
Our most popular article of 2016–17 was “1997 Grand Forks Flood” by University of North Dakota professor Kimberly Porter, which recounted a personal experience of the natural disaster many of our readers lived through. Similarly, our Winter 2017 issue featured McIntosh County German-Russians and three rural North Dakota cemeteries, meaning many of our readers were tied (as actual relatives, or culturally) to the people and communities discussed.

Kimberly Porter’s article on the 1997 Grand Forks flood was the most popular of the past year. North Dakota History, Vol. 82.1 (Summer 2017), pp. 18–19

4. Great design.
Images remain vital to our storytelling, and we are proud the journal has won the Mountain-Plains Museums Association Publication Design Award for two years in a row (2016–17). The most recent winner included this article on frontier photographer Orlando S. Goff, who captured an iconic photo of Sitting Bull in 1881.

5. One-of-a-kind stories.
On the northern plains, truth sometimes really is stranger than fiction. We continue to add original content for free online, including this recently posted 1957 article, “Reminiscences of a Pioneer Mother.” A personal favorite, Kate Roberts Pelissier’s astounding oral history is reminiscent of Little Women and the Little House books.

Margaret Barr Roberts, described in “Reminiscences of a Pioneer Mother” by Kate Roberts Pelissier, raised five daughters alone on a ranch near Medora after her husband disappeared. SHSND A4454

Have I piqued your interest enough? You can catch up with the contents of recent issues online, read them in our State Archives, purchase copies through our Museum Store, or subscribe. Our next issue, going to press in June, will highlight World War I memorials across the state and explore the 1856 G. K. Warren maps, which were pivotal in charting the Missouri River and its environs.

Keep reading! And don’t hesitate to let us know what you think.

 

* We conducted the survey electronically through an email to available subscribers. The link was also published in the print journal. Fifteen percent (148 people) of the email list responded.

What are the typical artifacts found in North Dakota? What do you usually find when you sort artifacts? What does an average box of artifacts from an excavation look like?

These are all questions I have been asked recently. But they are difficult to answer, mostly because there is a lot of variety in North Dakota’s archaeology. People in different times and circumstances used different tools, technologies, and materials—meaning that depending on the age or type of site, the artifacts found will also be different. Artifacts also come in many different sizes—and the size of the artifacts will effect what kinds of things you are looking for or finding.

So, I might not be able to show you what the “average” box of artifacts looks like. But I can show you what one specific box is like, as I have spent the past week sorting it.

The box I am finishing is from the Larson Village site (32BL9). Staff and volunteers have been helping with this project for several years, and we are almost done with the sorting (for more information on Larson Village, see blog.statemuseum.nd.gov/blog/adventures-archaeology-collections-larson-village). There are only about eight boxes left to finish. All those boxes contain the smallest sizes of objects that we currently sort—size grade 4 (anything that slides through a screen mesh 0.111 inch square) and size grade 5 (anything that slides through a screen mesh 0.0469 inches square).

The cardboard box is the size of a banker’s box.

A box of size grade 5 artifacts (2012A.13, 32BL9, from Feature 6 South ½)

This specific box has six bags of size grade 5 materials to sort.

A bag of size grade 5 artifacts. There are six of these bags in my current box.

Would you like to try sorting? Here is your chance! In size grade 5 we sort out only certain types of objects or materials including (but not limited to) identifiable bone, identifiable shell, seeds, and insect parts. What do you see in this photo? (click photo to see larger image)

Can you spot the aritfacts that need to be sorted out?

Hint, there are nine items visible in the above photo that we would sort out in the archaeology lab, including:
-3 small animal teeth
-1 small animal vertebra
-1 insect leg
-2 shells
-2 seeds

Can you find these items in the previous photo?

Can you find them? (The locations are circled at the end of this post).

So what exactly is in this box? Here is everything that has been found so far (minus the half of a bag I have yet to finish).

This is the last tray of material from this box. I have not yet finished the top half of the tray.

There is a lot of identifiable animal bone. These will be sent to a faunal analyst (someone who specializes in animal bone).

All the identifiable bone found in this box so far (2012A.13)

Modified bone is present too—bone that has been used or made into tools. If you look closely, you can see that these tiny, pointy pieces are very polished and smooth. They are tips from bone awls, used to make holes in leather and hide.

Two awl tips found in this box (2012A.13)

A complete awl from Larson Village—but not from the same box or feature (2012A.13, 32BL9, from Feature 26 North ½)

I have found quite a few gastropods (mollusks like snails). The shells are very difficult to pick out of the tray as they are very fragile. There are also a lot of insect parts—legs, wings, and more.

All the gastropods found in this box so far (2012A.13)

All the insect parts found in this box so far (2012A.13)

Here are chipped stone flakes of obsidian (volcanic glass). Usually we don’t pull out flakes of stone that are this small, but I have set these aside because they are identifiable and have a story. Obsidian does not originate in North Dakota. The closest sources are Wyoming (in the area of Yellowstone National Park) and Idaho. These flakes are evidence of either travel or the extensive trade relationships between the people living at Larson Village and elsewhere.

All the obsidian flakes found in this box so far (2012A.13)

Seeds show the kinds of wild plants that were growing around the village or that people were collecting to use, as well as the types of domestic plants people were growing—like sunflowers, corn, and squash.

All the seeds found in this box so far (2012A.13)

But what about the leftovers—the pieces we don’t pull out to send to experts to identify and study? You may have guessed: we save it. Why? Because technology and ideas change over time. Technologies that were not possible 50 years ago are possible now—like lipid residue analysis for pottery (to figure out what people were storing or cooking in pots), or obsidian sourcing (to figure out exactly where obsidian material comes from). Even though tiny pieces of unidentifiable charcoal, or fire-cracked rock, or bits of unidentifiable broken bone might not seem useful right now, archaeological methods will eventually change in ways that allow us to draw information from them.

Did you find all the artifacts that need to be sorted?

Throughout the year, the State Historical Society accepts hundreds of objects into the museum collection, all with interesting stories to tell. Occasionally, we accept objects under non-ideal conditions. For instance, there may be gaps in an object’s history, or a donation arrives damaged.

In June 2018, Curator of Collections Management Jenny Yearous purchased a Native American jingle dress with military patches at a garage sale in Bismarck, North Dakota. The proprietor of the garage sale had received the jingle dress from someone at the United Tribes Technical College International Powwow in Bismarck and no longer wanted it. Unfortunately, the owner did not have any additional information, so we had to do our own investigating.

The dress is believed to have been worn by a member of the Native American Women Warriors (NAWW), a color guard of female veterans. They also perform a jingle dance, which some tribes regard as a healing rite traditionally performed by women. Founded by Mitchelene BigMan, NAWW is a nonprofit group based in Colorado. Their mission is to support U.S. veterans and their families.

2018.00067

The back of the silver bodice has a series of patches sewn onto it, including “Native American Veteran,” “Iraq Veteran,” “Operation Iraqi Freedom/Woman Veteran,” and a “Bring Home or Send Us Back POW-MIA” patch. There is also a red, white, and blue ribbon with the words “Native American” on it, and in the center a large patch with an eagle head and the words, "THE NATION WHICH FORGETS ITS DEFENDERS WILL ITSELF BE FORGOTTEN / FALLEN HEROES / IN MEMORY OF OUR TROOPS / DEFENDERS OF OUR FREEDOM."

The Museum Collections Committee decided to accept this jingle dress into the collection despite not having much history about it. We simply do not have many contemporary Native American regalia, or many female-owned items related to the military. We have only one other jingle dress, which is not military-related. Combining the lack in the existing collection with the connection to the military and women, this object has an important place in the collection, even without a complete history.

If you or someone you know may have additional information about who wore this dress, please contact Melissa Thompson at 701.328.2691 or methompson@nd.gov.

Frances Reese donated a stone sculpture made of Colorado pink alabaster by the artist Tex Wounded Face. Wounded Face was born in Watford City, North Dakota, in 1955 and is of Mandan/Hidatsa descent. He passed away at the age of 57 in Scottsdale, Arizona. The sculpture was given to the donor’s husband, William F. Reese, when he and Wounded Face held a joint exhibit in Seattle in 1978.

The sculpture, titled The Americanization of the Native American, is the head and shoulders of a Native American with flowing hair, arms outstretched with a blanket covering the arms.

The box carrying the sculpture arrived at the North Dakota Heritage Center damaged. When unpacked from the box, the sculpture was discovered to have several pieces of rock separated from the base area. The Museum Collections Committee decided to acquire the sculpture for our collection despite its damaged condition. We do not have many pieces of contemporary Native American artwork, and the missing pieces do not distract from the overall aesthetic of the sculpture. The sculpture was placed in our collection with the hope that we would someday have the funds to repair the damage.

If you would like to donate to the collection’s conservation fund, please call 701.328.2666.