GEORGE CATLIN — EWERS 485 



Man, in the simplicity and loftiness of his nature, unrestrained and unfettered 

 by the disguises of art, is surely the most beautiful model for the painter, and the 

 country from which he hails is unquestionably the best study or school of the arts 

 in the world ; such I am sure, from the models I have seen, is the wilderness of 

 North America. And the history and customs of such a people, preserved by pic- 

 torial illustrations are themes worthy the life-time of one man, and nothing short 

 of the loss of my life, shall prevent me from visiting their country, and of becoming 

 their historian. (Catlin, 1841, vol. 1, p. 2.) 



No missionary answering a call to service among a heathen people 

 ever dedicated himself to a cause more steadfastly or energetically than 

 did George Catlin to his self-determined task of "rescuing from obliv- 

 ion the looks and customs of the vanishing races of native men in Amer- 

 ica." To this single purpose he devoted the best years of an amazingly 

 active life. 



TRAVELS IN THE INDIAN COUNTRY 



George Catlin gained his initial experience as a painter of Indians 

 among the acculturated, reservation Iroquois of western New York. 

 His earliest known Indian subject is an unfinished portrait of the 

 Seneca orator, Red Jacket, signed and dated "Buffalo, 1826." (It is 

 reproduced in Haberly, 1948, pi. 2.) This work may have been the one 

 exhibited in the American Academy of Fine Arts show in 1828 as "No. 

 68. Eed Jacket, a sketch." In 1829 Catlin returned to western New 

 York to paint portraits of other Seneca, Oneida, and Tuscarora Indi- 

 ans. That winter (1829-30) he painted an Ottawa Indian visitor to 

 Niagara Falls and two Mohegan Indians. One of the latter was frock- 

 coated John W. Quinney, noted as a missionary preacher among his 

 own people (pi. 2, fig. 1) . 



In the spring of 1830, Catlin started on his great western adventure 

 by travelmg to St. Louis. There he gained the friendship of William 

 Clark, best remembered as coleader with Meriwether Lewis of the over- 

 land expedition to the Pacific Ocean a quarter-century earlier, and then 

 Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the western tribes. No one was in 

 a better position to introduce Catlin to the Indians west of the Missis- 

 sippi. In July of that year Catlin accompanied General Clark to 

 Prairie du Chien and Fort Crawford to make treaties with the Iowa, 

 Missouri, Sioux, Omaha, and Sauk and Fox. Early that fall he was 

 at Cantonment Leavenworth on the Missouri painting Iowa Indians 

 and members of tribes removed from the Eastern Woodlands — Dela- 

 ware, Kaskaskia, Kickapoo, Peoria, Potawatomi, Shawnee, and Weah. 

 Later that fall he accompanied General Clark to Kansa Indian villages 

 on Kansas River where he executed a series of portraits of tribal 

 leaders. 



In the spring of 1831 Catlin accompanied Indian Agent (Major) 

 John Dougherty up the Missouri and Platte Rivers to visit his charges. 



