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Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
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San Marino, CA 91108
Rare Books
Indians of southern Mexico : an ethnographic album
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Rare Books
Image not available
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Image not available
Visual Materials
This set of 373 photographs by the photographer Frederick Monsen focuses on Native Americans of the Southwest in mostly candid photographs taken in Pueblo communities from approximately 1886 to 1911. Most of the photographs in this collection are enlargements made from 3 ¼" x 4 ¼" Kodak roll or cartridge film; Monsen preferred using the small Kodak cameras so he could quickly capture natural moments. There are also some posed portraits, landscapes and others that were possibly taken with larger-format cameras, particularly those taken on the Brown-Stanton survey of 1889. Some photographs were made by Monsen while he was with U. S. Geological Surveys, and others during his own photography trips. The majority of Native Americans pictured are Hopi and Navajo, but there are also Paiute, Apache, and Pueblo Indians. There are a few views of Mojave Indians of Southern California, and natives of Baja, Mexico. There are several views of Indian children, shown with and without clothes, in their daily activities. Scenes of non-Indian Western life include men in covered wagons on trails, gold prospectors and stagecoaches. There are many artistic landscape views of canyons, buttes and mesas; Death Valley; salt beds; ancient ruins; cactus and other desert plants. Unusual subjects of note are three photographs of skeletons in the deserts of Arizona and one view of the covered bodies of prospectors being carried on burros. The prints are all signed by Monsen and have typed or handwritten captions on the back, written by Monsen. The prints in the collection appear to have been made over a period of years – some have Monsen's printed labels on the back, some have blank labels, or none; signatures are in both ink and pencil; some have copyright symbols, some do not; and the mounts vary in size and type of paper. There are some duplicate images, with slightly different captions, crops or printing effects. Occasionally duplicate photographs have captions that contradict each other, such as the year photographed (see for example, images 367 and 369). These discrepancies have been noted. Other items in collection: - One box of ephemera, including brochures for Monsen's lectures and exhibits; a reprint of The Craftsman, March 1907; and Artland magazine, August 1926, with article on Monsen. - One 8" x 10" photograph (in Ephemera box), titled "The Eagle's Flight." It shows four Hopi boys on the edge of a mesa cliff. This print appears to have been added to the collection at a later time. This image is not in the set of 373 enlargements.
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Visual Materials
A photograph album compiled by Horatio Nelson Rust (1828-1906), U.S. Indian agent and archaeological artifact collector, documenting Indians living in Southern California, Arizona and New Mexico, approximately 1886-1905. Includes group portraits of Indian school students in California; members of the Cahuilla, Luiseno, Morongo, Mojave, Hopi, and Navajo tribes; the Indian Council at Pala, 1886; and scenes in Pechanga, Soboba and other native communities of Southern California. A smaller portion of the album includes Southwest and pueblo scenes; archaeological artifacts; and a few commercial photographs of North American Indians from elsewhere. Some notable images include: a snapshot of Chief Joseph and his nephew standing in front of a train, 1898; views of Navajo Indians whom Rust brought to Pasadena, San Pedro and the Pacific Ocean, 1902-03; and Indian agent Tom Jeffords. Rust appears in several photographs throughout the album. The photographs were made by various photographers, mostly unidentified, but some are credited: C. J. Crandall; E. A. Bonine; C. S. Fly (reproductions of photographs of Geronimo); and John Grabill. The album is accompanied by a four-page index by Rust and a few pieces of ephemera, including a printed card of "The Lord's Prayer translated by William E. Connelley into the Wyandot language."
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Visual Materials
Zuni dancers in a line in the plaza of the pueblo. They are wearing masks and other dance regalia.
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Visual Materials
One disbound photograph album, 74 pages, with approximately 230 prints depicting chiefly Southern California locations and gold mining country in Northern Mexico, taken by various photographers including C. P. Warden and Company (Los Angeles), Graham Photo Company (Los Angeles), Richard H. Kindig, Norman H. Reed (Santa Barbara), Pillsbury (Los Angeles), Gray, and unidentified photographers.
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Visual Materials
An album of 115 amateur photographs of people and places, chiefly in Southern California, New Mexico, and Colorado, presumably kept by civil engineer Edwin B. Davey (1893-1961) in the 1910s. Subjects mainly appear to reflect Davey's work surveying for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad in the American Southwest and recreational activities in Southern California. Snapshots include six photographs of a U. S. Navy seaplane (labeled "Santa Barbara Fiesta," July 3-6, 1919); three photographs showing houses of Davey and his wife, Genevieve Davey, including at 1418 Ivy Street in Glendale, California; two photographs of "picking beans" in Oxnard, California, October 1918; four photographs showing a parade near the Glendale Pacific Electric Station; American soldiers in an unidentified camp and on a trip to Mexico in September 1917; ten photographs of Ralph DePalma racing in the Santa Monica Road Race in March 1919; six photographs of a group of women swimming and in a rowboat near the Long Beach pier; an unidentified train derailment showing a Pullman car labeled "Antonio," which has "Rock Iland [i.e. Rock Island] #6" written on one of the images; images of men with surveying equipment, including one identified as Las Vegas engineers in 1913, and scenes of railroad construction and surveying at Raton, New Mexico, including a railroad tunnel identified as "Raton Pass Tunnel," and the Colorado/New Mexico state line; a group and individual portraits of the baseball team of Central High School presumably in Pueblo, Colorado; and studio and amateur portraits of young men. In addition, there are a few snapshots of the desert including the Cajon Wash and Hesperia, California, and people at various train stations, such as Colorado Springs, Colorado; Long Beach, California; and Lamy, New Mexico.
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