Box 3

Box 3 contains black and white field photographs, black and white portraits, Indian grave postcards, a newspaper illustration, black and white photos of Kwakiutl objects from the NW Coast Collection, and contact prints. The field photographs were taken from 1878-1904, and include photos of totems belonging to the Kwakiutl and Haida people in Price Whales Island Alaska, Queen Charlotte Islands, Kitwanga, B.C., Klukwan, Alaska, and Alert Bay, B.C. There are also village scenes including the Bella Coola and Haida people in Alert Bay and Fort Rupert, taken by Hunt and Maynard, and photographs of Thompson Indians, Babine Indians salmon fishing, a potlatch, a Kwakiutl healing ceremony, and other domestic scenes. Other photographers include Smith and Newcombe. One photo is mounted and marked “copied by Thomas Lunt, Oct 1910 from transparency.”

The black and white portraits are of Nootka Indians. Along with the Kwakiutl, these two tribes formed the Wakashan language family, which consists of seven different languages divided into Northern Wakashan (Kwakiutlan) languages and Southern Wakashan (Nootkan) languages.

The newspaper clipping illustration goes along with the black and white Indian grave postcards, captioned “Burial place and Idols of the Frazer River Indians,” dated May 1873.

The black and white photographs of the Kwakiutl objects from the NW Coast Collection were taken by R. Weber in the 1930s and contain explanations by Hunt, with additional comments from Boas on the backs.

The contact prints were taken between 1930-1931 and the main subject is of the Kwakiutl at Ft. Rupert. There is a set of contact prints captioned, “Geo. Hunt and wife and 2 nephews (Cadwallader) Julia Averkieva, Ft. Rupert, 1930.” Averkieva was a student of Boas’ and was the Director of North American Studies at the Institute of Ethnography in Moscow, and compiled an extensive collection of Kwakiutl string figures.