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President’s Message Jane Randol Jackson Historic Trails & Communities Travelers’ Rest State Park Expands• • A Bibliography• • ’s Sacagawea

Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation / www.lewisandclark.org November 2011 Volume 37, No. 4 Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation / www.lewisandclark.org August 2012 Volume 38, No. 3

TheBirdwoman, Search Wife, for Mother, clark Interpreter:’S eluSive YellowSToneWho Was Sacagawea? canoe camp

“Sacagawea Returned to Her People—August 24, 1805.” by Charles Fritz. In this painting, Sacagawea is depicted during her departure from Camp Fortunate, going west up , A Moose, todays’ Horse Prairie Creek in southwestern . The next day, with help of the Lewis and Clark Encounter a World of Women women and their horses, the expedition crossed over and the Continental Divide. and the Theory of American Degeneracy "Our Canoes on the River Rochejhone" by Charles Fritz, 19 inches by 16 inches, oil on board From to Sacagawea: The Evolution of a Name Contents

President’s Message: In Peace and Good Friendship 2 Letters: Iron-Framed Boat to Coracles; Burning Bluffs Redux 5

Buttons, Beads & Bilious Pills at Montana’s First Campsite 6 Archeological evidence at Travelers’ Rest State Park prompted the Service to redraw park boundaries. By Martha Lindsey

Sacagawea, Sacajawea, Sakakawea How Do You Spell Birdwoman? 10 From Lewis and Clark, who spelled her name 17 different ways to the spelling of “Sakakawea,” there have been numerous spellings of the Shoshone woman’s name. By Irving W. Anderson and Blanche Schroer Entrance to the Mountains, p. 7 Lewis and Clark Encounter a World of Women 12 When Lewis and Clark encountered Native American women, they often decried what seemed like oppression. But in many Native American societies they encountered, women’s roles complemented men’s and gave them secret sources of influence. By Carolyn Gilman

Bird Woman, & A Golden Coin Visual Portrayals of Sacagawea 19 By Donna J. Barbie In , film, plates, and coins, have literally shaped Sacagawea into an American cultural heroine.

Sacagawea Primer: A Bibliography 25 An invaluable source of Sacagawea biographies, essays, and articles. By Barb Kubik Mink, a Beautiful Girl, p. 12 Reviews 28 The Character of by Clay S. Jenkinson; The Lost Journals of Sacajewea by Debra Magpie Earling. By Greg Gordon; Rick Newby

Endnotes 32 Eva Emery Dye wrote her 1902 historical novel about Sacagawea to help promote women’s . But she wasn’t aware of the moment Sacagawea herself voted. By Ron Laycock

On the cover Sacajawea by E.S. Paxson, 1904. Montana Museum of Art and Culture Bird Woman, p. 19

WPO_August 2012.indd 1 7/25/12 4:44 PM President’s Message In Peace and Good Friendship August 2012 • Volume 38, Number 3 merica went through signi cant Don Peterson and Cathie Erickson for WE PROCEEDED ON is the of cial publication changes in 1812. John Jacob their assistance and bookkeeping. I also of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage A Foundation, Inc. Its name derives from Astor’s extend special thanks to Ken Jutzi, who a phrase that appears repeatedly in the constructed near the performed extraordinary service with collective journals of the expedition. © 2012 former site of . Mountain our information management system. E. G. Chuinard, M.D., Founder man discovered an ISSN 02275-6706 overland route to the Paci c via the Editor and Designer Snake and Columbia rivers. The New Caroline Patterson, [email protected] Madrid earthquake shook residents Eileen Chontos, Chontos Design, Inc. in the heartland and even caused the Volunteer Proofreaders Mississippi to flow backward for a H. Carl Camp • Jerry Garrett • J. I. Merritt time. The was the rst Printed by Advanced Litho steamboat to successfully navigate Great Falls, Mont. from to the Gulf of Mexico.

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Its arrival coincided with ’s Jay H. Buckley Barb Kubik becoming the eighteenth state of Provo, Vancouver, Wash. the Union. War broke out between H. Carl Camp Glen Lindeman the and Great Britain Omaha, Neb. Pullman, Wash. in a second . Robert C. Carriker J. I. Merritt Spokane, Wash. Pennington, N.J. (who turned 42 on Elizabeth Chew Robert Moore, Jr. August 1, 1812) was appointed the Charlottesville, Virg. St. Louis, Mo. new Missouri territorial and Carolyn Gilman Gary E. Moulton served as ex-of cio superintendent of St. Louis, Mo. Lincoln, Neb. Indian affairs for all tribes. James Holmberg Phillippa New eld Several years later, after the election Louisville, Ken. , Calif. President Jay H. Buckley Wendy Raney of James Monroe, the Era of Good Cascade, Mont. Feelings was ushered in. I express my gratitude to the Membership Information Since October 1, 2011, the Executive Committee, the Board of Membership in the Lewis and Clark Trail leadership of the Lewis and Clark Directors, and the committees and their Heritage Foundation, Inc. is open to the Trail Heritage Foundation has been chairs for the fantastic work they have public. Information and applications are busily engaged in fostering its own Era been doing: Ken Jutzi (Awards); Bob available by writing Membership Coordinator, of Good Feelings. During my term as Gatten (Bicentennial Trail Stewardship Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, P.O. Box 3434, Great Falls, MT 59403. president of the LCTHF, I have been Advisory); Lorna Hainesworth and grati ed to see so many individuals Jim Mallory (Eastern Legacy); Barb WE PROCEEDED ON, the quarterly magazine of the Foundation, is mailed to current and chapters step forward to address Kubik (Education and Scholarship); members in February, May, August, and the concerns of our times. We elected Wendy Raney (WPO Editorial November. Articles appearing in this journal a new president, replaced the executive Advisory); Steve Lee (Financial are abstracted and indexed in HISTORICAL committee, and added new board Affairs); Margaret Gorski (Friends and ABSTRACTS and AMERICA: HISTORY AND LIFE. members. We held board meetings Partners); Jerry Garrett (Governance); Annual Membership Categories: in Clarksville, Great Falls, and had a Gary Moulton (Library and Archives); Student: $30 fabulous annual meeting at the Falls of Dick Prestholdt (Living History); Jim Individual: $49 the . We hired Caroline Patterson Rosenberger (Membership); and Lou Individual 3-Year: $133 Family/International: $65/$70 as the new editor for our scholarly Ritten (Meeting). If you would like Trail Partner: $200 journal, We Proceeded On. She has to serve on one of the committees, Heritage Club: $100 done an outstanding job of getting the please contact the committee chairs or Explorer Club: $150 publication of WPO back on schedule. someone at headquarters. In addition, Jefferson Club: $250 Discovery Club: $500 We hired Lindy Hatcher as the new I express my thanks to Bryant Boswell Lifetime: $995, $2,500 and $5,000 executive director. Lindy has done a for his help in facilitating our work

The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. masterful job of learning the major and with the Boy Scouts. Jim Keith, is a tax-exempt nonpro t corporation. Individual minor components of the operation Linda and Jerry Robertson, Phyllis membership dues are not tax deductible. The portion of premium dues over $40 is tax deductible. and we are so pleased to have her at Yeager, and members of the Ohio the Great Falls headquarters. We thank River Chapter put on a terri c 44th

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WPO_August 2012.indd 2 7/25/12 4:44 PM President’s Message

annual meeting in Clarksville. Steve Exciting things are happening from Lee was instrumental in initiating an sea to shining sea. After losing nearly annual report. Doug and Lynn Davis 300 members since 2010, we have added helped restore order to Great Falls 60 new members this year for a total of ce les. Sue Buchel and others have of approximately 1,200 members. We volunteered at the Sherman Library. need your ongoing support to recruit An anonymous donor gave a thousand and reclaim more members. dollars to the Foundation to assist Enthusiasm in the schools is also in the executive director search. The catching re. Teacher David Ellingson membership of the Badger Chapter taught a Lewis and Clark class focused raised funds to make a donation to the on the scienti c contributions of the Foundation. The Chapter expedition to high school students paid for lobby directional signs and in Woodburn, Ore. Following the the Portage Route Chapter funded journals, students did field work the Willliam P. Sherman Library in the Columbia Gorge and near and Archives sign at the Great Falls Fort Clatsop documenting the same Available at Booksellers Interpretive Center. Other chapters botanical specimens the captains Or Directly from the Publisher at hosted fantastic regional meetings on collected more than 200 years ago. Or Call 877-462-8535 Thewww.FortMandan.com Dakota Institute Press

Editor Caroline Patterson, President Jay Buckley, Executive Director Lindy Hatcher

the Columbia, Missouri, Mississippi, After collecting used cell phones and and Ohio rivers, at the Columbia selling them for parts, the third grade Gorge in Ore. and in Wash., and in class of the Princeton Day School in the East in Frederick, Md., Big Bone donated the proceeds to Lick, Ky., and Tippecanoe, Ind. We the Foundation. We are grateful to one anticipate other meetings including and all for their contributions. the one commemorating Sacagawea’s I am grateful to the three dozen death in in September LCTHF chapters throughout the Available at Booksellers and another in New Orleans, La., in country. Their leaders and members Or Directly from the Publisher at February 2013. You may want to start are instrumental in helping us ful ll making plans to attend the LCTHF’s our mission as the nation’s premier Or Call 877-462-8535 45th annual meeting next summer at non-profit organization dedicated www.fortmandan.com Fort in Washburn, N. Dak. to the preservation of the Lewis and The Dakota Institute Press August 2012 We Proceeded On 3

WPO_August 2012.indd 3 7/25/12 4:44 PM President’s Message (continued) The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. Clark National Historic Trail and trail. Thank you for your ongoing the sharing of its stories. We are so contributions to create a lasting Lewis pleased that we were able to distribute and Clark legacy. It has been an honor $50,000 of Trail Stewardship grants to serve you and associate with you. P.O. 3434, Great Falls, MT 59403 to our chapters. Chapters and other We have pared down our expenses 406-454-1234 / 1-888-701-3434 entities may now apply online for the to live within our means. Nevertheless, Fax: 406-771-9237 next grant cycle, which was unveiled our operating budget for WPO and the www.lewisandclark.org at the annual meeting and in the executive director still depends upon The mission of the LCTHF is: Annual Report. We hope chapters take dues and contributions from members As Keepers of the Story ~ advantage of these grants to conduct and friends. Please consider ways in Stewards of the Trail, the Lewis trail stewardship, advance education which you can help build the future: and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, about Lewis and Clark, create interest step up to serve, recruit members, Inc. provides national leadership in maintaining the integrity of in the local communities, develop attend national and regional meetings, the Trail and its story through chapter leadership, and recapture or and contribute to LCTHF or to one stewardship, scholarship, education, generate additional local and national of the restricted funds that provides partnership and cultural inclusiveness. membership. Involved citizens, in income and opportunities for the concert with our federal, state, and organization and comes back full circle tribal partners, can do a tremendous to the chapters and members. amount of good. Finally, join with me in extending Officers When we work together, we a heartfelt, Lewis and Clark welcome President accomplish more than by working to incoming President Dan Sturdevant, Jay H. Buckley alone. This past year, our volunteers Vice President Margaret Gorski, Provo, Utah provided 128,000 hours of service Treasurer Jerry Garrett, and Secretary Immediate Past-President and partnership support valued at Larry McClure. We thank them for Stephenie Ambrose Tubbs $4,808,766 in helping us fulfill our their devotion, passion, and sacrifice. President-Elect mission to “preserve, promote, and Huzzah! Dan Sturdevant teach the diverse heritage of Lewis and Proceeding on in peace and City, Mo. Clark for the benefit of all people.” friendship… Please know how deeply we appreciate — Jay H. Buckley Vice-President Margaret Gorski the members who step forward to make President, LCTHF Stevensville, Mont. the Foundation a success. You are the wpo welcomes letters. We may edit them best ambassadors for spreading the for length, accuracy, clarity, and civility. Secretary Lewis and Clark story and fulfilling Send them to us c/o Editor, wpo, P.O. Box Larry McClure our charge to be wise stewards of the 3434, Great Falls, MT 59403. Tualatin, Ore.

Treasurer Jerry Garrett Saint Louis, Mo. Editor’s Note On December 22, 1812, Sacagawea, the Shoshone woman who travelled with Directors at large the , translating, interpreting, and guiding, reportedly died Ken Jutzi, Camarillo, Calif. at age 25 at Fort Manuel, a Missouri Fur Trading Company trading post in Barbara Kubik, Vancouver, Wash. present-day So. Dak. Medical researchers think she died from complications Ron Laycock, Benson, Minn. from an illness she had suffered from all of her life—an illness worsened by the Gary Moulton, Lincoln, Neb. birth earlier that year of her daughter Lisette. At the time of her death, she was Philippa Newfield, San Francisco, Calif. with her husband , her son Baptise and daughter Lisette. Jim Rosenberger, , Wisc. Clay Smith, Great Falls, Mont. Clark legally adopted Sacagawea’s two children, educating Baptiste in St. Louis Bill Stevens, Pierre, S. D. and then in . It is not known if Lisette survived infancy. Richard Williams, Omaha, Neb. When Bill Stevens mentioned to me that he was devoting the Encounters on the Prairie Chapter regional meeting, September 28–30, 2012, to Sacagawea, I Incorporated in 1969 under Missouri General Not-For-Profit was inspired to use this issue of We Proceeded On to highlight scholarship about Corporation Act. IRS Exemption this remarkable and mysterious woman. We know so little about her—yet she Certificate No. 501(c)3, ldentification has fired our imaginations for so long, inspiring biographies, novels, poetry, and No. 510187715. children’s books. I hope this issue piques your curiosity. I know it did mine. —Caroline Patterson

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WPO_August 2012.indd 4 7/25/12 4:44 PM Letters

hoop-poles being fixed in the bottom (northwest of the Route 15 bridge at Iron-Framed Boats across the keel, turned up their ends, Mulberry Bend SWMA) as opposed expanded the hull of the boat, which to the Ionia Volcano location. I would to Coracles being fastened by thongs to two other agree that the late Martin Plamondon II’s Those interested in the origins of poles bent round, the outside of the rim herculean cartographic reconstruction Meriwether Lewis’s iron-framed, formed the gunwhales [sic]: thus in an efforts are not flawless. In fact, I pointed skin-covered boat may find additional hour’s time our bark was rigged. ...” out an apparent error in his plotting of documentation on the subject in The Neill gives other instances of one of Clark’s critical bearing readings Florida Anthropologist. Wilfred T. Neill temporary and expedient leather on August 22, 1804, and there are wrote a 1954 article “Coracles or differences between his depiction Skin Boats of the Southeastern of the ’s position Indians” in which he scoured the along this day’s travel versus the historical literature for mentions Clark-Maximilian Sheet 6 in Dr. of skin or leather watercraft in the Gary Moulton’s The Journals of southeastern regions of America. the Lewis & Clark Expedition, Since the source might be somewhat Volume 1. However, using the best obscure (but easily available through source material available, Clark’s Interlibrary loan), Neill documents own course and distance notations other occurrences in the literature: and his journal entries, the tenuous John Tobler mentioned in 1737 link between Clark’s observation of that the Indians in the area of the “burning bluffs” and the Ionia Savannah Town (or Savaneton), Volcano literally doesn’t add up. South Carolina, brought “buffalo, Using the area where Aowa bear, and dear hides ... and even a Creek (Clark’s “Roloje” Creek) leather boat” to the local merchants. emerges from a narrow valley east of He noted that the boat could be Ponca, Neb. as a reference point— folded up and easily carried, with a and this is a very reliable benchmark capacity of four or five people when because the creek is constrained at or used to cross rivers. very near its 1804 position between James Adair, a trader and early Inspecting Iron Frame Boat by Keith Rocco/ two closely-spaced ridges—Clark’s Indian historian, described a canoe made Tradition Studio. Courtesy of the National distance calculations from Aowa Creek to of tanned leather, with “the sides over- Park Service his observation of the “burning bluffs” lapped about three fingers breadth, and totaled 29.25 river miles. The distance well sewed with three seams. Around watercraft that were not much more from Aowa Creek to the present-day the gunnels, which are made of saplings, than hides shaped into a bowl or a tub Ionia Volcano is only 13 miles. Even are strong loop-holes, for large deer-skin used by individuals involved in trade in the differing interpretations of the strings to hang down both the sides: in the 1730s. Meriwether ’s position and meander of the river with two of these, is securely tied to the may have learned of such watercraft encountered August 22, 1804, (which stem and stern, a well-shaped sapling, during his boyhood sojourn in Georgia could add perhaps a mile or two to the for a keel, and in like manner the ribs. and tried (unsuccessfully) to make use of distance between Aowa Creek and Ionia) Thus, they usually rig out a canoe, fit the idea at the Great Falls. can’t alter the fact that the expedition to carry over ten horse loads at once, in passed the Ionia Volcano location on the space of half an hour: the apparatus Kerry Lippincott August 22, that none of the journal is afterwards commonly hidden with Casper, Wyo. keepers (Clark, Ordway, Whitehouse, great care, on the opposite shore.” His and Gass) noted any volcanic occurrences observations were made sometime on that day. It would be two days later between 1735 and 1750, although they Burning Bluffs Redux (August 24, 1804) before Clark noted were not published until 1775. the extensive “burning bluffs” in his This letter is in response to Jim Peterson’s journal. Distance calculations from the William Bartram, a famous naturalist, May 2012 letter about John Jengo’s described his 1778 crossing of the expedition’s position on August 24 to article in the February WPO,“‘Blue definitive landmark stops such as Spirit Ocmulgee River in Georgia in which, Earth,’ ‘Clift of White,’ and ‘Burning “[We] sat about rigging our portable Mound (which the captains hiked to Bluffs’: Lewis and Clark’s Extraordinary on August 25, 1804) prove that the leather boat, about eight feet long, which Encounters in Northeastern .” was made of thick soal leather ... We ... expedition had to be in the vicinity of cut down a White-Oak sapling, and by I wanted to respond to Mr. Peterson’s Wynot, not Ionia, when they noted and notching this at each end, bent it up, statement that I relied upon erroneous mapped the “burning bluffs.” which formed the keel, stem, and stern maps to draw my conclusion that the post of one piece; this was placed in the actual “burning bluffs” noted by William John Jengo bottom of the boat, and pretty strong Clark were located near Wynot, Nebraska Downington, Penn.

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WPO_August 2012.indd 5 7/25/12 4:44 PM Buttons, Beads & Bilious Pills: Montana’s First Campsite

By Martha Lindsey

icknamed “Montana’s First Campsite” for Landmark in 2006, negating all of the original 700 acres its association with the Lewis and Clark and designating 24 acres encompassing the archaeological NExpedition, Travelers’ Rest in 1960 was site. Today, the Travelers’ Rest Preservation & Heritage designated a National Historic Landmark at the Association is just $100,000 short of $700,000 in funding confluence of Lolo Creek and the in needed to acquire additional acreage for the park. This will Lolo, Montana. In 1976, the area was given a 700-acre enable the park to own outright the land surrounding the boundary “to include enough of National Historic Landmark . the low meadowland and tree- c and its visitor center/museum. lined creek to provide an adequate setting for the site of the two The Corps at historic camps and to allow for Travelers’ Rest possible changes in the creek bed.”1 Travelers’ Rest was a pivotal Then the archeologists arrived. In Cultural Western Hall, Dan site for the expedition as The trade bead (left) and lead artifacts excavated from In the course of their digging from the Travelers’ Rest archeological dig in summer 2001. it headed to and from the 2001 to 2002, they discovered a The tombac button (not shown) was returned to the Pacific Coast. On September button from an early nineteenth- property owner and is not held at the park. 9, 1805, the corps approached century military jacket, a trading bead, campsite fire rings, the snowy and treacherous Bitterroot Mountains and as well as evidence of mercury from Dr. Rush’s bilious pills. rested along a “fine bould clear runing stream” that The discovery was exciting, but problematic: it showed that Captain Meriwether Lewis named Travelers’ Rest the National Historic Landmark was located on a site that Creek.2 Here they prepared for what would be the did not include the area where Lewis and Clark camped. most treacherous part of their journey—the Bitterroot The evidence was convincing enough to prompt the Mountains. When they returned from the Pacific Coast to do something that was itself on June 30, 1806, Captain William Clark described their historic: to redraw the boundaries of the National Historic difficult journey:

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WPO_August 2012.indd 6 7/25/12 4:44 PM ociety S istorical istorical H ate ate t S Washington

Entrance to the Bitterroot Mountains by the Lou Lou Fork, by Gustav Sohon, June 1854. Travelers’ Rest is located along the base of the hills to the right.

Descended the mountain to Travellers rest leaveing The chapter then acquired a set of infrared photographs those tremendious mountanes behind us—in passing of the National Historic Landmark and the surrounding of which we have experiensed Cold and hunger of which I shall ever remember.3 Lolo community, which helped identify subsurface anomalies in the soil, where historic and prehistoric people The expedition spent four days at Travelers’ Rest, might have left their marks on the land. The Travelers’ resting, hunting, and planning one of their most important Rest campsite was located further up the Lolo Creek, navigation decisions: to split up. Lewis proceeded east and approximately one to two miles west of the Bitterroot north to the while Clark went south and River. When the chapter members received permission down the Rochejhone or . from the landowners to scan the site with metal detectors, But where, precisely, did the corps camp at Travelers’ Rest? they dug up many items from early settlers, such as large screws and wagon wheels; however, one small, yet Button, Button, Whose Button? significant discovery was made in August 2001: the Tombac Locating archeological evidence of the expedition was button. “The button,” as it has become known, was often daunting, but in 1996 the members of the Travelers’ Rest sewn on military uniforms after the Revolutionary War Chapter of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation and dated from 1760 through 1812.4 While a button alone took up the challenge. Travelers’ Rest scholars were aided was not enough to confirm the site, it became a catalyst by significant new research and newly available historic for a full-blown archeological excavation. documents that were being published, including Gary Moulton’s 13-volume The Journals of the Lewis & Clark From Magnetometers to Dr. Rush’s Pills Expedition, as well as the journals of Private Joseph When the Travelers’ Rest Chapter hired professional Whitehouse and Sergeants Patrick Gass and John Ordway. archeologist Dan Hall to take over the project in spring Robert Bergantino, a Montana Tech geologist, used 2001, he brought in a magnetometer to search for other modern-day survey equipment to follow and replicate relics that would have survived the 200 years since the Corps Clark’s original survey calculations. of Discovery traveled through . The first August 2012 We Proceeded On • 7

WPO_August 2012.indd 7 7/25/12 4:44 PM Dale Dufour Dale Lolo Creek, which flows along Travelers’ Rest State Park, is adorned in fall colors.

magnetometer detected soil anomalies. While these images encampment could be adjusted for the corps, which was did not detect what caused the disturbances, they helped closer in size to a platoon (24 soldiers). pinpoint 18 areas to be excavated. While the two captains relied on Campfire hearths were the first While a button and bead reinforced von Steuben’s manual for structure find. Situated directly next to the and discipline, they also used it to set old creek bed, they were larger in the importance of trading, it was not up camp. The blue book stipulated diameter than fires traditionally used precisely where the tents should be by the Salish Indians. The fire pits proof that non-natives had used the pitched “the captains and subalterns also boasted more than charcoal. tents are to be in one line, 20 feet Carbon dating revealed that the fires site, let alone the Corps of Discovery. from the rear of the men’s tents, that had burned within 30 years of the captains in the right wing opposite expedition. And there was more: a small blue glass trade the right of their respective companies.” The manual also bead and a piece of lead. specified where campfires, butchering areas, and latrine While a button and bead reinforced the importance pits should be built.5 In accordance with its specifications, of trading, it was not proof that non-natives had used the the two campfire hearths excavated at Travelers’ Rest were site, let alone the Corps of Discovery. The piece of lead, aligned in a fairly straight line, perpendicular to the old however, was most likely a scrap from bullet-making, creek bed. As specified by von Steuben’s manual, the latrine which was not a practice of the Native Americans at this was distanced almost exactly—nearly 300 feet—from time. Isotope testing determined the lead was mined in where the butchering area would have been. Olive Hill, . While historic records tell us that It was the mercury vapor in the decomposing organic this mine did sell lead to the federal government, there were matter at the latrine site that connected the area to the no records of exactly where the expedition had purchased Corps of Discovery. Mercury vapor from Dr. Rush’s its lead. bilious pills were taken by men for anything from Hall and his team made another substantial finding constipation to syphilis, Dr. Rush’s bilious pills were the on August 29, 2002. Because the expedition was a military expedition’s go-to first-aid remedy. Dr. Rush’s orders for venture, the camp would have relied on Baron Friedrich “preserving health” relied heavily upon the pills, and he Wilhelm von Steuben’s Regulations for the Order and instructed the men to take as many as two or more pills Discipline of the Troops of the United States, informally at a time for illness. While taking poisonous pills for good known as the “blue book.” While the manual laid out health seems counterintuitive, mercury was a common procedures for a regiment (500 to 1,000 soldiers), the basic medicine in the metropolitan areas of the late eighteenth

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WPO_August 2012.indd 8 7/25/12 4:44 PM century. Based on common practices of purging or bleeding out illness, mercury was a strong laxative. When taken as a remedy, very little was absorbed before the body began to expel it, theoretically taking the illness with it. In the early 1800s, in , no one other than the members of the Lewis and Clark Expedition used Dr. Rush’s pills. Although each piece of evidence did not decisively prove that Lewis and Clark stood at the Travelers’ Rest creek side, the preponderance of evidence—the button, the camp re hearths, the traces of mercury from the bilious pills—suggests this Montana State Park is where the Corps of Discovery camped on their way to and from the Paci c Ocean. Today more than 20,000 people visit the park each year. Visitors can get a sense of the expedition at this spot, well-known to the Salish Indians, that is surrounded by streaming waters, cottonwood and pitch pine trees, and dotted by the delicate and tough pink blossoms of bitterroot  owers ( rediviva).

Martha Lindsey, of Missoula, Mont., is program director for Travelers’ Rest Preservation & DISCOVER THE PAST. Heritage Association and a member of the LCTHF’s Travelers’ Rest Chapter. EXPERIENCE THE PRESENT.

NOTES 1Daniel Hall. “Travelers’ Rest National Historic Landmark: Validation and Veri cation of a Lewis and Clark Campsite.” 2003. Report GIVE prepared for the Missoula Of ce of Planning and Grants. to the Travelers’ Rest Expansion Campaign, 2Gary E. Moulton, ed. The Journals of the Lewis & Clark Expedition, 13 volumes so we can preserve and enhance this gift for (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1983- 2001). Vol. 5, p. 192. future generations. 3Stanley Olsen. “Dating Early Plain Buttons by their Form.” American Antiquity 28(4). 1963. pp. 551–554. 4 . “Dr. Rush to Captain Lewis for Preserving His Health” 11 June 1803. The Thomas Jefferson Papers, Series 1. , Washington D.C. http://hdl.loc.gov/ loc.mss/mtj.mtjbib012481 Accessed June 2012. Proud fiscal sponsor 5Baron Frederich Wilhelm von Steuben. Regulations for the Order and Discipline of Give online at the Troops of the United States. (, www.missoulacommunityfoundation.org Penn.: U.S. War Dept, 1779). August 2012 We Proceeded On 9

WPO_August 2012.indd 9 7/25/12 4:44 PM Sacagawea, Sacajawea or Sakakawea How Do You Spell Birdwoman?

by Irving W. Anderson and Blanche Shroer

istory has accorded the Shoshone Indian its meaning. Lewis’s journal entry for May 20, woman member of the Lewis and Clark 1805, reads: “a handsome river of about fifty HExpedition a most novel place in the hearts yards in width discharged itself into the shell and minds of generations of Americans. That her [Musselshell] river…this stream we call Sah-ca- fame is deserving is evident from historical gah-we-ah (sah KAH gah WEE ah) or bird records. Sacagawea was by birth a Shoshone. woman’s River, after our interpreter As can be best determined, she would have the Snake [Shoshoni] woman.”2 been approximately 12 years old in 1800, Clark’s three maps that show understood by the explorers to have the river named in her honor been the year she was taken prisoner reinforce Lewis’s spelling and by the Hidatsa Indians and removed meaning of her name. from her Rocky Mountain homeland Lewis and Clark history east to their village near present- scholars, together with the U.S. day Bismarck, . Lewis Geographic Name Board, the U.S. and Clark encountered her there in National Park Service, the National November 1804. By that time, she had Geographic Society, Encyclopedia been given the Hidatsa name Sacagawea, and World Book Encyclopedia, among which means Birdwoman. others, have adopted the Sacagawea form. Sacagawea’s name was spelled by the The Bureau of American Ethnology, as early explorers a total of 17 times. Thirteen as 1910, had standardized the Sacagawea of these were recorded by Lewis and spelling in its publication. Her name Clark, and one was by Sergeant traces its etymology to the Hidatsa John Ordway, each in their Indian tribe, among whom she lived original longhand journals. In most of her adult life. The name addition, Clark inscribed her derives from two Hidatsa Indian words: name on three of his maps. sacaga, meaning bird and wea meaning

Although their flair for inspired aynes woman. It is pronounced Sa ca’ ga wea, H spelling created some interesting with a hard “g.” Clark explained later variations, in every instance Michael that in recording Indian vocabularies, all three of the journalists who the “great object was to make every Sacagawea attempted to write it were consistent letter sound.”3 in the use of a “g” in the third syllable. Over the years, numerous linguistic The captains’ longhand manuscript journals1 reveal a attempts to decipher the mystery of her name have been standardized phonetic spelling of her name, together with published. Shoshone advocates claim her as “Sacajawea”

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WPO_August 2012.indd 10 7/25/12 4:44 PM (SAK-ah-jah-wee-ah), a form of her name that was “Sacaga” would not be a bad spelling … but never “Sacaja” popularized in spelling and pronunciation. This led to [for bird] and “wea means woman.”10 Matthews’ explains complications, however, because her name was never spelled in his dictionary that there is no “j “included in the Hidatsa “Sacajawea” during her lifetime. Moreover, “Sacajawea” alphabet and that “g” is pronounced as a “hard g.” allegedly means the equivalent of “canoe launcher”4 in The authors of this paper agreed with the sources Shoshone, which contradicts Lewis and Clark’s primary cited above that the Shoshone Indian woman’s name is documentation, “bird woman.”5 Sacagawea. Over time, the American The “Sacajawea” spelling derives The name derives from two Hidatsa “editorial ethic” will uniformly adopt from the 18154 narrative of the the Sacagawea form. We owe it journey, a secondary source published Indian words: sacaga, meaning bird to America’s most famous Native two years after Sacagawea’s death.6 American heroine to correctly spell The narrative was edited by Nicholas and wea meaning woman. and pronounce her name. Biddle, a classical scholar who never met Sacagawea and never heard her pronounce her name. This article was adapted from “Sacagawea: Her Name and Biddle worked from the captains’ original longhand Her Destiny,” first published in WPO, November 1999. journal entries, correcting spelling and grammar, and Irving W. Anderson, who lived from 1920 to 1999, was substantially abridging many daily entries. Although his renowned for his scholarship on Sacagawea and the Lewis editing methodology is credited with standardizing the “Sah and Clark Expedition. Blanche Schroer, who lived from ca gah we a” form in the journals, no one knows why he 1907 to 1998, was a Sacagawea scholar and freelance writer decided upon the “Sacajawea” spelling in his 1814 narrative, in . especially when all of the primary documents spelled the Notes name with a “g.”7 Perhaps Biddle was influenced by the 1 poorly formed “g’s” contained in many of Clark’s longhand The original manuscript journals are held in the archives of the American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia. They journal entries. can be accessed online at http://www.amphilsoc.org/mole/ Indeed, two decades after the expedition, Clark persisted view?docId=ead/Mss.917.3.L58-ead.xml in this quirk of his penmanship when he spelled her name 2Gary E. Moulton, ed. The Journals of the Lewis & Clark one final time. Clark perpetuated his life-long, exasperating Expedition, 13 volumes. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1983-2001), Vol. 5, p. 171. idiosyncrasy of scribbling poorly formed “g’s” that appear 3Donald Jackson, ed. Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition to be “j’s” when he penned: “Se car ja we au Dead.”8 with Related Documents. 1783-1854. 2nd Edition. 2 vols. Urbana: North Dakota Hidatsa advocates vigorously promote University of Press, 1978. Vol. 2, p. 527. a “Sakakawea” (sah-KAH-KAH-wee-ah) spelling and 4Grace Raymond Hebard. Sacajawea. A and Interpreter of pronunciation of her name. Analogous with the “Sacajawea” the Lewis and Clark Expedition with An Account of the Travels form, the “Sakakawea” spelling is not found in the Lewis of Toussaint Charbonneau and of Jean Baptiste, the Expedition Papoose. (Boston, Mass.: Arthur H. Clark Co., 1952, reprint ed. and Clark journals. This spelling has been independently 1962), p. 289. constructed from two Hidatsa Indian words found in a 5Blanche Schroer, “Boat-pusher or Bird Woman? Sacagawea or dictionary titled Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Sacajawea?,” Annals of Wyoming, Vol. 52, No. 1, Spring 1980, Indians, published by the Government Printing Office, pp. 46–54. Washington, D.C. in 1877. 6Nicholas Biddle and Paul Allen, eds., History of the Expedition Compiled by U.S. Army Surgeon Washington Under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark. 1804-1806. 2 vols. 1814. Reprint edition Elliot Coues, ed. (Mineola, N.Y.: Matthews 65 years following Sacagawea’s death, the words Dover Publications, Inc. 3 vols. 1965). appear verbatim as “tsa-ka-ka, noun; a bird,” and “mia [wia 7Irving W. Anderson, “Sacajawea, Sacagawea, Sakakawea?” South bia] noun: a woman.” In a 1950 publication titled Sakakawea Dakota History, Vol. 8, No. 4, Fall 1978, pp. 303-311. the Bird Woman, Matthews originally used another form 8Russell Reid, “Sakakawea the Bird Woman,” State Historical of spelling “Tsakakawia” which was “anglicized for easy Society of North Dakota, Bismarck, 1950, p. 4. pronunciation” but it later became “Sakakawea … the 9Olin D. Wheeler, The Trail of Lewis and Clark. 1804–1904. (New spelling adopted by North Dakota.”9 This form, however, : G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904). Vol 1. pp. 126, 135. 10 contracts Matthews’ explanation: “In my dictionary, I give , Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, the Hidatsa word for bird as Tsahaka.” Ts is often changed 1877), p. 90. Reprinted (Ann Arbor: University of to S, and K to G, in this and other Indian languages, so Press, 2005). August 2012 We Proceeded On • 11

WPO_August 2012.indd 11 7/25/12 4:44 PM L   C E  A W  W 

B C G SMITHSONIAN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART

“Women … being viewed as property & in course “We Hidatsa women were early risers in the planting Slaves to the men have not much leisure time to season. It was my habit to be up before sunrise, while Spear—” the air was cool, for we thought this the best time for —William Clark1 garden work. …We thought that the corn plants had souls, as children have souls. …We cared for our corn in those days, as we would care for a child.” Left: Wife of Two Crows, painted by George —Buffalo Bird Woman, Hidatsa2 Catlin in a Hidatsa Village in 1832

Right: Mi-néek-ee-súnk-te-ka, Mink, a Beautiful Girl, a Mandan girl painted by in 1832.

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WPO_August 2012.indd 12 7/25/12 4:44 PM the astute theory—later echoed by anthropologists—that the status of women was linked to their economic role. “Those nations treat their old people and women with most difference [deference] and rispect where they subsist principally on such articles that these can participate with the men in obtaining them.”5 The captains, however, could rt A not let go of their first conclusions. Even the commanding Chinookan merican A women were “compelled”—they eum of s

u never chose—“to geather roots, and M assist them in taking fish, [and]… onian s perform every species of domestic Smith drudgery.” Observing them, Lewis Bird’s-eye View of the Mandan Village, 1800 Miles above St. Louis George Catlin, 1832. confidently echoed Jefferson’s assertion that “our women [are] aptains Meriwether indebted to civilization for their ease Lewis and William Clark The two captains observed that, in many and comfort.”6 Generations of readers Ctraveled through a world would accept the implication that full of women, but for the most respects, the status of women was higher Indian women could only benefit part, their observations concerned in the tribes they encountered farther west. from Euro-American civilization. only other men. When they did see But was it that simple? Because women, they decried what seemed Lewis and Clark rarely spoke directly like oppression. “The , Minit[aree]s &c. treat their to anyone but men, they could not know that for Native women as subservient,” Clark noted. The women “do the American women, as for their non-Indian sisters, power drugery as Common amongst Savages.” Among the , and powerlessness were intertwined. In Native American the women seemed to him like “perfect Slaves to the men, as societies, as in the United States, there was conflict and all Squars of nations much at war, or where the womin are disrespect between the sexes, including the domestic more noumerous than the men.” This was the expedition’s violence and ribald talk even Lewis and Clark recorded. main “discovery” about Plains Indian gender relations.3 On the Plains, men and women lived strictly separate lives This perception was not new. As early as 1785, Thomas and spent much of their time apart. They had separate Jefferson stated: “The [Indian] women are submitted social duties and separate religious organizations, and to unjust drudgery. This I believe is the case with every they even spoke different versions of their own languages. barbarous people. …The stronger sex imposes on the Men wielded public power, and the power of violence. But weaker. It is civilization alone which replaces women in for Indian women, separation did not necessarily mean the enjoyment of their natural equality.” However, during subservience. Their roles complemented men’s, requiring the course of the expedition, Lewis and Clark encountered mutual reliance and cooperation. Their responsibilities a variety of gender roles that would force them to modify even gave them secret sources of influence. In many ways, their simple assumptions. The two captains observed that, Mandan women would have been shocked at the status of in many respects, the status of women was higher in the women in Virginia.7 tribes they encountered farther west. The Plateau tribes, Clark noted, exhibited a more egalitarian attitude.4 On The Women Lewis and Clark Left Behind the Pacific Coast, it came as an almost unpleasant shock Lewis and Clark contrasted the “downtrodden” Native that the women were “permitted to speak freely before American women with the women of their own culture. them, and sometimes appear[ed] to command with a tone Lewis idealized women of his race, writing once of “the of authority.” To explain the difference, Lewis developed pure celestial virtues and amiable qualifications of that August 2012 We Proceeded On • 13

WPO_August 2012.indd 13 7/25/12 4:44 PM lovely fair one.”8 Women of the upper classes in Virginia suits or contracts related to the property, a man had to had an easier life than did Indian women, and represent her, so the “masterful” Lucy enlisted her undoubtedly few plantation mistresses would young son Meriwether, and assigned him her have chosen to exchange places. power of attorney. She still had authority, And yet, Virginians of the early but she had to exercise it invisibly, through nineteenth century did not think it male proxies.12 proper for women of any class to have If a matriarch of Lucy’s standing much power. A Virginian woman had little control over her children and could not vote, hold public office property, a younger and less experienced or serve on a jury. She could make a woman, such as Julia Hancock, was contract or sue in court only under that much more dependent on men.

special circumstances. Marriage was LOUIS. MUSEUM, ST. MISSOURI HISTORY According to Clark family legend, when a mixed blessing: to be without a William saw the young Julia Hancock at husband often meant poverty, but when her family’s Virginia plantation in 1801, a woman married, her property became he decided to marry her. If so, he was her husband’s. Her children belonged to prescient—she was only ten years old. their father’s family, and a divorced or Julia Hancock Clark who was After returning from the expedition in married at 16, had 5 children and widowed woman risked losing custody. 2 houses, and set the social mores 1806, Clark’s rst trip—even before he Women’s and men’s work was segregated, for St. Louis society. Portrait by went to Washington, D.C.—was to return as in Indian society. But through children, John Jarvis Wesley, 1820. to her family’s plantation to x the date of work, religious authority, and love, their wedding. “I have made an attacked Virginian women had some of the same Julia had privileges that most vigorously,” he wrote Lewis with informal powers as Indian women. Such soldierly jocularity. “We have come to powers were often invisible to men.9 most woman of her day terms, and a delivery is to be made rst Meriwether Lewis’s most enduring could not expect. of January…when I shall be in possession relationship with a woman was with highly pleasing to my self.” Julia had just his mother, Lucy Marks. Though she turned 16 when they married.13 came from the landowning class of Virginia, Marks had Julia had privileges that most woman of her day could not “spartan ideas” and “a good deal of the autocrat” about expect. She grew up in a wealthy household, surrounded by her, according to her acquaintances. And yet she was “kind slaves. She was well educated, owning volumes of Shakespeare without limit” and full of “activity beyond her sex.” At 17, and writing more legibly than her husband. And yet her she married her cousin William Lewis, a man troubled by marriage followed some customs that a Mandan woman “hypochondriac affections,” or depression. After ten years, might have found demeaning. Both Virginian and Mandan four children and a revolution, William Lewis died, and she women married young, around 15 to 17 years of age. Their married John Marks, a relative of Jefferson’s by marriage. husbands were often older; the 22-year difference between She outlived her second husband as well, retiring to her William and Julia was not unusual in either culture, and made herbal medicines and her prized library of books.10 for a relationship more like one of father and daughter than Because of the laws of primogeniture, Lucy lost one of husband and wife. If they belonged to prominent guardianship of her oldest son, Meriwether, when her rst families, girls could not decide on their marriage partners; husband died, because the eight-year-old boy was heir to the the decision was a matter of negotiation between parents. Lewis estate, and his father’s family assumed charge of his The similarities ended there. In Mandan society, a suitor upbringing and property—including the property that Lucy offered rich gifts of horses and goods, and girls boasted was living on. And so Lucy’s husband’s brother, Nicholas about how much had been given for them, because the Lewis, became the boy’s guardian. She did not lose actual material gifts were public af rmation of their value to the custody of her son for another ve years. By then, she had family. In Virginia, the girl’s family paid to get daughters remarried and thus had lost all claim to the Lewis estate.11 off their hands; Julia brought a groaning boatload of slaves When her second husband, John Marks, died in 1791, and furnishings to set up house with her new husband. Lucy became the executrix of his estate, which she managed A Mandan girl stayed in her parents’ home, surrounded till their sons were old enough to inherit it. However, in by a supportive family; a Virginian girl had to move to

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WPO_August 2012.indd 14 7/25/12 4:44 PM her husband’s home. In Julia’s case, that meant an eight- important ones were children, work, sisterhood, and love. hundred-mile trek westward to St. Louis, where she The bonds of family affection were as strong in a was isolated from family and friends and was Mandan village as in Virginia, but there were utterly dependent on her husband’s kindness. differences. In Euro-American society, As far as we know, Julia was never children belonged to their father’s family, discontented with her marriage. As the wife and inheritance passed from father to of a prominent man, she managed two large son. It was not so with the Mandan houses, entertained official visitors, and and the Hidatsa. These tribes were set the social and material standards of St. matrilineal—children belonged to their Louis society—she had the most stylish and mother’s family and inherited their clan expensive possessions, the best house, and from her. Since children belonged to a set the best table. It was essential work, but SOCIETY HISTORICAL THE NEW-YORK clan different from that of their father, it did not meet Lewis’s criterion of adding to all the important ties and duties of clan the family’s subsistence, so it gave her little membership—as well as discipline— economic power. Family letters recorded were taught by their mother’s relations. little of her life other than pregnancy and Yellow Corn, a Mandan Religious rites, property, and social by Charles Balthazar, ill health. In ten years, she had ve children. charcoal with stumping. status all passed from mother (or She died at 28 years of age. Clark then mother’s brother) to child.17 married her cousin. Like other Mandan women, A Mandan household often consisted of a group of sisters married YELLOW CORN: MANDAN EXPLORER Yellow Corn had sources to the same man. Women never had All those near relatives of mine …are bound to leave their homes: when a couple to me like the threads of the spider-web. of power that were often married, the man came to live in his —Bear’s Arm, Hidatsa, quoting wife’s earth lodge, moving in with her Charred Body14 invisible to outsiders. parents and sisters. Children brought up One woman who got a chance to in such a lodge called all their mother’s observe the differences between Euro-American and Native sisters “mother” as well, and if their mother died, the sisters American cultures was Yellow Corn. She was the wife of became responsible for the children. As a result, it was Shehek-Shote, the chief of the Mandan village closest to inconceivable for a woman to lose custody of her children. the spot where the expedition wintered at Even among the patrilineal Sioux, where women’s from 1804 to 1805, and Lewis and Clark often crossed the status was lower, their rights over their children up to the Missouri River to speak to Shehek-Shote in his earth lodge. age of puberty were uncontested. If a couple separated or What the captains did not know was that the earthen the husband sold his wife, gave her away, or abandoned house Shehek-Shote lived in and the food he ate belonged to her, she kept the children. It did not stop a Lakota man Yellow Corn and her family. The chief’s children belonged to from asserting: “His woman (tawicu) was his property…. her clan and traced their descent through their mother’s line. He might dispose of her at his will.” But if he acted on that With others of her age group, Yellow Corn was a member of belief, he might pay the price of losing his children.18 women’s societies that exercised sacred power over growing The tenderness of Indian women’s relationship to their things. She had the right to purchase knowledge of female children and grandchildren was embodied in the things they mysteries, such as pottery and house building. Of cially, she made, from toys to clothes to cradles. Unlike men, women had no say in public policy, but she in uenced men through could also call on special powers to protect their children, persuasion and criticism.15 When Lewis and Clark invited for their songs and dreams reached beings with an interest Shehek-Shote to go with them to meet the president, Yellow in their welfare. On children’s clothes, symbols of those Corn insisted on going. The captains were not pleased, but powers warned away less friendly forces. she got her way. Along with her young child, she toured WORK AND ECONOMIC POWER: MANDAN AND the east coast and met Jefferson. But for Lewis and Clark, HIDATSA WOMEN she remained a cipher: they never even recorded her name.16 Like other Mandan women, Yellow Corn had sources The women’s work Clark condemned as “drudgery” was of power that were often invisible to outsiders. The most the source of Native American women’s power. They did August 2012 We Proceeded On 15

WPO_August 2012.indd 15 7/25/12 4:44 PM work hard, but it gave them economic control. Unlike Euro-Americans, believed that the products of a woman’s labor belonged to her, not to her husband. Even though a man might shoot a buffalo, the hide belonged to the woman who tanned it. All the things she made from the hide—clothes, bags, even the tipi—belonged to her as well, unless she gave them away.19 rt Mandan and Hidatsa women A guarded the secrets of skilled craftwork merican as jealously as medieval guilds in Europe. A eum of s

Secrecy kept prices high and reinforced u M women’s control over the commodities onian they produced, but that was not why s they guarded ; they did Smith George Catlin painted this Hidatsa village along the Knife River in 1832. so out of respect. “Basket makers would not let others see how they worked,” slaves. Seeing women in the said Buffalo Bird Woman of the Hidatsa Their disapproval and misunderstanding of fields, white men often concluded Tribe “because if another wanted to learn that they were slaves as well. how to make baskets she should pay a Indian work roles did not stop the Corps of Their preconceptions about good price for being taught.” A mother Discovery from relying on women’s labor. gender roles made it difficult for trained her daughter to value knowledge them even to perceive what the by encouraging her to give a present for Indians were doing as agriculture. each skill. The price for learning sacred skills like pottery Their disapproval and misunderstanding of Indian work was especially high, because that included songs and rituals roles did not stop the Corps of Discovery from relying given to humans by supernatural beings. “If one did it [a on women’s labor. Over the winter of 1804 to 1805, they craft] who had no right he or some of his friends would get bought countless bushels of corn to eat and to take upriver. hurt,” said Buffalo Bird Woman.20 Their gender-role blindness led to a comic blunder on The basis of the Mandan and Hidatsa tribes’ great the part of Lewis and Clark. Hoping to introduce the Indians wealth was the surplus of corn they sold to traders and to mechanized agriculture, they presented a corn mill to the other tribes. The scale of their agriculture was captured Mandan men, failing to take into account that grinding corn by the fur trader Alexander Henry, who rode between the was a woman’s job. The Mandan men later reduced the corn villages in 1806: “Upon each side were pleasant cultivated mill to arrow barbs, weapons that were more appropriate spots, some of which stretched up the rising ground on our gifts for men than food processors; had the mill been given left, whilst on our right they ran nearly to the Missouri. In to women, the result might have been different.22 those fields were many women and children at work, who all appeared industrious. … The whole view … had … the Sisterhood as a Source of Power appearance of a country inhabited by a civilized nation.”21 Sisterhood was another source of power for Indian women It was women who owned and worked the fields, with their unnoticed by Lewis and Clark. On the Plains, men and sisters and daughters, and who guarded the ripening corn women had separate social and religious organizations. from birds and boys. Women kept the seed and danced to Among the Lakota Indians, membership in societies was lure the corn spirits back each spring. Women processed and often limited to those who had dreamed or received visions preserved the food so that it would last through the winter, from a particular source. In the Mandan and Hidatsa and they prepared it into meals. Yet, no aspect of women’s villages, however, membership was more general. People work caused more confusion for visitors from the East. did not join as individuals; societies were organized by Euro-Americans divided labor by gender, but age. All girls of a similar age gathered together to purchase differently: to them, farming was the work of men and songs, regalia, and ceremonials of the society from the

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WPO_August 2012.indd 16 7/25/12 4:44 PM generation above them. With their age-mates, women According to Lakota elders, she “was like a woman with moved up the scale from the little girls’ Skunk Society to the two faces. One face was very beautiful, and the other very River Society or Enemy Society to the prestigious Goose ugly. …She would lure hunters away with her beautiful face, and White Buffalo Cow societies. Members of a women’s and when she had them in her embrace she would turn her society called each other “sister” and called the women of horrid face to them and frighten them out of their senses.” the next-older society “mother.” Members provided mutual The woman who dreamed of Double Woman could cause support throughout their lives.23 all men near her “to become possessed. …So the people are Each society had powers and obligations related very afraid of her. …Whoever dreams in this way seems to to different aspects of life. Younger women’s societies be crazy. …but then everything she makes is very beautiful.” encouraged their village’s war efforts by performing According to a modern Lakota scholar, Double Woman celebrations for the returning war parties. The Goose Society “represents a dualism in which a moral choice must be made. looked over the crops by holding springtime rites for good …the dreamer must choose between the life of reckless fun harvests and summertime dances to ward off drought and and sexuality or the life of modesty.” 28 grasshoppers. The White Buffalo According to Clark, the men of Cow Society danced in winter to draw the corps needed no aid from dreams close the buffalo that would sustain Every exchange between the expedition about bull , since they “found no the tribe. Although the societies were and the Native American tribes required difficulty in getting women.” 29 The not sacred, they had great powers, and journal-keeping men knew that their women derived prestige and social , and sex was no exception. readers would miss the tales of Native standing from them.24 A Hidatsa elder licentiousness if they omitted them— explained the reverence in which they the stories were a staple of nineteenth- were held: “This society of old women was…inspired by the century travel narratives—so hints of sexual escapades spirits of the mysterious women who live everywhere on the abounded. Mercury was the only love medicine employed earth. …They appear in many forms, sometimes as animals, by the Corps of Discovery. Lewis used it to dose the men sometimes even as little children. Wherever they wish to go who contracted venereal disease. they can travel to in no time, just like thought. Wa-hu-pa Every exchange between the expedition and the Wi-a, Mysterious woman, they are called.”25 Native American tribes required translation, and sex was Another potent source of female power lay in sexual no exception. Sexual mores were a perpetual source of attraction. For Plains Indian women, love was ruled by misunderstanding. The men of the Corps were constantly tradition and mystery. The Lakota believed that when a looking for sexual partners, but they were judgmental about girl reached sexual maturity, changes occurred: “A tonwan the women who were willing. To Missouri Valley tribes, sex [spiritual essence] possesses her which gives her the could be a way of fulfilling sacred obligations of hospitality, possibility of motherhood and makes her wakan [holy] and a way of transferring supernatural power, and a way of this tonwan…[is] very powerful for either good or evil as it incorporating strangers into kinship and trade networks. may be used.” Forces of disorder and irrationality lurked Men who offered their wives to the visitors for one of those near women between puberty and marriage and could make reasons were scrupulously rejected by the captains, despite approaching them dangerous. 26 the ill will it caused. When the women themselves made Men were not without powers of their own. A young overtures, the journals called them “lechous” and “lude.” man who distinguished himself in war or hunting was But the captains did not demand from their men the chastity eligible to look for a marriage partner, and he often called that they criticized Indian women for lacking. Lewis wrote: on the supernatural for help. Because the bull elk was “To prevent this mutual exchange of good officies altogether considered the master of power over females, a man who I know it impossible to effect, particularly on the part of dreamed of the elk received its mystical ability to attract our young men whom some months abstanence have made women. He might exercise that power through music, very polite to those tawney damsels.”30 dancing, love potions or charms, and he had the right to In the world of women that Lewis and Clark traveled wear elk-horn symbols on his possessions.27 from and into—Euro-American as well as Native But men were not the only aggressors in love. The American—children, work, sisterhood, love, and sexuality Lakota supernatural being Double Woman, or Anog were powerful forces. They worked as well for Julia and Ite, could give women the power of seduction over men. Lucy as for Sacagawea and Yellow Corn. They were indirect August 2012 We Proceeded On • 17

WPO_August 2012.indd 17 7/25/12 4:44 PM powers, succeeding only through their influence on men. 12Lucy Marks, Power of Attorney to Meriwether Lewis, July 4, But in different cultures, those powers had very different 1797, Lewis-Marks Collection, Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville. meanings. If Lewis and Clark thought Indian women would 13Here and below, see Bakeless, Lewis & Clark, pp. 69, 195, 378, gladly assume the rights and roles of Virginian women, they 383, 390–401; Jackson, Letters, p. 388; William Clark Kennerly might have been surprised. and Elizabeth Russell, Persimmon Hill: A Narrative of Old St. In the long run, Lewis and Clark were prophetic in Louis and the Far West (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, linking women’s status to their economic role. As the 1948), pp. 14, 37. Julia’s letters and her volumes of Shakespeare, mentioned below, are at the Missouri History Museum. American market economy reached west, Native American 14Martha Warren Beckwith, ed., Mandan-Hidatsa Myths and women’s control over their own labor was eroded. Traders Ceremonies Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society, vol. 32. dealt directly with men for commodities that were, in fact, (New York: J. J. Augustin, 1938), p. 23. produced by women. First, Indian men “took charge” of the 15Ellen Miles, Saint Mémin and the Neoclassical Profile Portrait small furs prized by traders and of the proceeds from their in America, ed., Dru Dowdy (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian sale.31 Later, other aspects of women’s work came under new Institution Press, 1994), pp. 145–48; Virginia Bergman Peters, rules. When Lewis and Clark compensated Sacagawea for Women of the Earth Lodges: Tribal Life on the Plains (North Haven, Conn.: Archon Books, 1995). her services, they did not pay her: they paid her husband. 16Moulton, Vol. 8, pp. 305–306. It was a harbinger of things to come. 17Here and below, see Gilman and Schneider, The Way to Independence, p. 20. Carolyn Gilman is special projects historian at the Missouri 18 History Museum and author of seven books on and James R. Walker, Lakota Society, ed. Raymond J. DeMallie (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1982), pp. 42–43, 56. Native American history. 19Walker, Lakota Society, pp. 40, 43. Notes 20Gilman and Schneider, The Way to Independence, pp. 116, 117; 1Gary E. Moulton, ed., The Journals of the Lewis & Clark Peters, Women of the Earth Lodges, p. 4. Expedition, 13 vols. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 21Elliott Coues, ed., New Light on the Early History of the Greater 1983–2001), Vol. 3, p. 488. Northwest: The Manuscript Journals of Alexander Henry and 2Carolyn Gilman and Mary Jane Schneider, The Way to David Thompson 2 vols.,1897. (Reprint, : Ross and Independence: Memories of a Hidatsa Indian Family, 1840–1920 Haines,1965), p. 344. Museum Exhibit Series, no. 3. (St. Paul: Historical 22Jackson, Letters, p. 44; Moulton, Vol. 3, p. 210; Coues, New Society Press, 1987), p. 33. Light, p. 329. 3 Donald D. Jackson, ed., Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition 23Peters, Women of the Earth Lodges, p. 58; Alfred W. Bowers, with Related Documents 1783–1854 2d ed. (Urbana: University of Mandan Social and Ceremonial Organization (: Illinois Press, 1978), p. 504; Moulton, Vol. 3, pp. 117, 163. University of Chicago Press, 1950), p. 62; Alfred W. Bowers, 4Moulton, Vol. 5, p. 140, 289; Vol. 7, p. 291; Thomas Jefferson, Hidatsa Social and Ceremonial Organization (Smithsonian Notes on the State of Virginia (New York: Harper Torchbooks, Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 194. 1964), p. 57. On preexisting stereotypes of Indian women, see Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1965), p. 174. Patricia Albers and Beatrice Medicine, The Hidden Half: Studies 24Bowers, Hidatsa, pp. 200–207. of Plains Indian Women (Washington, D.C.: University Press of America, 1983). 25Beckwith, Mandan-Hidatsa Myths, pp. 232–33. 5Moulton, Vol. 6, pp. 168–169. 26James R. Walker, Lakota Belief and Ritual, ed. Raymond J. DeMallie and Elaine A. Jahner (Lincoln: University of Nebraska 6Ibid. Press,1980), p. 242. 7Laura F. Klein and Lillian A. Ackerman, eds., Women and Power 27William K. Powers, “The Art of Courtship among the ,” in Native North America (Norman: University of Oklahoma American Indian Art Magazine, Vol. 5, no. 2 (Spring, 1980), pp. Press, 1995), pp. 232–38. 40–47; Joseph Epes Brown, Animals of the Soul: Sacred Animals 8 Moulton, Vol. 4, p. 266. of the Oglala Sioux (Rockport, Mass.: Element Books,1992), p. 18. 9 Linda Kerber, No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies: Women 28Powers, “Art of Courtship,” pp. 41–42; Walker, Lakota Belief, and the Obligations of Citizenship (New York: Hill and Wang, pp. 107, 165–66; Paul Durand, Where the Waters Gather and the 1998), pp. 11–15. Rivers Meet (O-ki-zu Wa-kpa) (Faribault, Minn.: Paul Durand, 10 John Bakeless, Lewis & Clark: Partners in Discovery (New 1994), p. 1. York: William Morrow and Co., 1947), pp. 15–18; Stephen E. 29Jackson, Letters, pp. 537–38. Ambrose, : Meriwether Lewis, Thomas 30 Jefferson, and the Opening of (New York: James P. Ronda, Lewis and Clark Among the Indians (Lincoln: Simon and Schuster, 1996), pp. 23–24. University of Nebraska Press, 1984), pp. 62–64; Jackson, Letters, p. 537; Moulton, Vol. 5, p. 121; Vol. 6, p. 142. 11William Meriwether and Nicholas Lewis, Guardian Bond, 31 September 14, 1786, Albemarle County Records, Charlottesville, Va. Walker, Lakota Society, p. 43.

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WPO_August 2012.indd 18 7/25/12 4:44 PM Bird Woman, Donna Reed & A Golden Coin Visual Portrayals of Sacagawea

By Donna J. Barbie

hen I was a child, I Lewis and Clark and other knew exactly what members of the Corps of WSacagawea looked Discovery included mentions like. My naïve certainty arose about Sacagawea in their from summer treks, along logs, no one offered even a with my brother and our scrap of physical description -030. buddies, to the North Dakota P of the woman who would State Capitol grounds in eventually be thrust into

Bismarck, less than two miles ollection 2010- legend. Like the expedition C

from our neighborhood. In h itself, the Sacagawea legend

the mornings, we lingered in otograp has reinforced some of Ph

the museum. Then we ate our ota America’s most sacred beliefs ak D

sack lunches outside, beneath h about itself. According to ort Leonard Crunelle’s statue Bird N these accounts, America Woman.1 We grew up hearing dawned when European stories about Sacagawea’s settlers secured areas of orical Society of t contributions to the Lewis s the continent with the help and Clark Expedition, and of a beneficent God, and seeing Bird Woman, the successive generations of runelle, State Hi runelle, State perfect image of the strong, C pioneers rightfully extended

patient, and persevering eonard the area of freedom to its L Sacagawea we so admired, “natural” borders. Often

brought those tales to life. culpted by featured as the lone Native s But what other meanings American joining the Corps and messages do Crunelle’s of Discovery, Sacagawea statue, as well as other visual signified native compliance Sakakawea Statue Statue Sakakawea images of Sacagawea, actually in that mission. Depicted Leonard Crunelle’s 1910 bronze statue Bird Woman stands on relay? Although Captains the lawn of the North Dakota State Capitol in Bismarck. in numerous portraits, August 2012 We Proceeded On • 19

WPO_August 2012.indd 19 7/25/12 4:44 PM , and films, she was quite literally “shaped” into in Washington Park honoring Sacagawea in 1905.5 Designed an American cultural heroine. and crafted by , this bronze work depicts a The presentation of Sacagawea as an Indian princess guide who assertively thrusts her right arm forward to show in many of these narrative and visual texts helped spawn Lewis and Clark the way to the Pacific. Other Progressive- this legend. The ubiquitous Indian princess, claims Native era writers, painters, and sculptors soon followed suit, American scholar Rayna Green, has marking Sacagawea as essential to the occupied an ambiguous position The Sacagawea legend did not mission’s success. Wholeheartedly between savagery and civilization. embraced as a heroine, Sacagawea was Her skin, for example, was typically fade once pioneers had secured the thus ushered into legend. whiter than most natives, but she An Indian Princess is Born was always darker than whites. More continent. On the contrary, it has thrived importantly, when the legendary Among the most important portrayals princess acted, she inevitably helped in the American consciousness, of Sacagawea during this period was a white man or men carve out a with artists and writers offering Crunelle’s Bird Woman on the lawn consecrated space from the American of the South Dakota state capitol in wilderness.2 Appearing as the guide seemingly limitless variations. 1910.6 Typical of other Sacagawea and sometime savior of the Lewis works of the period, this larger- and Clark Expedition, Sacagawea was than-life bronze portrays her as a depicted as that most astute native heroine based on her support of the who, like Pocahontas, realized that corps. A brochure written to help white settlement offered blessings of raise funds for the statue offered an advanced civilization. For more a word-picture of the soon-to-be than a century, visual representations famous woman. She was described of Sacagawea have delivered to as “more erect, more slenderly built the American people the image …a princess of uncommon grace of a heroic woman who advanced of mind and of person.”7 Indian the national cause. These include princesses, apparently, were more Crunelle’s 1910 Bird Woman; the 1955 likely to raise funds than ordinary Hollywood film ; Indian women. Dedication speeches Harry Jackson’s 1980 monument also reiterated sacred frontier istribution Sacajawea; a 1989 decorative plate D narratives, and the unveiling provided edia from The Hamilton Collection; and M a visual reminder of the princess’s the golden dollar coin, first struck uncommon contributions to the in 1999. mission. According to the Bismarck

According to the Corps of Home Paramount Tribune, the 14th U.S. Infantry Band Discovery journals, Sacagawea was Donna Reed as Sacagawea in Paramount played “The Star Spangled Banner” useful in large ways and small, but the Picture’s 1955 movie, The Far Horizons. as the ribbon was cut to “release the The movie is still available on DVD from folds of the National Flag that veiled journal-keepers did not define her as Paramount Home Media Distribution. an Indian Princess and certainly not the bronze features of Sakakawea.”8 as an American heroine.3 The absence of descriptions in Literally wrapped in the flag in this case and figuratively those primary texts allowed subsequent writers and visual wrapped in the flag in other works, Sacagawea became one artists to fill in the gaps with their own perceptions of of the most recognizable emblems of American heroism. Sacagawea. Novelist Eva Emery Dye in her 1902 book, The Although written materials to raise funds and the Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and Clark, did exactly dedication ceremony were transitory, Crunelle’s statue that.4 As the nation prepared to celebrate the Lewis and continues to reinforce Sacagawea’s eminent place in Clark Expedition centennial at the turn of the twentieth American culture. The 12-foot bronze seems to emerge century, Dye transformed Sacagawea into an Indian Princess from the block of rough granite upon which it stands. who helped the Captains in the wilderness. Inspired by Dye, Crunelle’s Sacagawea appears to be an imposing the Women’s Club of Portland raised funds to erect a statue woman, who stands erect, her head and chin tilted slightly

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WPO_August 2012.indd 20 7/25/12 4:44 PM upward. Her strong, bronze features The Hollywood production,

reveal neither sorrow nor pleasure, ts reserved. The Far Horizons supplied the most gh ll ri

but a sense of calm concentration or A famous, or more accurately infamous, determination. Dressed in fringed imagery of Sacagawea during this

rust, 2006. rust, 9 buckskin and blankets, this attentive T era. Arising from a romantic novel Native American mother raises her by Della Gould Emmons’ Sacajawea right hand to her shoulder, assuring of the published in 1943, the security of the sleeping baby. Her the film starred as an, © Harry Jackson Jackson an, © Harry hm

right foot is placed slightly in front as Lewis and Fred MacMurray as Clark C of the left, as if to indicate that she is and featured an embarrassingly ard J. ard J. h

ic 10 walking at an unhurried pace. R miscast Donna Reed as Sacagawea. Although the statue might appear, As the publicity photos reveal, at first glance, to be a representative Reed wore typical fringed buckskin, indigenous woman, the inscription but this get-up was form-fitted with on the base of the statue corrects the hem raised remarkably high—so that impression: “Sakakawea—the much the better to attract Captain Shoshone Indian `Bird Woman,’ who Clark. Very obviously Caucasian, in 1805, guided the Lewis and Clark Reed sported an oily mess of brown Expedition from the Missouri River makeup to emphasize Sacagawea’s

to the Yellowstone.” This monument and Mrs. Gift of Mr. 1980. Jackson, Harry by Sacagawea ethnicity. As movie critic Frances honors a specific historical woman for Harry Jackson’s polychromed bronze statue, Romero recently argued, The Far a time in her life when she “guided” Sacajawea, which was unveiled on July 4, Horizons was one of the top ten 1980, in front of the of the Historical white men in the wilderness. To Center in Cody, Wyoming. misleading Hollywood productions reinforce that message, the statue faces because no historical sources hinted directly west, highlighting Sacagawea’s at the titillating and “implausible” unique heroism. Sacagawea scans the Not simply identified with the frontier romance.11 western horizon to see America’s period, Jackson’s sculpture depicted Even by the 1980s, when future. Her slow, but inexorable, stride issues about diversity and ethnicity represents the long journey she has a Native American woman who is became central to American cultural endured on foot, an accomplishment discussion, artists continued to that is more impressive because she essentially the frontier itself, subject to create images of Sacagawea that bore her baby on her back. In these and settlement. featured her connection to the ways, Sacagawea and her child signify frontier narrative. Harry Jackson, the perseverance of American settlers a celebrated artist who specialized who courageously moved westward across the frontier. in sculptures about the American West, produced and successfully marketed works featuring Sacagawea. From Silver Screen to Polychromed Bronze Commissioned by the Buffalo Bill Historical Center of The Sacagawea legend did not fade once pioneers had Cody, Wyoming, Jackson completed Sacajawea in 1980.12 secured the continent. On the contrary, it has thrived in the This 10-foot, polychromed bronze monument, which bears American consciousness, with artists and writers offering no inscription, stands in the center’s courtyard. seemingly limitless variations. During the 1940s and ’50s, for The monument reinforced common understandings example, novelists often concocted a romantic attachment of the Native American woman who accompanied between Sacagawea and one of the men of the expedition. Lewis and Clark into unknown wildernesses. As Donald Although previous scripts scrupulously avoided references Goddard asserted, “the monument places Sacagawea to Sacagawea’s sexuality, writers in this period typically firmly at the “crossroads of the .”13 He framed the story around the potential for interracial added that “Sacajawea was created by the wind, which romance. The Indian princess of the trans-Mississippi West, sweeps her hair and the enshrouding blanket into diagonal as a result, became a nearly perfect duplicate of her “sister,” ridges and contours that suggest geological formation… Pocahontas, as she bore a hopeless love for a gallant captain. [she is] herself a landscape, a promontory of primordial August 2012 We Proceeded On • 21

WPO_August 2012.indd 21 7/25/12 4:44 PM human consciousness shaped people. Among those offerings, the by the elements.”14 Not simply The plate also illustrated the context of “Sacajawea” plate was a commodity identi ed with the frontier period, that combined nostalgia for Jackson’s sculpture depicted Sacagawea’s “American” heroism by “Indian” objects with positive a Native American woman directly associating this Indian princess messages about America’s past. who is essentially the frontier Attempting to appeal to broad itself, subject to exploration and with the frontier West audiences, the advertisement for settlement. The monument was the “Sacajawea” plate connected unveiled July 4, 1980. the Native American woman and Journalist Carl Bechtold her “American” heroism. “Gentle, suggested a particular motivation serene and knowledgeable,” the for Jackson’s efforts to embody script read, “Sacajawea helped lead Sacagawea: the Sacagawea her party over plains and rivers and industry could be pro table. As through Montana mountain passes.” Bechtold reported, Jackson sold Although none of the western states 12 bronze castings of the two- existed at that time, copy writers foot studio model in less than recorded no apparent dissonance 30 minutes after the unveiling. in naming the territory “Montana.” Within 24 hours, Jackson had Additionally, the text explained taken orders for more than that the plate is a “tribute to this double that number. At $15,000 American heroine” of the Lewis DAVID WRIGHT DAVID a piece, this limited-edition work and Clark Expedition. Familiar with recorded sales of just under America’s uncharted wilderness, she $500,000 in less than a day. The Hamilton Collection’s 1989 “Sacajawea” guided civilized men through the Twenty other small versions of plate offers an image of a “gentle, serene, perils of the frontier. Reinforcing and knowledgable” American princess. the monument, painted like the that message, the advertising banner larger work, also sold out rapidly.15 For more than two read, “Sacajawea: A Brave and Noble American Heroine.” decades, Jackson produced a great many limited-edition Just as other works have done, this advertisement declared sculptures depicting Sacagawea, including Sacajawea II Sacagawea an American heroine because of services she (1980), Sacajawea with Packhorse (1992), In the Wind II performed during the expedition. (1993), and Sacajawea Modi ed II (2004). Sacagawea, in The advertisement also provided a color photograph fact, became one of the mainstays of Jackson’s gallery. After of the collector plate. The plate, which was taken from Jackson died at 87 in 2011, the price of his work soared, a graphic print designed and executed by David Wright, and his estate put 13 sculptures up for auction at the Coeur displayed a woman possessing all the physical attributes d’Alene Art Auction.16 Two of those “rare” pieces featured of the Indian princess. She is young and beautiful, and her Sacagawea. A three-foot study for the original monument skin is light brown. Her clothing of fringed buckskin may fetched nearly $43,000, and In the Wind, a Sacagawea bust not indicate that she is “royalty,” but the fur trim, extensive auctioned for the rst time, brought in $17,550.17 beading and quill work, jewelry, and other ornaments point to Sacagawea’s extraordinary station. PRINCESS ON A PLATE The plate also illustrated the context of Sacagawea’s Because Jackson’s limited edition sculptures were costly, “American” heroism by directly associating this Indian his pieces were unquestionably outside the reach of most princess with the frontier West. Wright placed her in the Sacagawea enthusiasts. A commemorative porcelain wilderness, with snow-peaked mountains in the distance, plate sold by The Hamilton Collection offered a less a river in the mid-ground and a primitive campsite in expensive option, and its 1989 advertisement testified the foreground. This portrait also denotes Sacagawea’s to the force and attraction of traditional representations connection to the men of the corps. Two frontiersmen, of Indian princesses.18 Anyone who peruses Sunday’s no doubt Lewis and Clark, look at a map or chart in the Parade Magazine knows that The Hamilton Collection background, and a few other men talk by the boat. There has marketed innumerable images of Native American is no doubt, however, that Sacagawea is the subject of this

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WPO_August 2012.indd 22 7/25/12 4:44 PM vignette. Sitting gracefully and serenely in the foreground, What does raise significant questions is this: why the beautiful Indian princess dominates the print. is Sacagawea the sole Native American woman who is No dissonance interrupted the visual harmony of the constantly and consistently celebrated in America? As Coin scene or Sacagawea’s association with the American mission Facts notes, “The decision to create a design inspired by on the continent. Nowhere does the plate register conflict Sacagawea reflects a long numismatic tradition of placing between Sacagawea’s nobility as an “American Indian symbolic and allegorical images of women and Native woman” and her role as an “American heroine.” Colors of Americans on U.S. coinage as a means of communicating red, white, and blue are prevalent. The baby’s cradleboard our nation’s history and values.”24 Of course, those is decorated with red beads or quills in a design remarkably “symbolic and allegorical” similar to the stripes of an American flag. A picturesque images of Native Americans heroine, Sacagawea holds her baby’s cradleboard in her have long reflected sacred lap, her arms surrounding him protectively. As the portrait frontier narratives, and confirms and the advertising copy echoes, she simultaneously the fulfills her obligations as a protective mother and as an coin has continued that American heroine of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. tradition. Coupled with the reverse side of the Lady Liberty coin, Sacagawea becomes The most pervasive contemporary representation of virtually inseparable from Sacagawea appears on the golden dollar coin. According the eagle, one of the most to CoinFacts.com, the internet encyclopedia of U.S. coins, important national symbols. the impetus for the Sacagawea dollar arose from the United To erase any doubt about States Dollar Coin Act of 1997, requiring U.S. Secretary the origins of the coin, of the Treasury Robert Rubin to replace the unsatisfactory “The United States of Susan B. Anthony dollar coin.19 That previous dollar was America” is emblazoned unsatisfactory because it was easily mistaken for a quarter above the eagle’s wings. due to its similar size and reeded or textured edge.20 As is required of all U.S. Although the statute mandated that the reverse of the coinage, the motto “E coin display an eagle, the Secretary was allowed to select Pluribus Unum” signifies the subject for the obverse. Rubin stipulated that the design strength that results from must “maintain a dignity befitting the Nation’s coinage” and uniting diverse peoples that it must depict one or more women. By June 1998, the into a singular nation. Dollar Coin Design Advisory Committee, appointed by The Sacagawea golden dollar that was first unveiled in May 1999. On the surface, all of the secretary, recommended Sacagawea as the subject and The back of the Sacagawea these images might be began reviewing designs. According to the U.S. Mint, the golden dollar changes each year, interpreted as declarations public played a significant role in picking the winner as they but always has a Native American of Sacagawea’s importance theme. This is the 2012 coin. offered comments via letters and the official website.21 By as a Native American December, designs for both obverse and reverse had been within the multi-cultural nation. But her image was selected, and they were unveiled in May 1999.22 clearly not chosen for that reason. Instead, as the U.S. Mint declares, Sacagawea was selected because she was part of The Sacagawea Dollar Coin the “journey of discovery.”25 The Golden Eagle Coins This rendering of Sacagawea with her baby, Jean Baptiste, is Company additionally notes that the committee announced reminiscent of Crunelle’s Bird Woman. Both Crunelle and that it chose a figure of “Liberty depicted as a Native , the artist who designed the Sacagawea American woman inspired by Sacagawea.”26 Perhaps it is side of the coin, used Native American models to provide not a surprise to see the word “Liberty” above Sacagawea’s 23 authentic physiognomies. Goodacre’s Sacagawea looks head since the word always appears on American coins, more youthful, an apt change since Sacagawea was only but this declaration signifies that Sacagawea is three-fold in her teens during the Corps of Discovery journey. Both removed from selfhood. She becomes a representation of depictions feature Native American women and attentive an American symbol. Not an individual, not even a generic and caring mothers. Native American, she becomes the iconic Lady Liberty. August 2012 We Proceeded On • 23

WPO_August 2012.indd 23 7/25/12 4:44 PM As journalist Katie Mueting writes in the Daily 6“Statue Unveiling at State Capitol Is Unique Event.” Bismarck Nebraskan, faculty and students at the University of [ND] Tribune, October 14, 1910, p. 1. Nebraska–Lincoln, had various responses to the Sacagawea 7Sakakawea (Bird Woman) Statue Notes, (Fargo, N. Dak.: Porte Company, 1906), p. 2. dollar. History professor Gary Moulton was part of the 8 image selection process and was pleased with the warmth “Statue Unveiling at State Capitol Is Unique Event.” Bismarck [ND] Tribune, October 14, 1910, p. 1. emanating from the design.27 English professor Frances 9The Far Horizons, directed by Rudolph Mate (Hollywood: Pine Kaye and Lakota education specialist Helen Long Soldier Thomas Productions, 1955). Film. saw the coin in a different light, however. Kaye noted that 10Della Gould Emmons, Sacajawea of the Shoshones (Portland: the coin was “kind of a backhanded compliment” since the Binfords & Mort, 1943). expedition was not pursued for Native American peoples, 11Frances Romero, “Top 10 Historically Misleading Films,” Time and Long Soldier remarked that people needed to consider Entertainment. January 26, 2011. http://entertainment.time. the consequences of Sacagawea’s assistance to the Corps com/2011/01/26/top-10-historically-misleading-films/#the-far- horizons-1955#ixzz1wC1Nhoth. Last accessed May 24, 2012. of Discovery.28 12 Although Disney has not offered a full-length Harry Jackson, Sacajawea, sculpture in bronze, polychrome, 1980, Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, Wyo. production of the Sacagawea story, at least not yet, it 13Donald Goddard, “Shaped From Earth, Immortalized in Bronze: is highly unlikely that she will fade from American Sculptor Harry Jackson’s Sacagawea.” The American West, Vol. consciousness. As University of Victoria historian Brian 17, No. 2 (March-April 1980), p.14. Dippie argues, Sacagawea is the most honored woman in 14Goddard, p. 15. American history because her legend “has an emotional 15Carl Bechtold, “Jackson’s Statue Dedicated: nearly half-million appeal mere fact can never equal.”29 Novels sweep through in sales.” The Cody [WY] Enterprise, July 9, 1980, p. A-11. the country, but most lose their audiences fairly quickly. 16Matthew Jackson, “Rare Harry Jackson sculptures at the Coeur That is not true of visual artifacts, however, particularly d’Alene Art Auction.” Harry Jackson Studios.com. July 2, 2011. monuments and coins. They imply permanence and offer http://harryjacksonstudios.wordpress.com/2011/07/26/harry- jackson-sculptures-at-coeur-dalene-art-auction-a-success/. Last implicit and explicit meanings that are handed down to accessed May 16, 2012. generations of Americans. For more than a hundred years, 17Artnet.com, “Art Valuation.” http://www.artnet.com/ Sacagawea has not represented a unique person in her own artwork/426140932/424517823/harry-jackson-lot-no-62- right, nor has she embodied the history and stamina of sacagawea.html#fineartdetail1.asp. Last accessed May 20, 2012. Native American women in general. Instead, she has been 18“Sacajawea: A Brave and Noble American Heroine,” emblematic of the very frontier narratives that ushered her advertisement for The Hamilton Collection Limited Edition Plate, illustration in Parade Magazine, October 22, 1989, p. 15. into legend in the first place. 19Coin Facts, “Historical Notes: History of the Sacagawea Dollar.” http://www.coinfacts.com/historical_notes/history_of_the_ A native North Dakotan, Donna Barbie earned a doctorate in sacagawea_dollar.htm. Last accessed , 2012. American Studies From Emory University and currently chairs 20 the Humanities and Social Sciences Department at Emory- Sacagawea Dollar Guide. http://sacagaweadollarguide.com/ Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Florida. 21U.S. Mint, Golden Dollar Coin. http://www.usmint.gov/mint_ programs/golden_dollar_coin/index.cfm?action=sacHistory. Last Notes accessed May 21, 2012. 1Leonard Crunelle, Bird Woman, sculpture in bronze, 1910, 22Coin Facts, Ibid. Bismarck State Capitol Grounds, Bismarck, N. Dak. 23U.S. Mint, Golden Dollar Coin. 2 Rayna Green, “The Pocahontas Perplex: The Image of Indian 24Coin Facts, Ibid. Women in American Culture,” Review, Vol.16, 25 No. 4 (Autumn 1975), pp. 698-714. U.S. Mint, Golden Dollar Coin. 26 3Early compilations of the original journals included the 1807 Golden Eagle Coin, “Sacagawea Dollars.” http://www. M’Keehan edition of Patrick Gass’s journal; the 1814 Biddle text; goldeneaglecoin.com/Dollars/Sacagawea_Dollars. Last accessed and Elliot Coues’ The History of the Lewis and Clark Expedition May 22, 2012. by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, 3 volumes, (New York: 27Katie Mueting, “Coin Creates Controversy,” Daily Nebraskan, Dover Publications, Inc., 1965, reprint of 1893 edition). February 14, 2000, accessed May 13, 2012, http://www. 4Eva Emery Dye, The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and dailynebraskan.com/news/coin-creates-controversy-1.1027878 Clark (Chicago: A. C. McClurg, 1902). 28Ibid. 5Alice Cooper, Unnamed Statue of Sacagawea, sculpture in 29Brian W. Dippie. “Sacagawea Imagery,” Chief bronze, 1905, Washington Park, Portland, Ore. Foundation: 4, accessed May 21, 2012, http://www. windriverhistory.org/exhibits/sacajawea /sac04.htm

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WPO_August 2012.indd 24 7/25/12 4:44 PM Sacagawea: A Bibliography  B K

here is no single definitive biography of this “The Actual Role of the Bird Woman” are both good popular member of the Corps of Discovery. examples of well-developed essays with biographical TThere are, however, a number of books and material. biographies that offer solid biographical information. This The best biographical works about Sacagawea should bibliography is not an endorsement of any one particular meet the following criteria. work or philosophy, nor is it all-inclusive. Instead, this • They should have primary source documentation, such is offered as a helpful guide to readers who want to read as letters, journals and maps. about this Shoshone woman. They may want to start rst • Solid biographies should refl ect an understanding of the to examine the bibliographies in these particular books roles and responsibilities of young Agaidika Shoshone, and journal articles. and Hidatsa women in the late eighteenth and nineteenth In addition to those listed here, biographical centuries. information can be found in the original journals and • Without an understanding of marriage between fur letters of the Corps of Discovery, in Charbonneau family traders and fur trappers and Native American women, histories and in essays. Blanche Schroer’s article, “The many biographies misconstrue the relationship between Legend and the Truth” and Dr. E. G. Chuinard’s article, Sacagawea and her husband, Toussaint Charbonneau.

PRIMARY SOURCES BIOGRAPHIES IN BOOKS Jackson, Donald, ed. Letters of the & JOURNALS Lewis and Clark Expedition with Anderson, Irving W. A Charbonneau Related Documents, 1783-1854. Family Portrait. Astoria: Fort Clatsop Urbana: University of Illinois Press, Historical Association, 1988. 1978, pp. 315-7. Although this is the single most accurate This volume, which features letters, biography of the Charbonneau family, it includes Captain William Clark’s lacks annotations and footnotes, as well letter of August 20, 1806, to Toussaint as endnotes. There is, however, a good Charbonneau, with his offers of bibliography. employment for Charbonneau and an education for Sacagawea’s son, young Clark, Ella E. and Jean Baptiste Charbonneau. Margot Edmonds. Sacagawea of the Lewis and Luttig, John C. Journal of a Fur- Clark Expedition. Trading Expedition on the Upper Moulton, Dr. Gary E., ed. Berkeley: University Missouri, 1812-1813. Edited by Stella The Journals of the Lewis & Clark of California Press, M. Drumm. St. Louis: Missouri Expedition, Volumes 1-13. Lincoln: 1979. Historical Society, 1920. University of Nebraska Press, Luttig served as the Missouri Fur 1983-2002. Crawford, Helen. “Sakakawea.” Company’s clerk at Fort Manuel, in The strengths of Moulton’s work lie North Dakota Historical Society what is now South Dakota. His diary, in his annotated endnotes and depth Quarterly, Vol. 1, no. 3 [April 1927], in which he recorded the death of “the of his resource materials. Each volume p. 4-15. Wife of Charbonneau” at the fort on includes an introduction, bibliography This biography, produced in the 1930s, December 20, 1812, includes a copy and index. Volume 1, Atlas of the Lewis is very dated, but accurate. of the court-ordered guardianship & Clark Expedition includes Clark’s of Charbonneau’s children, maps, map of May 19-24, 1805, showing “Sar- bibliography, biographical sketches of kah-gah-we-a or Bird Woman’s Fork or Sacagawea, Charbonneau, and children. R” [Map #39]. August 2012 We Proceeded On 25

WPO_August 2012.indd 25 7/25/12 4:44 PM Hebard, Dr. Grace R. Sacajawea: Schultz, James Willard. Bird Woman Rees, John E. “Footnotes to A Guide and Interpreter of the [Sacajawea] The Guide of Lewis History.” Yesterdays. Vol. 2, Lewis and Clark Expedition with an and Clark; Her Own Story Now no. 2 [Summer 1958], pp. 34-5. Account to the Travels of Toussaint First Given to the World. Boston: This piece was originally published Charbonneau, and of Jean Baptiste. Houghton in 1923. Glendale: Arthur H. Clark Company, Mif in, 1918. 1932. Shaul, David L. “The Meaning of A must-read to understand 1930s Thomasma, the Name Sacajawea.” Annals of biographies, essays and discussions Kenneth. The Wyoming, Vol. 44 [Fall 1972] , about Sacagawea’s post-expeditionary Truth About p. 237-240. life and death, and that of her Sacajawea. son, Jean Baptiste Jackson, WY: Charbonneau. Grandview ESSAYS Publishing Howard, Harold. Company, 1997. There is as much debate about Sacajawea. Norman: Thomasma described the role of Sacagawea’s role as a member of the University of Sacagawea using heavily edited entries corps as there is about her name. These Oklahoma Press, from Captain Meriwether Lewis’s and thought-provoking essays contain 1972. William Clark’s journals. detailed biographical materials, A sound, two-part biography that additional resource materials and analyzes Sacagawea’s life and death at copies of primary sources including Fort Manuel in 1812. The book also “SAH-KAH-GAR-WE A”: THE letters, journals, and government offers brief biographies of husband SPELLING AND THE MEANING OF 1 documents. and son. HER NAME [MAYBE] 1This is the spelling as it rst appears in Hunsaker, Joyce Badgley. Sacagawea Anderson, Irving W. “Probing the the journal of Captain William Clark Speaks: Beyond the Shining Riddle of the Bird Woman: How on April 7, 1805. Between the five Mountains with Lewis &Clark. Long Did Sacajawea Live and journal keepers, there are at least 17 Guilford, Conn.: TwoDot/The Globe Where Did She Die?” Montana: The different spellings of her name. Pequot Press, 2001. Magazine of Western History, Vol. 23, no. 4 [October 1973], pp. 2-17. Told as a rst-person “account” There is much scholarly, regional, and of Sacagawea, this author offers popular debate about the spelling of Anderson, Irving W. and Blanche an interpretation of the role of Schroer. “Sacagawea: Her Name and Sacagawea as a Native American her name, and its meaning. Some of Her Destiny.” WPO, Vol.25, no. 4 woman, wife, mother, and member of the following essays offer information [November 1999] pp. 6-10, 30. the Corps of Discovery. about her name, its spelling, origin, and its various meanings. Chuinard, Dr. E. G. “The Actual Rees, John E. Madame Charbonneau: Role of the Bird Woman: Purposeful The Indian Woman who Anderson, Irving W. “Sacajawea? – Member of the Corps or Casual ‘Tag Accompanied the Lewis and Clark Sakakawea? Sacagawea?: Spelling, Along’?” Montana: The Magazine Expedition, 1804-1806. Salmon, ID: Pronunciation, Meaning.” WPO, Vol. of Western History, Vol. 26, no. 3 Lemhi County Historical Society, 1, no. 3 [Summer 1975], pp. 10-11. [Summer 1976], pp. 18-29. 1970.

Saindon, Robert A.. “Sacajawea: Boat Dawson, Jan C. “Sacagawea: Pilot or Reid, Russell. Sakakawea: The Bird Launcher—The Origin and Meaning Pioneer Mother?” Paci c Northwest Woman, Bismarck: State Historical of A Name . . . Maybe.” WPO, Vol. Quarterly, January 1992, pp. 22-27. Society of North Dakota, 1986 14, no. 3 [August 1988]: pp 6-8. and [1950]. S’e-Kaka-Wi’a: The Etymology of Grinnell, Calvin. “Another View of

an Indian Name. Privately Printed, Sakakawea.” WPO, Vol. 25, no. 2 Saindon, Robert. “The Abduction of 1998, pp. 237-240. [May 1999], pp. 16-21. Sacagawea.” We Proceeded On, Vol. Thorough and scholarly, Saindon is 2, no. 2 [Spring 1976], p. 6-8. Thoughtful view through eyes of as well-respected as Irving Anderson. Mandan-Hidatsa elders. Saindon’s article examines the route Sacagawea’s captors may have used from the Three Forks area to the Knife River.

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WPO_August 2012.indd 26 7/25/12 4:44 PM Howard, Helen Addison. “The Schroer, Blanche. “Boat Pusher Wilson, Gilbert L. Buffalo Bird Mystery of Sacagawea’s Death.” or Bird Woman? Sacagawea or Woman’s Garden: Agriculture of the Paci c Northwest Quarterly, Vol. 58, Sacajawea?” Annals of Wyoming, Hidatsa Indians. St. Paul: Minnesota no. 1 [January 1967], pp. 1-6. Vol. 52, no. 1 [Spring 1980], pp.46- Historical Society Press, 1987 [1917]. 54. “Sacajawea: The Legend and the This is a rst-hand account of traditional Karttunen, Frances. Between Truth.” In Wyoming, Vol. 10, no. 5 farming and preserving methods among Worlds: Interpreters, and [December-January 1978], pp. 20-44. Hidatsa women in nineteenth century. Survivors. New Brunswick: Rutgers Both are impeccable, well-researched, The Agaidika Shoshone were nomadic University Press, 1994. See “Over the and thoughtful articles from a fishers, gatherers, and hunters; the Continental Divide: Sacajawea [ca. Sacagawea scholar who lived on the Hidatsa were farmers and hunters. It 1790-1812 or 1884].” Wind River Reservation. is important to understand the two worlds Sacagawea grew up in. Kessler, Donna J. TheMaking of Taber, Ronald W. “Sacagawea and Sacagawea: A Euro-American the .” Paci c Northwest Legend. Tuscaloosa: University of Quarterly, 58, no. 1 [January 1967], OTHER MATERIALS Alabama Press,1996. pp. 7–13. Van Kirk, One of most interesting and well- This article analyzes the relationship . Many written analyses of our fascination with between two authors and suffragettes, Tender Ties: the story of Sacagawea. Examines the Dye and Hebard, who believed the Women in various ways authors tell her story and Shoshone Indian woman was the Fur-Trade explore her roles as a member of the perfect role model for the suffrage Society, 1670- Corps of Discovery, “interpretess,” movement. 1870. Norman: wife, and a mother. University of Oklahoma Kingston, C. S. “Sacajawea as a NATIVE AMERICAN RESOURCES Press, 1980. Guide: The Evaluation of a Legend.” Madsen, Brigham D. The Lemhi: Van Kirk explores the social, economic, Paci c Northwest Quarterly, Vol. 35, Sacajawea’s People. Caldwell: Caxton diplomatic ties involved in marriage no. 1 [January 1944], pp. 3-18. Printers, Ltd., 1990. between Native American women in One of earliest comparisons of There are very little well-written and British, French and Metís Sacagawea’s role as a “guide,” as described materials about the Agaidika [Lemhi] traders and trappers. The marriage in the journals and in books such as Dye’s Shoshone. Madsen’s book tells their of Charbonneau and Sacagawea was The Conquest. story in the years similar to this—and this book the key after the Corps of to understanding their relationship. Large, Arlen J. “The Clark-Sacagawea Discovery. Endnotes, bibliography, index, Affair: A Literary Evolution.” WPO, illustrations. Vol. 14, no. 3 [August 1988], pp. 14-18. Ronda, James P. A humorous look at the purported Lewis and Clark FICTION romance between Captain William Among the Indians. Clark and Sacagawea, as it appears in Lincoln: University Bruchac, Joseph. Sacajawea: The ctional accounts. of Nebraska Press, Story of the Bird Woman and the 1984. Lewis and Clark Expedition. San “Sacajawea: A Symposium.” Annals Diego: Silver Whistle, 2000. This includes a chapter about of Wyoming, Vol. 13, no. 3 [July relationship between the Shoshone This unique story uses Native American 1941], pp. 162-94. and the corps and the role of Sacagawea. legends, journal entries, and first- Includes rarely-seen copy of Dr. person accounts to help Sacagawea and ’s report [1925] about Sturdevant, William C., ed. “Uncle” William Clark tell their stories Sacagawea’s death. Handbook of North American to Jean Baptiste Charbonneau in 1811. Indians, Vol. 11, The Great Basin, edited by Warren L. D’Azevedo. Waldo, Anna Lee. Sacajawea. Washington D.C.: Smithsonian New York: Avon Books, 1979. Institution, 1986. Romantic ction at its best. Popular best seller for years.

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primary sources to construct a while attributing Lewis’s “eventual The Character of Meriwether psychological profile of America’s breakdown and suicide” to “his tight Lewis: Explorer in the Wilderness most famous explorer. Rather than repression of his soul’s angst.” By Clay S. Jenkinson ordering his material into a strict To compare the personalities chronology, Jenkinson organizes it of the two co-captains, Jenkinson Foreword by David Nicandri into distinct themes, such as Lewis’s skillfully employs the metaphor of The Dakota Institute, 2011 $19.95 need for primacy, his relations with a nuclear power plant to illustrate others, and the lapses in record the relationship between Lewis and enowned Lewis and Clark keeping, all of which provide insight Clark. A nuclear plant is “an engine Rscholar Clay Jenkinson expands into his character. In this balanced of enormous power” but fraught upon his previous work, also titled portrait, he presents Lewis as a with potential disaster. He likens The Character of Meriwether “determined explorer, a brilliant, the co-captains to a plant’s fuel and Lewis, but subtitled “Completely control rods. Only when the two rods Metamorphosed in the American are in proper balance can the plant West.” While the subject and author function. A fuel rod is powerful but remain the same, Explorer in the unstable, as was Lewis. The control Wilderness is much more than a rod is essential to the nuclear power revised or expanded edition, it is— plant’s operation—as Clark was to well— “completely metamorphosed.” the expedition—and if “withdrawn Rather than scattered vignettes, entirely, chaos ensues, as was usually Jenkinson’s latest work provides an the case when Clark was separated in-depth psychological assessment of from Lewis for prolonged periods.” both Captains Meriwether Lewis and Jenkinson makes a strong case that William Clark and the relationship without Clark tending to the day-to between the two men. In this -day affairs, while Lewis’s head was thoroughly engaging book, Lewis in the clouds, the expedition would and Clark emerge as flesh and blood have failed miserably. When Lewis people—rather than mythological did, indeed, suffer a meltdown in the heroes—who annoy each other, suffer aftermath of the expedition when he from mosquitoes and indigestion, and was separated from Clark, Jenkinson vacillate between petty selfishness “Clay Jenkinson’s provocative character study of concludes, “Clark is Sancho Panza to Meriwether Lewis opens a new chapter in Lewis and magnanimity. As such, The often lyricaland Clark writer, scholarship. and Let a theman debates of begin.”great Lewis’s Don Quixote.” William E. Foley, Author, Character of Meriwether Lewis serves integrity.”“Wilderness At the Journey, same The time Life of Williamhe tells Clark” us Clark was absent at three

as an important antidote to the more that LewisNow was Available also through“tightly Booksellers wound, of the most fateful junctures of Everywhere Or Directly from the Publisher celebratory version of their journey high-strung” and “prissy.” Although Lewis’s life, Jenkinson argues, and www.FortMandan.com given us in Stephen Ambrose’s Jenkinson avoidsor 877- 462posthumous-8535 had he been present those events Undaunted Courage. In Jenkinson, psychoanalysis and medical diagnoses, would have turned out differently. Lewis’s fearlessness, for example, is he does conclude that Meriwether He devotes considerable time to less heroic and more bound up with Lewis “was a fractured soul.” describing the calamities and near- his obsession of being a true explorer Jenkinson approaches the tragedies that befell Lewis on the and being the first on the expedition Journals of Lewis and Clark less 1806 return trip east, when the co- to make important discoveries. as a through the physical captains separated for five weeks Jenkinson opens the book with landscape and more as a channel into during which Lewis traveled north detailed evidence of Lewis’s state of the interior wilderness. He sees Clark’s to the Marias and Clark proceeded mind. With painstaking diligence, complaints of gastric difficulties, foot southeast along the Yellowstone. Jenkinson scrutinizes the expedition problems, and mosquito torment as Unlike the outward journey when he journals, correspondence, and other the “capacity for healthy catharsis” and Clark travelled together, Lewis

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made a series of extremely poor about whether Meriwether Lewis The Lost Journals of Sacajewea decisions—particularly during his committed suicide or was murdered. By Debra Magpie Earling encounter with the Blackfeet when Based on the preponderance of Photo-interventions by he left a peace medal on one of the evidence, he concludes that Lewis Peter Rutledge dead warriors and his hunt with the took his own life. By the time Koch Editions near-sighted Pierre Cruzatte that the reader reaches this point in 65 numbered and 5 hors commerce copies A suite of exhibition prints is available nearly cost him his life. Jenkinson the book, this seems a foregone 80 pp. , $3,500. 2010. further argues that had Clark been conclusion. For the general reader, with Lewis on his final journey from this debate (and several others) n spring 2005, during the Lewis and St. Louis to Washington D.C. in 1809, seems largely academic and esoteric. IClark Bicentennial, the Missoula the melancholy Lewis would never Indeed, if the book has a fault, it lies (Montana) Art Museum launched an have committed suicide. in the almost overwhelming detail exhibition, Native Perspectives on On the other hand, when the two that Jenkinson provides in fully the Trail: A Contemporary American captains were in too close a proximity, illustrating each point. Indian Portfolio. Alongside the such as during the winter camps at Overall, however, The Character prints by leading Native American Fort Mandan and Fort Clatsop, Lewis, of Meriwether Lewis strikes a balance visual artists such as Jaune Quick- the fuel rod, shut down. Jenkinson between delivering sufficient detail to-See Smith, Neil Parsons, Dwight maintains that this accounts for the and insight for historians and Lewis Billedeaux, Molly Murphy, and perplexing mystery of Lewis’s lengthy and Clark enthusiasts while providing Corwin “Corky” Clairmont, there absences from journal-keeping. With engaging prose for general readers. appeared the text of a powerfully Clark faithfully maintaining the Jenkinson has made a significant haunting poem entitled “The Lost daily journal, Lewis might have felt scholarly contribution with this Journals of Sacajewea” by Bitterroot his contributions were redundant, work. He demonstrates that historical Salish novelist Debra Magpie Earling. or perhaps he felt freed from the documents such as the Lewis and Master letterpress printer and drudgery. In contrast, Lewis was at Clark Journals need to be examined, book artist Peter Koch, a native his lyrical best when separated from not only literally, but also interpreted Montanan who makes his home his co-captain. in a way that helps us understand in California, was also Clark also comes under the character of the authors and exhibiting a Lewis and Clark–themed scrutiny in this work. One the most the meaning behind those words body of work at MAM. Koch’s perplexing decisions Clark made was —a tricky proposition, but one suite of Iris prints, entitled Nature to forgo waiting for Lewis at their in which Jenkinson is successful. Morte, offered—like Earling’s poem predetermined meeting spot at the This work will no doubt find its and most of the work in Native confluence of the Yellowstone and rightful place alongside Stephen Perspectives on the Trail—a highly Missouri. Here, as in many other Ambrose’s Undaunted Courage, critical interpretation of the impact “mysteries,” Jenkinson’s humanistic David Nicandri’s River of Promise, of the Corps of Discovery on the approach of seeking psychological Thomas Slaughters’ Exploring Lewis landscapes and cultures of the explanations sheds light on what and Clark, and James Ronda’s body American West. appears irrational behavior. Beset of work, including Lewis and Clark Earling and Koch recognized by mosquitoes at the rendezvous Among the Indians. each other as kindred spirits, and site, Clark left a note for Lewis and began immediately to plan the project pushed on seeking a better waiting Greg Gordon , who received his doctorate that has become this extraordinary area. Jenkinson writes, “In the face of in history from the University of book. Earling extended her original Montana, teaches in the Environmental this rendezvous crisis, Lewis lost his text into a full-throated voicing of Studies program at Gonzaga University. capacity to think rationally” resulting His latest book, Money Does Grow on sorrow and rage over the legacy of in a sort of “betrayal fantasy.” Trees: A. B. Hammond and the Age of abuse of Native American women Jenkinson wraps up his profile the Lumber Baron, is forthcoming from and of destruction of the Native by examining the ongoing debate University of Oklahoma Press. American world that revolved around August 2012 We Proceeded On • 29

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the vast herds of bison, a place and time when even “the bones of the earth [could not] stand the weight of buffalo running.” In Earling’s telling, Sacagawea’s “is the story Lewis and Clark won’t be writing down.” It is a harrowing story; as Earling has noted elsewhere, “The stories I feel called to write often reveal the darkest side of the human heart.” Her novel, the award- winning Perma Red, unflinchingly depicts beauties and often brutal realities of life on Montana’s Salish- Kootenai Reservation in the 1940s. Here, again, she is unflinching: A page from the Lost Journals of Sacajewea, which combines poetry by Debra Earling The white men with photo-interventions by Peter Koch. don’t see the wives who are sense a spiritual strength in the face To surround and embrace hidden of extremity that, quite simply, moves this astonishing text, Koch has in the lodges at beyond rage or bitterness to a quiet constructed an equally extraordinary the edges of lost acknowledgment of the importance container. His self-styled “photo- the women who carried the of telling our stories, but especially interventions” make great use of small-pox dead those that might otherwise be lost. the early photographic record of to scaffolds Euro–American incursion into losing their fingers With all these the Northern Plains/Rockies and in purging fires stories of loss of the Native peoples and great rivers as wide of children bison herds that those Euro– or women who as a smile remembered gather bundles of when rain changes Americans encountered. Images sticks the brief night by L. A. Huffman, F. Jay Haynes, in the frost-bitten with your face. S. J. Morrow, and anonymous winters of fever. photographers, printed on They are witches When rain Twinrocker Da Vinci hand-made the pattern of a who crawl paper, perfectly attend Earling’s hump-backed hundred faces, a their hands thousand faces, text, forging tensions, offering only palms/the all the lost, all the evidence, tendering us a glance at webbed feet of dead keep an austere, troubling, and gorgeous ducks/work dogs showing up world. The cover is printed on a to carry meat. on the highway smoked buffalo rawhide cover paper beneath the lip of This is the life left to designed and hand-made especially unfortunate women. trembling leaves in the wind tossed for this edition, and the spine of The Lost Journals of Sacajewea is beaded Earling’s work, as novelist James rivers In the flooding with trade beads and small caliber Welch (author of Winter in the Blood waters cartridge cases. and Fools Crow) has written, can be In the myriad Peter Koch, founder of the Codex “startlingly spiritual,” and within the tales of rain Foundation which every other voice of her imagined Sacagawea, we no one is lost from us.

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the symbol of two organizations meeting in Portland in 1905: the Lewis and year sponsors the internationally Clark Exposition and the National American Women’s Suffrage Association. renowned Codex Book Fair and In her 1905 address convention, NAWSA President used Conference at the University of Sacagawea as a model of courage, patience, and persistence. California Berkeley, has created a Forerunner of Civilization, great leader of men, patient and motherly great many books as works of fine woman, we bow our heart to do you honor! May we ... learn the lessons art in his 44-year career, but none of exemplified in your life, in our efforts to lead men through the Pass of them match the alchemy of text and justice, which goes over the mountains of prejudice ... to the land of prefect freedom ... one in which men and women together shall in perfect type, paper and binding. At $3,500, quality solve the problems of the nation.7 The Lost Journals of Sacajewea is not for everyone, but copies can When the statue of Sacagawea was unveiled July 6, 1805, Susan B. Anthony again linked the Shoshone woman to suffrage movement. be found in libraries and museums across the land, from the Montana The recognition of the assistance rendered by a woman in the discovery of this great section of the country is but the beginning of what is due. Historical Society to the University Next year the men of this proud state, made possible by a woman, will of Chicago to Yale University. decide whether women should at last have the right in it which they Perhaps one day soon, a publisher have been denied them so many years. Let men remember that part that will bring out a trade edition. women have played in its settlement and progress and vote to give them these rights which belong to every citizen.8

Let Sacagawea have the last words: did not ratify the Equal Rights Amendment in 1906. It was defeated in 1906 and 1908. Finally, in 1912, Oregon narrowly passed the They are stacking measure giving women the right to vote. the bones of Sacagawea Votes buffalo Mountains of There was an important incident in the life of Sacagawea that Women’s Suffrage dead buffalo rotting Movement leaders could have used to further their cause—but they did not Bones, more know about it because the full volumes of the Lewis and Clark Journals had not yet been released. On November 24, 1805, when the expedition camped bones ...... a great on the ’s north side, near the Pacific Coast, the party was white fire rising cold, wet, hungry, and exhausted, their equipment in tatters. The corps had to over the vast land decide where to establish suitable winter quarters. On November 24, 1805, the they once expedition members voted on whether to stay or cross over to the other side roamed. of the river. Sacagawea voted, along with the men and her vote counted. York, Clark’s slave, voted as well. Years before women, blacks and Native Americans Cathedral of were granted the right to vote, Sacagawea, a young Indian woman, still in her bones. teens, voted, along with the men of the Corps of Discovery. In the murky dust of buffalo Ron Laycock is a past president of LCTHF and resides in Benson, Minn. the cities rise. Notes 1Eva Emery Dye. The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and Clark. (Chicago: —Rick Newby A. C. McClurg & Co., 1902). 2Ibid., p. 283 3 Poet, editor, and cultural journalist Ibid., p.284. Rick Newby is a past member of the 4Ibid., p. 284. Montana Arts Council, and the boards 5Ibid., p. 290. of the Montana Center for the Book, 6 and the Holter Museum of Art. In 2009, Ronald W. Tabor. Sacagawea and the Suffragettes: An Interpretation of a Myth. he received the Montana Governor’s Quarterly, Vol. 58, No. 1 (January 1967), p. 8 Award for the Humanities. 7Ibid., p. 9 8Ibid., p. 10.

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WPO_August 2012.indd 31 7/25/12 4:44 PM Endnotes

The Sacagawea of Eva Emery Dye By Ronald Laycock

va Emery Dye’s historical novel, The followed the great rivers, navigating the EConquest: The True Story of Lewis continent. Sacajawea’s hair was neatly and Clark, is credited with creating a braided, her nose was fine and straight, mythological version of Sacagawea far and her skin was pure copper like the different from than the Shoshone woman statues in some old Florentine gallery. Madonna of her race, she had led the of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.1 way to a new time. To the hands of this Published in 1902, just as the American girl, not yet eighteen, had been entrusted public about to celebrate the centennial of the key that unlocked the road to Asia. the Lewis and Clark Expedition, the book was widely received because it presented Some day upon the , the public with a dramatic version of the Sacajawea’s statue will stand beside that expedition. By the turn-of-the-twentieth of Clark. Someday, where the rivers part, century, not many books had been written her laurels will vie with those of Lewis.

about the expedition, and only condensed, ciety Across North America a Shoshone edited versions of the original journals So Indian Princess touched hands with

rical 5 were available. o Jefferson, opening a country.

The book also gave American readers n Hist o

a heroine in Sacagawea. This larger- Oreg Dye the Suffrage Worker than-life Sacagawea was far different Eva Emery Dye from the Shoshone woman in the Lewis In order to understand Dye’s Sacagawea, it is important to understand that Eva Emery Dye was the and Clark journals. Although Dye’s reputation as a factual Clackamus County Chairman and a longtime member of the historical novelist lent credibility to The Conquest, most of Oregon Equal Suffrage Association. After the Equal Rights her information was inaccurate. Dye’s heightened language Amendment was turned down by the 2nd Annual Convention describing Sacagawea reflects her larger-than-life stance toward in 1898, she searched for a heroine that exemplified the the Shoshone woman. of womanhood. Out of Ross’ Hole, Sacajawea pointed the way by Clark’s Pass, over the Continental Divide, to the Big I struggled along as best I could with the information Hole River, where the trail disappeared or scattered. I could get, trying to find a heroine. ...Finally I came But Sacajawea knew the spot...”Yonder, see a door in upon the name of Sacajawea and I screamed, “I have found my heroine.!” the mountains.”2

Ever patient, Sacagawea serves as the guide, the “Indian I then hunted up every fact I could find about princess” who, as Dye states later, leads the American Sacajawea. Out of a few dry bones, I found in the old explorers across the continent, urges them on when they tales of the trip, I created Sacajawea and made her a real are discouraged and weary, who can read the mysterious living entity. For months I dug and scraped for accurate landscape and the others cannot. information about the Indian maid .... Dye paints a highly romantic vision of Sacagawea, as a Native American woman who is strong, beautiful, motherly, The world snatched at my heroine, Sacajawea … The heroic, and steadfast in her ability to point out landmark after beauty of that faithful Indian woman stood with her baby landmark on their mysterious journey. on her back, leading those stalwart mountaineers and explorers through the strange land appealed to the world.6 Before them arose, bewildering, peak on peak, but again the Bird Woman, Sacajawea, pointed out the Yellowstone Gap, the Bozeman Pass of today on the Sacagawea in Bronze great Shoshone Highway.4 Following the publication of The Conquest in 1902, the Woman’s Club of Portland formed a Sacagawea Statue Sacajawea, modest princess of the Shoshones, heroine Association with Dye as chair. Women from Oregon and of the great Expedition, stood with her babe in her arms across the country sold Sacajawea spoons, mugs, and other and smiled upon them from shore. So had she stood in souvenirs to raise money for the statue. Sacagawea also became the , pointing out the gates. She had continued on page 31

32 • We Proceeded On August 2012

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For more information on how we can help you self-publish of the Corps your book or to receive a free quote, contact: Kathy Springmeyer, Director of Publications of Discovery. 406.444.5105 800-821-3874 www.sweetgrassbooks.com PO Box 5630 Helena, MT 59604

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Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation / www.lewisandclark.org November 2011 Volume 37, No. 4 Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation / www.lewisandclark.org August 2012 Volume 38, No. 3

TheBirdwoman, Search Wife, for Mother, clark Interpreter:’S eluSive YellowSToneWho Was Sacagawea? canoe camp

“Sacagawea Returned to Her People—August 24, 1805.” by Charles Fritz. In this painting, Sacagawea is depicted during her departure from Camp Fortunate, going west up Thomas Jefferson, A Moose, todays’ Horse Prairie Creek in southwestern Montana. The next day, with help of the Shoshone Lewis and Clark Encounter a World of Women women and their horses, the expedition crossed over Lemhi Pass and the Continental Divide. and the Theory of American Degeneracy "Our Canoes on the River Rochejhone" by Charles Fritz, 19 inches by 16 inches, oil on board From Sakakawea to Sacagawea: The Evolution of a Name