CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by UNL | Libraries University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Great Plains Quarterly Great Plains Studies, Center for Winter 2010 Landscapes of Removal and Resistance: Edwin James's Nineteenth-Century Cross-Cultural Collaborations Kyhl Lyndgaard University of Nevada, Reno Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/greatplainsquarterly Part of the Indigenous Studies Commons, and the United States History Commons Lyndgaard, Kyhl, "Landscapes of Removal and Resistance: Edwin James's Nineteenth-Century Cross-Cultural Collaborations" (2010). Great Plains Quarterly. 2519. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/greatplainsquarterly/2519 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Great Plains Studies, Center for at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Great Plains Quarterly by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. LANDSCAPES OF REMOVAL AND RESISTANCE EDWIN JAMES'S NINETEENTH,CENTURY CROSS,CULTURAL COLLABORATIONS KYHL LYNDGAARD The life of Edwin James (1797-1861) is book­ One reason for James's obscurity is the willing­ ended by the Lewis and Clark expedition ness he had to collaborate with others. Both (1803-6) and the Civil War (1861-65) (Fig. 1). of his major works, Account of an Expedition James's work engaged key national concerns of from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains (1823) western exploration, natural history, Native and A Narrative of the Captivity and Adventures American relocation, and slavery. His prin­ of John Tanner (1830), as well as many of his cipled stands for preservation of lands and articles, were published with his name listed animals in the Trans-Mississippi West and his as editor or compiler rather than as author. opposition to Indian relocation should be cel­ The explorer Major Stephen H. Long and the ebrated today, yet his legacy does not fit neatly Native American captive John Tanner were into established literary or historical categories. his two primary collaborators, yet James's name has fallen from the covers of his books. For example, the captivity narrative James wrote in collaboration with John Tanner, an illiter­ Key Words: American Indian, captivity, conserva­ ate man, was recently republished by Penguin tion, environment, exploration, Indian relocation with James's name expurgated from the book.! This editorial choice is made possible by the Kyhl Lyndgaard is a PhD candidate in the Literature quality and nature of the collaboration. Lisa and Environment program at the University of Logan would certainly identify A Narrative Nevada, Reno. His dissertation focuses on American Logan would certainly identify A Narrative cross-cultural captivity narratives. His work has of the Captivity and Adventures of John Tanner been published in ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in as a "cross-cultural collaboration" in that Literature and Environment, Nineteenth-Century "the narrative self suspends accommodation Prose, and Green Praxis & Theory. He is currently or explanation of the other and allows differ­ serving as Managing Editor for ISLE. In Fall 2010, ence simply to exist in the text."ztext.,,2 James allows he begins a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Luther College in Iowa. this difference not only in this latter book but also throughout Account of an Expedition from [GPQ 30 (Winter 2010): 37-52] Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains, extending 37 38 GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY, WINTER 2010 discuss James's work with the so-called White Indian John Tanner as a cross-cultural col­ laboration and explain how their collaborative texts resisted Andrew Jackson's 1830 Indian Relocation Act. Finally, I examine the rami­ fications of the personal and political disputes that occurred in the 1830s between James, Tanner, and the important Indian agent and ethnologist Henry Rowe Schoolcraft. While the collaborative nature of James's writing has obscured his popular legacy, his willingness to collaborate demonstrates the integrity he dis­ played during a period of intense scientific and literary competition. James's most productive years were during the 1820s and 1830s, when he addressed the twin questions of westward expansion and Native American relocation. Rebecca Faery explains how Native Americans were removed from the frontier landscape during the early FIG. 1. Edwin James. From Rocky Mountain nineteenth century: "The effort, both liter­ Naturalists by Joseph Ewan, The University of ary and political, of removing Indians into a Denver Press, 1950. romanticized, mythic 'elsewhere,' far to the west in the place of the setting sun, produced this approach not only to Native Americans a pervasive image of 'romantic Indians.'''3 but also to the plant and animal communities This socially constructed image of Native of the Great Plains that he describes. In addi­ Americans depicts them as happily giving tion to his major collaborative volumes, James way in the face of white settlement and even worked closely with leading scientists in the facilitating the process. Faery discusses several eastern United States, such as John Torrey and texts that perpetuated this literary treatment Amos Eaton. Despite some successes, competi­ of Native Americans, but she struggles to find tion from other leading writers and scientists, dissenting voices-in part because people like especially Thomas Nuttall and Henry Rowe James, who collaborated with others, did not Schoolcraft, may have discouraged him from produce works that honor the idea of an indi­ writing in his later years. vidual creative genius. In this article, I argue that James resisted Arnold Krupat's book chapter "Representing prevailing and exploitative land-use policies Indians in American Literature, 1820-1870," and environmental attitudes while he illumi­ explores further how white writers failed to nated the relationship between ethnicity and honestly resist Native American removal. landscape. First, I situate James's collaborative "What I find extraordinary," writes Krupat, relationships and argue for the importance "is the degree to which, when it comes to and uniqueness of his voice. Next, I exam­ the actual, detailed, year by year history of ine James's early career as botanist for the Native American removal and dispossession 1819-20 Major Long expedition to the Rocky in the nineteenth century, both the canoni­ Mountains to show his belief that the Great cal and the lesser authors of the period, have Plains-or "Great American Desert"-should extraordinarily little to say."4 Krupat does be preserved through game laws and even be not mention James in his discussion but does reserved for Native American hunters. I also consider several major authors: "[TJhey very LANDSCAPES OF REMOVAL AND RESISTANCE 39 rarely engage with [Native Americans] as At every point-wilderness conservation contemporary historical, cultural and social on the one hand and tribal preservation beings-and when they do, as we have noted on the other, appreciation for the land and even with Melville, Thoreau, and Fuller, it respect for indigenous cultures, destruction is still to see them as living anachronisms or of the environment and extinction of Indian last remnants."sremnants."5 A closer look at James and his tribes-the issues seem to fall into logical, career illuminates his struggle against better­ even obvious associations'? known narratives that celebrated, or at least accepted as inevitable, manifest destiny and James's writing contains some of the clearest the Indian Relocation Act during the early articulations of Mitchell's argument, forcefully nineteenth century. James's writing as a whole presenting an argument in favor of conserva­ is much more engaged than that of nearly any tion and preservation of both landscapes and of his contemporaries because of his impressive Native Americans. and consistent efforts to see the people and James's local knowledge of the people and landscapes of the frontier on their own terms. places he encountered in both the Great Plains By collaborating with both white and Native and Michigan Territory, and his concerns for authors, James manages to shed many of the larger national debates and government policy, individual prejudices that Krupat identifies in caused his writing to challenge uncritical writers of the American Renaissance. proponents of westward expansion. By calling This effort by James to honestly engage with attention back to James, I argue we can better the people and places he encountered on the understand these intense national debates that frontier resulted in some extraordinary pas­ surrounded the expansion of the United States sages, yet it somewhat ironically also allowed in the antebellum period. James's resistance his name to be removed from texts and places, toward this expansion was much more original a practice that has continued to the present and intense than what is seen in any other day. For example, in a 2003 book that borrows major texts. The collaborative nature of these James's own words for its title, A Region of texts serves to further highlight the integrity of Astonishing Beauty: The Botanical Exploration of James's argument, even as collaboration served the Rocky Mountains, author Roger LL. Williams James's own career and ambition less well.welL summarizes James's concerns by saying that "the obvious merit of such causes [as Indian EXPEDITION TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS: A welfare, the temperance movement,