by Pamela M. Henson

NINETEENTH CENTURY SMITHSONIAN ANTHROPOLOGISTS:

CREATING A DISCIPLINE AND A PROFESSION

by Pamela M. Henson

Wnen

^thetwentieth century

dawned,

anthropol-

ogy was

firmly establishedattheSmithsonian.

The

U.S. National

Museum had

asubstantial

department devoted

to thestudy

of human

culture,

and

extensive collections

documented human

life

from around

the globe.

At

theSmithsonian's

Bureau of American

Eth- nology, led

by

the formidable

John ^Wesley

^{Powell, eth-}

nologists

and

archeologistsscoured the

American West

for

remnants of

Native

American

culture.Latenineteenth century

American

anthropology,rifewith

sometimes

pub-

lic controversy,

was not

a field

of

quiet contemplation.

The Smithsonian

playeda central roleinthe

emerging

pro- fession

of

anthropology, includingethnology, archeology,

and

philology,or

what

today

we would

calllinguistics.

How and when

did an-

thropology become such an

im- portantpart

of

the

Smithsonian

Institution(SI)?In 1838,almost50 yearsaftertheRevolutionary

War

ended,the

United

Statessentout

The United

States

Exploring

Ex- peditiontoassertthe nation'ssta- tusasequaltothe imperialist na- tions

of Europe. The

six

navy

ships

circumnavigated

theglobe

from

1838to 1842,

mapping

the earth, exploringAntarctica,

and

collecting culturalmaterials

from around

the world.

Aboard

the ship

was

a

crew of

"scientifics,"

men

trained innatural history

who

were

chargedwithcollecting

and

James Smithson studyingthe botany,geology,

zoology and

culturesthey

encountered alongthe way.

(More about

^theExpeditionis

available at www.sil.si.edu/Digital Collections/usexex/).

Secretary

of War

Joel Poinsett (for

whom

the Poinsettia

was named)

eagerlyreceivedthe

many shipments of

speci-

mens and

artifactssentback duringthe expedition.

He

also

began

to planforaplace

where about

fortytons

of

these precious"curiosities,"including2500 ethnographic

and

ar-

chaeological specimens,

could

be stored, preserved

and

studied. In 1840, Poinsetthelpedcreatea"NationalInsti- tute for the

Promotion of

theArts

and

Sciences."

For

its

growing

collection,the Institute

was

allottedspacein the PatentOfficeBuilding's exhibitgallery,inabuildingthat

now houses

the

National

Portrait

Gallery and

the Smithsonian

American

Art

Museum. The

Institutestruggled with inadequate

funding and hoped

^tosecurecontrol

of an

unusual bequest

from an

Englishscientist.

The Founding of the Smithsonian

Institution

That

mysterious bequest

came from

a

wealthy

English chemist

and

mineralogist

named James

Smithson.

The

il-

legitimate

son of an English gentlewoman,

Elizabeth

Keate Hungerford

Macie,

and

the

Duke of Northumberland, Hugh Smithson

Percy,

Smithson

struggledallhislifetoestablish his statusin British

and

Continental society.

His

will

of

1826 left his estatetohis

nephew, Henry James Hungerford,

then a

young man.

But Smithson added

a peculiar clause.

He

stated that if his

nephew

died

without

^heirs,legiti-

mate

orillegitimate,thenhis estate

was

to

go

to the

United

States to

found

in theCity

ofWashington, under the name of the Smithsonian

Institution,

an

estab- lishmentforthe increase

and

dif-

fusion

of knowledge among men.

This

was

so

unusual

thatthewill'stext

was

publishedin the Times

of London and

the

New

York

American

after Smithson's deathin 1829attheage

of

64.

But

Smithson's

nephew was young and

healthy,

and by

allaccounts,quite adeptat

spending money,

sothe clause

was viewed

^as

an

interestingbut unlikelyprospect.

However,

just sixyears later,in1835,Smithson's

nephew

died

and

the extraordi- naryclause

went

intoeffect.In1838, the British

Court of

Chancery awarded

^theestatetothe

United

States.

As

the

USS Mediator brought

theproceeds

of

Smithson'sestate (bags

of

gold coins

worth

$508,318.46)across the

ocean

tothe

United

States,theU.S.

Exploring Expedition was

just settingoutacrossthe Atlantic, insearch

of knowledge about

allareas

of

theglobe.

The

fates

of

these

two

ships wereinextricably linked,theircargoes foreverintertwined

(Ewing

2007).

However,

it

took some time

for these forces to playout.Smithson'sgift

was not welcomed by

all.Anti- federalists

opposed

acceptingagiftto the nation.Debates

soon emerged

over

what

the

unknown

Englishscientist

had meant by

thephrase"increase

and

diffusion

of

knowl- edge."

The

debates

went on

forovera

decade

until

com- promise

legislation

was

passed

on August

10, 1846,creat- ing theSmithsonianInstitution asatrustinstrumentality

of

the

United

States

—

^{apublictrusttocarry}out Smithson's

mandate

forthe increase

and

diffusion

of

knowledge.

But what

exactly

would

thisInstitutionbe with

such

a

vague

will

and broad

legislative

mandate? A

university,

an

astro-

nomical

observatory, a nationallibrary,scientificlaborato-

ries,agriculturalor

mechanics

institute,abotanicgarden,a

museum —

^therewere

^many

possibilities,

and

theyincluded

what was

latercalledanthropology. Section6

of

thelegis- lation established that "objects

of

foreign

and

curiousre- search"

and

allobjects

of

natural historybelongingtothe U.S.

government,

includingthe collections that

had been

held

by

the

National

Institute,

were

to

go

to the

new Smithsonian

tobe preserved

and

studied.

The Board of

Regents

governing

the

new

Institu- tionfirstturnedtobuildingasuitablestructure to

house

theSmithsonian,choosingamedieval-type design that they believed

would

inspireacademicideals.

The

building

would house

research,a nationallibrary

and

anational

museum.

Thisnational

museum would meet

the

need of

the

young

nationfora

temple of

nationalidentity that

would

place the

United

States

on

apar

with

the great capitals

of

Eu- rope(Fieldetal. 1993).

As

thefirst"Secretary"

of

the Institution, theRe- gentschosethe

noted

physicist

Joseph

Henry,aprofessor attheCollege

of New

Jersey

(now

Princeton).

Although

reluctant toturn

from

hispioneeringresearch inelectro-

magnetism

totheresponsibilities

of running

anational

mu- seum

orlibrary,

Henry took

thelegislative

mandate

seri-

ously

and

established a

"Programme of

Organization."

He

dividedthe areas

of knowledge

into "sections,"

and

SectionII,

The Moral and

PoliticalClass,included Ethnol- ogy,incorporatingparticularhistory,comparativephilol- ogy,antiquities, etc.,providinga

founding

rationale for

what would become Smithsonian anthropology (Henry

1847).

In the belief that the

need

to

both

increase

and

diffuse

knowledge

deserved equalweight.,

Henry

estab- lishedtheSmithsonian's publication

program and

theIn- ternational

Exchange

Service. This service distributed

American

publications

throughout

the

world

inexchange forforeignpublications,

which were

thendistributed to colleges

and academies

acrossthe U.S.

(Crawford

1897).

The

first

Smithsonian

publicationin

1848 was

a

work of

anthropological research,Ancient

Monuments _of

theMississippiValley,

by

Squier

and

Davis.

With

itsfineillus- trations, the

publication

established that the

new Smithsonian would

publish

on

serious research topics

important

to the

United

States

—

^a

^key

^statement

^about

theSmithsonian's intendedrole(Squier

and

Davis 1848).

The Original Collections

The

Smithsonian

soon

receivedthescientificcollectionsonce held

by

theNationalInstitute,includingthe natural history specimens

and

ethnographicmaterialscollected

by

the U.S.

Exploring Expedition.

These and

otherethnographic

ma-

terials included extensivefield notes,drawings,

and

arti- facts, ranging

from

textiles,basketry,jewelry,masks,stat- ues,tools,

weapons, and household

goods.

They

included items

such

asaportion

of

thelid

of

a

mummy

case

from

"Sacara"(Saqqara),

donated

in1842

by

the

diplomat and

Egyptologist

George

Roberts

Gliddon

(1809-1857).

The

items

were

carefully

documented

^asto their

provenance and

use,

making

this avaluable collection for research.

Cultures

documented ranged from

the

Northwest Coast

Indians to the

Maori of New

Zealand,

from

the

Egyp-

tianstothe

Hawaiians (Henson

2004).

Placed

on

displayin the central hall

of

the

new Smithsonian

InstitutionBuilding,ortheCastle,theexhib-

its

immediately

proved popular withthe public, attracting a

growing

audience

of

curiousvisitors.

These

originalcol- lections

were soon supplemented

withasteady

streamof

new donations from around the globe. U.S.

ambassadors,missionaries,scholars,

and

adventurerscol- lected

and

sentobjectsbacktothe

new museum. But Henry

was

veryambivalent

about

the

museum and

library.

Main-

taining collections

was

veryexpensive,

and Henry

feared

ExhibitsintheGreat Hall oftheSmithsonianCastle, 1867.

Photocourtesy Smithsonian InstritutionArchives.

the collections

would

use

up

the

Smithson endowment and

leave little or

no money

forbasic research.

He

be- lieved the artifacts

and specimens were

valuable forre- search,butthat a

museum would only have

local

impact and

limitededucationalvalue. Feeling similarly

about

the library,

Henry had

it

removed from

the Institution in 1865

and

sent to the Library

of Congress (Rothenberg

et al.

2002).

The Emergence of Smithsonian Anthropology Anthropology and

itssubdisciplineswerejust

beginning

to

emerge

as fields

of

research inthemid-nineteenthcen- tury. Indeed,

many of

theSmithsonian'searlyanthropolo- gists

began

theircareersinotherfields:geology,mineral- ogy, orinvertebratezoology, to

name

afew. Fascinated

by

the cultures they

encountered throughout North America,

^thesescientiststurnedtheirattentionto

docu- menting

the

human,

ratherthanthe naturalworld.Secre- tary

Henry was

very supportive

of

anthropology, espe- ciallythefield

of

linguistics.

Throughout

thesecond half

of

thenineteenthcentury, the

Smithsonian

supportedthe collection

of

Native

American

vocabularies. In 1861,

George Gibbs

publishedInstructionsforResearchrelativeto theEthnology

and

PhilologyofAmerica.^Initiallyamineralo-

gist,

Gibbs who worked

forthe

Smithsonian without

pay,

stimulatedthe collection

of

vocabularies

and

other ethno- logicalinformation

by

missionaries

and

the

Bureau of

In- dianAffairsstaff

and worked

topublishthe data(Hinsley

1981).

Gibbs'interestintherelationships

among

languages stimulatedotherwork, includingthat

of

the earlyanthro- pologist Lewis

Henry Morgan who

called for

an

ethno- logical

map. The Smithsonian

issued a circular (or ques- tionnaire) for

Morgan's map and

servedas acentralpoint fordatacollection.Afterthe

founding of

the

Bureau of American Ethnology

in 1879,

John Wesley

Powell

and

his stafffurthersystematizedthelinguistics

work and

theeth-

nographic map

project.

Throughout

the 19^thcentury,the

Smithsonian

publishedlinguistic

works

intheappendices toitsannualreports intheSmithsonianContributionstoKnowl- edge,

and

later, inthe bulletins

and annual

reports

of

the

Bureau of American

Ethnology.

The museum

side

of anthropology continued

to

grow

as well.In 1850,

Spencer

Fullerton Baird, abroad- based naturalist,

was

hired as the first curator

of

the Smithsonian.

He

^later

became

thefirstdirector

of

the U.S.

National Museum and

the

second

Secretary

of

the

Smithsonian.

Incontrast to

Henry, who

worried

about

theexpense

of keeping

collections, Baird

dreamed only of

directing a great national

museum and encouraged

the

donation of

collections. Baird

himself

studied kitchen

middens

alongthe coast

of Maine.

The museum's

anthropologicalcollections

grew

rapidly.In the 1870s,

many

ethnologicalartifactsweredis-

played in the Castle. For the

purposes of comparison,

Native

American

ethnologicalspecimens were juxtaposed withartifacts

from China,

_Japan,

and

prehistoricFrance.

Along

thearcades

were

portraitsdepicting

American

In- diandelegates

who

visited

Washington between

1858

and

1869,painted

by

the U.S.National

Museum

artist

Antonio Zeno

Shindler.Untiltheywere destroyedinafirein the Castle in 1865, the

John Mix

Stanleycollection

of North American

Indian portraits

had hung

in the Castle.

The

1850s, 1860s

and

1870s

were

the decades

of

the explora- tion

of

the

American

West.

Museum

^{directorBaird en-}

suredthatscientists

accompanied almost

^all

of

the mili- tary

and

geologicalsurveys

of

theWest,

and

thatthearti- facts

and specimens

collected

came

tothe

Smithsonian.

The

Castle

was soon packed with

birds, dinosaurs,

and

baskets

(Henson

2000).

The Centennial Exhibition of 1876

Inthe 1860s,CharlesRau,alanguageteacher in

New

^York,

began

to writepapersfortheSmithsonian

Annual

Report.

Having

establishedareputationas

an

excellentarcheolo-

gist, in 1871,

Rau was

hiredtoprepare theethnological section

of

theSmithsonian's exhibitsat the

Centennial

Exhibition

of

1876inPhiladelphia.

The

popular

and

well- receivedCentennialexhibitsestablishedtheSmithsonian's reputation internationally. Objects

such

asa

Tsimshian housefront were added

to the

growing

collections

and

were

soon on

display inthe

Smithsonian

building.Shortly aftertheCentennial,Secretary

Henry

died

and Spencer

Baird

was appointed

the

second

Secretary in 1878.Baird focusedhisenergies

on

constructingaseparate U.S.

Na-

tional

Museum, now known

asthe theArts

and

Industries building,

and

hiring astaff

of

professionalcurators. In 1881,^as the

museum opened, Rau was appointed Cura-

tor

of

the

Department of

Archeology. Untilhisdeathin 1887,

Rau

builtthecollections,organizedthe

museum

dis- plays,

and

continuedtopublish in theInstitution'sjournals (Hinsley1981).

Rau was

joined in

1884 by

the

new

curator

of

ethnology,Otis

Tufton Mason,

aprofessorat

Columbian

College

(now

part

of

the

George Washington

University) in

Washington, D.C.

There,

he and

Powell

had

established the

academic

study

of anthropology

in the 1870s,

and Mason

^received

one of

anthropology'sfirstPh.D's

from

the

Columbian

Collegein 1879.In the

same

year

Mason

helped

found

the

Anthropological

Society

of Washing-

Anthropology exhibitat thePhiladelphia Centennial Exposi- tion, 1876.PhotocourtesySmithsonianInstritutionArchives.

ton, the parent organization

what would become

the

American

AnthropologicalAssociation. LikeRau,

Mason had worked on

the exhibits for theCentennial Exhibition asavolunteer,

beginning

in 1872.

Mason was

influenced

by

theevolutionary ideas

of Gustav Klemm,

a

German

scholar.

Using an

evolutionary

framework, Mason

devel-

oped

exhibits as synthetic series that

demonstrated, he

believed, the progress

of

a specific field

of technology through

allstages

of development, from

the

most

primi- tive societiesto

modern

civilization.

He

believed thatsuch exhibitsreflectedthestages

through which human

societ- ies

had advanced

intheircultural

development. Mason's

"synoptic series" exhibits

were

attacked

by Franz

Boas,

who argued

thatthey

were not

based

on

data

and

that exhibitsshould focus

on

ethnicgroups,nottechnological series.

But Mason was

first

and foremost

acollector,

who

believed thatobjects,

more than anything

else,told the story

of human

history(Hinsley1981).

The

expeditionstothe

American West

wereagreat source

of

collections for the

Smithsonian,

but theyalso

produced

anothergreatresource

—

anthropologists,such as

William Henry Holmes and John Wesley

Powell.

The

expeditionsalsoled to the

formation of

a

new

organiza- tionatthe

Smithsonian —

^the

^{Bureau of American}

^Eth-

nology

(BAE). Like

many

others

on

their travels west,

Holmes and

Powell

had become

fascinated

by

the arti- facts

of

existing

and

earlierNative

American

cultures.

William Henry Holmes

As

achild,

William Henry Holmes

(1846-1933)wasequally interested inart,naturalhistory,

and

geography.

Those

in- terests

would

serve

him

well in his

long

careerwith the Smithsonian.

He was

firsthiredas scientific illustratorfor the

Smithsonian

intheearly 1870s.In 1872

he was

hiredas

an

artist

and

geologist

on

the

Hayden

Yellowstone

Survey and made

his

name

asa

major

figure intheexploration

of

the

West throughout

the 1870s.Inthe 1880s,hecontinued

working on

surveysforthe

newly

created U.S.Geological

Survey and soon headed

itsscientificillustrationdivision.

But Holmes had become

fascinated

by

theNative

American

materialsheencountered out West.

His

artistic eye

was soon

analyzing ceramics

and

otherartifactsfor patterns

and

relationships.

He was named

a curator

of anthropology

intheNational

Museum.

In 1889hejoined thestaff

of

the

Bureau of American

Ethnology,but

soon

leftfor the Field

Museum

inChicago.

He

returnedtodi-

rectthe

BAE from

1902 to 1909, albeit reluctantly.In1909

he was appointed Head Curator of Anthropology

inthe National

Museum, where he remained

therest

of

hislife.

In 1920,

he was

also

appointed Director of

the

Smithsonian

Gallery

of Art and oversaw

its

expansion

intoa

major museum. A man of many

talents,

Holmes

exemplified the self-taught

amateurs who became

pro- fessionals inthe

second

half

of

the 19^thcentury.

He

^set

highstandardsforaccuracyinscientificillustration,ingeo- logical

mapping, and

inanalysis

of

artifacts.

He

also

was well-known

forrefusing to believe thatthestone points

found by

collectors

were from an

ancientsociety

— ^he

argued they

were incomplete

rejects

from modern

Native

Americans. He was

not

convinced

until 1926,

when

JessieFigginscarefullyexcavated

an

ex- tinctbison with

Folsom

points

embedded

initsribs.

Only

then

would Holmes

accept the antiquity

of

Native

Ameri-

cansin

North

America.

John Wesley Powell

The

geological surveys

of

the

American West produced

anothertoweringfigureinSmithsonian

anthropology John Wesley

Powell (1834-1902). Like

Holmes,

Powell

was

in- terested innatural historyasayouth.

With some

course

work

at

Wheaton and Oberlin

Colleges,

he soon became well-known

as

an amateur

naturalhistorian,aswell as a collectorofNative

American

materials.

He

servedinthe Civil

War and

lost his right

arm below

the

elbow

at the Battle

of

Shiloh. Afterthe war,

Major

Powell, as

he was known,

taughtatIllinois

Wesleyan

College

and began

sys-

tematic surveys

of

the

Colorado

Rockies. In 1868-1869,

he conducted

hisfirstanthropologicalstudies

among

the

Ute

tribe. In

May

1869,

with support from

avariety

of

organizations,includingthe U.S.

Army and Smithsonian

Institution,Powellled adaring

and

epicadventure

down

the

Colorado and Green

Rivers.

When he and

hisparty

emerged from

the

Grand Canyon on August

29, thefirst

Westernerstoeversee

and document

the

Colorado

River in

Grand Canyon,

Powellwas

an

instant hero.

He

received

government

appropriationsfor hissubsequentsurveys,

and

hisExplorationsof^theColoradoRiver

and

laterpublications

were

well-received.

In 1872,Powell

was appointed

aspecial

commis-

sioner

of

IndianAffairs

and

servedas

an informal

advi- sor to

Congress on

Indian affairs, western land policy,

and

sciencepolicy.HisReportonthe

Lands

_ofthe

Arid

Region

JohnWesley PowellwithaPaiuteIndian nearKaibabPlateau.

Photo by John

K. Hillers, 1873. Courtesy Smithsonian Institution Archives.

of^theUnitedStatesargued for carefulcontrol

of

western water sources; it

was

ignored at the

time but

is

now

re-

gardedasvisionary.In 1879,

Major

Powell

was appointed

director

of

a

new

organizationwithinthe

Smithsonian,

the

Bureau of

Ethnology,

renamed

later the

Bureau of American

Ethnology.Powellremainedinthatpositionuntil

1902,simultaneously

running

the U.S.GeologicalSurvey, also created in 1879. Powell advocated a strong federal science

program and

theapplication

of

scientificprinciples to

government

policies

such

as land use (Hinsley 2981;

Judd

1968;

Noelke

1974).

Powell's

BAE was

the leading center for

Ameri-

can ethnologyin thelate19thcentury.Itwasalsothe

home of

a

number of

fascinatingpersonalities,

men and women who

bridgedthe transition

from amateur

to professional.

Interestingly,the

BAE employed

or

supported

a

number of

early

women

anthropologists,

who

wereseenasuniquely able to

work

with

women informants

(Lurie _1966;

Noelke

1974).

Matilda Cox Stevenson and the Zuni

In 1879, shortly after the

BAE was founded,

geologist

James Stevenson was

sent to

Zuni Pueblo

to

conduct

ar-

cheological studies.

He was accompanied by

his formi- dablewife,

Matilda

orTillyas she

was known, who

stud- iedtherole

of women

in

Zuni

society,especiallydomestic practices

and

childrearing.

She

then turnedtothe

complex

and

fascinating

Zuni

spiritualworld. Afterherhusband's

deathin 1888,TillyStevensoncontinued

doing

field

work and producing

publications fortheBureau.

Her

aggres- sive style

of

gainingaccess torituals

was

oftencriticized,

and

sheis

remembered

forherabilitytointimidatethe feistydirector

of

theBureau,

John Wesley

Powell.

As

with

many women who

depart

from

the

norms of

female behavior,Tilly

Stevenson

isoften

remembered more

for herpersonality

than

herscientificcontributions.

But

her colleagues

acknowledged

thatshe

had

a finegrasp

of

the significance

of Zuni

ritual;indeed, the

Zunis

permitted her

unusual

accesstoritualsbecause theybelievedsheun- derstood their

meanings and

purposes.

She

did

not

ro- manticizethe Indians' place in

American

society.

She saw

acculturationas leadingto a

breakdown of Zuni

values

and

socialstructure, aloss,

not

gain, fortheZuni.

Mrs.

Stevenson

was on

the payroll

of

the

BAE

^for

many

years as

an independent

researcher

who

reportedto

BAE man-

agers

but

did

not work

directlyfor

them. She worked

^at

home,

strugglingwithillhealth

and

alcoholism.

When

the

Bureau

furloughed herin 1901,sheexertedherconsider- ablepoliticalinfluence

and

kept herstatusuntilshe

com-

pletedher

major work on

the

Zuni

in 1904 (Hinsley1981;

Judd

^1968).

Alice Cunningham Fletcher and the Omaha

At about

the

same time

that

Stevenson

arrived at

Zuni

Pueblo,Alice

Cunningham

Fletcher

took up

^thestudy

of

Indianculture.In1879shetraveled

from Boston

to

Omaha,

Nebraska, to begin studies

of Omaha

culture. Fletcher lovedthe rigors

of

livinginIndianvillages

and was

moti- vated

by

adesire to

improve

Indianlife.

Her

ethnological

Alice

Cunningham

Fletcher.

Photo

courtesy the

Na-

tional Anthropo- logicalArchives.

MountainChief, Chiefof

Montana

Blackfeet, listeningtosong being playedon aphonograph andinterpreting itin sign lan- guagetoFrancesDensmore,1916.PhotocourtesytheNational Anthropological Archives.

reports

on

the

Omaha

wereusuallypublished

by

the

BAE, sometimes

coauthored withFrancis LaFlesche,

an Omahan who became

likea

son

toher.LaFlesche

was on

the staff

of

the

Bureau of

IndianAffairs

and

laterthe

BAE.

^Fletcher

was named

acollaborator

of

the

BAE and

usedthiscon- nection tosecurepublication

of

herresearch.

Unfortu-

nately,shealso

was

astrong advocatefor social change.

She

secured passage

of

abillthatcreated

homesteads

for the Indians

but

cost

them

free access to a larger set

of

lands. Sincethe

Omaha community

never

took

well to settled farming, her

program of

social ameliorationled tofurther deterioration

of

theirculture

and economic

sta- tus (Hinsley 1981;

Judd

1968;

Welch

1980).

Frances Densmore and Indian Song and Dance

These women paved

the

way

forFrances

Densmore, who

also

worked

as

an independent

scholar with

BAE

sup- portaftertheturn

of

the century.

Educated

atOberlin, she

combined

interestsin

music and

ethnologytocreate a careerstudyingIndian

song and

dance.

Armed

with

wax

cylinders,she traveled across thecountry recording Indian music, analyzingthe relationships

between

tribes

and

the significance

of

ritualinIndianlife.

From

1907toher1957 death, the

Bureau

paid her

though

she never

worked

in residence inWashington.

The Smithsonian Densmore

Col- lection

of

Indian

song

contained over

2400

songs

by

the

time of

herdeath.

She

described

and

transcribed each

song and

collectedIndian instruments forthe

Museum.

She

analyzedthesongs musically

and

described theirrela- tionship toIndianculture.

She completed

a

volume on

the

music of

four Southwesterntribesinher90thyear.Unlike Stevenson, she

had

fine relationswiththetribesshestud- ied,

and

unlikeFletcher,shedid not romanticizetheirrole in

American

society(Judd 1968).

The Establishment of

a

Profession

Anthropology

provided fine career opportunities for

women of independent

spirit

committed

to research.

None was

ever inresidenceatthe

museum; perhaps

asa corollaryto theirindependentstatus,allthreedevotedtheir

time

to research

and

publication, rather

than menial

or clericalduties.

None

ever entered

management,

butAlice

Cunningham

Fletcher

founded

the

Women's Anthropo-

logicalSociety

of Washington

sincethe original

Anthro-

pologicalSociety

ofWashington (ASW), founded by Ma-

son, did not initially

admit women.

In 1903, however, Fletcher

became

the first

woman

president

of

the

ASW

when

the

two

organizations

merged. These women

^pio-

neers, like

Stevenson and

Fletcher, establishedarolefor

women

in

anthropology and moved beyond

studies

of

domesticlifeintostudyingallaspects

of

culture.

By

the mid-1880s, the

BAE was an

established institution,

beginning

to exertauthorityover

American

anthropology.

The Smithsonian, which

itself

came

into beingthroughacuriousintersection

ofAmerican

national aspirations

and an

emergent westerninterestin naturalhis- toryas

an

adjuncttoimperialism, playedacentral role in the

emergence of anthropology

as a profession. In America,thisprofession

was

focusedespecially

on

theeth- nology,linguistics

and

archaeology

of

Native

Americans.

The BAE

also

had

fostered the careers

of

several early anthropologists,includingseveral

women.

Washington,with

itsprofessionalsocieties,colleges,National

Museum, and

the

BAE was

the

American

center

of

the

new

discipline until theearly1920s

when

the

anthropology departments

inseveral universities,including

Harvard and Columbia,

wereexertingleadership in theprofessionas well.

References

Crawford,William

W

^{1897. "The} International ExchangeSys- tem." In George

Brown

Goode, ed., TheSmithsonianInstitution 1846-1896, The History of^itsFirstHalfCentury.

De

Vinne Press.

Ewing, HeatherP.2007. The LostWorld ofJames^Smithson:Science, Revolution,andtheBirthof^theSmithsonian. Bloomsbury

USA.

Field,CynthiaR.,RichardE.Stamm, andHeatherP.Ewing. 1993.

The Castle:

An

Illustrated History of^the Smithsonian Building.

SmithsonianInstitutionPress.

Henry,_Joseph. 1847.

"Programme

ofOrganization." In

Annual

Reportof^theBoardof Regents for^{the Year 1847.} U.S.

Government

PrintingOffice.

Henson, Pamela

M.

2004.

"A

National Scienceand

A

National

Museum."

InA.E.Levitonand

M.

L.Aldrich,eds.,Museumsand

other Institutionsof Natural^{History:Past, Present,} andFuture, pp.

34-57.California

Academy

ofSciences.

Henson, Pamela

M.

2000. "SpencerBaird's Dream:

A

U.S. Na- tional

Museum.

In

M.

T.GhiselinandA.E. Leviton,eds.,Cultures

andInstitutionsofNaturalHistory, pp. ^101-126.CaliforniaAcad-

emy

ofSciences.

Hinsley,Curtis

M.

1981.TheSmithsonianandtheAmericanIndian:

Making

aMoralAnthropologyin VictorianAmerica.Smithsonian Institution Press.

Judd, Neil

M.

1968. TheBureau_ofAmericanEthnology:

A

^Partial

History. Universityof

Oklahoma

^Press.

Lurie,

Nancy

Oestreich. 1966.

"Women

in EarlyAmerican An- thropology." InJune Helm, ^{ed., Pioneers}ofAmericanAnthropol- ogy: TheUsesof Biography. UniversityofWashington Press.

Noelke,Virginia. 1974.TheOriginandEarlyHistoryoftheBu- reau of

American

Ethnology, 1879-1910. Ph. D. dissertation, UniversityofTexasatAustin.

Rothenberg,Marc,etal.,eds.2002.The PapersofJoseph Hentry: The Smithsonian Years,January1854-December1857.Vol.9,pp.xiii-xxvi.

The SmithsonianInstitutionandScienceHistoryPublications.

Welch, RebeccaHancock. 1980.Alice

Cunningham

Fletcher,An- thropologistandIndianRightsReformer.Ph.D.dissertation.The GeorgeWashingtonUniversity.

PamelaHensonistheDirectorof^theInstitutionalHistoryDivision, SmithsonianInstitutionArchives.