Manuscripts Collection
Gilbert Livingstone Wilson was born in October 1869 in Springfield, Ohio, the oldest son of Samuel and Mary (Russell) Wilson. He was educated at Lake Forest and Wittenberg (Ohio) Colleges, graduating from the latter in 1896. He went on to Princeton Theological Seminary, where he completed studies for the Presbyterian ministry in 1899. After leaving seminary, he moved to the Midwest, where his first pastorate was in Moorhead, Minnesota (1900-1902). Later he served as pastor in Mandan (1902-1905) and Langdon (1905-1907), North Dakota, before moving back to Minnesota where he was pastor at Shiloh Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis (1907-1917), First Presbyterian Church in Stillwater (1917-1920), and Lexington Parkway Presbyterian Church in St. Paul (1927-1930).
Wilson's interest in American Indians dated back to his boyhood, when he was a fan of
Indian myths and history. When his ministerial work took him to Mandan, North
Dakota, he had an opportunity to meet and study the Indians at nearby Standing Rock
and Fort Berthold Reservations. His early work was in collecting Indian myths, many
of which he later published in two children's books,
Goodbird and his family were the chief informants for Gilbert's extensive studies
and through his friendship with the family Wilson was able to collect a great deal
of unique information, particularly in the area of Indian agricultural practices. In
1916, Wilson was the recipient of the University of Minnesota's first Ph.D. in
anthropology. His thesis, "The Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians: An Indian
Interpretation" was published in 1917 and republished in 1987 by the Minnesota
Historical Society as
Gilbert Wilson died on June 8th, 1930 at his St. Paul home after an illness of several months.
Reports, notebooks, a scrapbook (1894-1928), photographs, drawings, articles, and other material relating largely to the Wilsons' work during 1908 and 1918, when Gilbert Wilson gathered data on Indian cultures for the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. The reports are duplicates of those he sent to the museum.
The bulk of the papers are focused on Gilbert Wilson's anthropological study of the Hidatsa and Mandan Indians (particularly the former) of the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota during the period 1906-1918. While a Presbyterian minister in Minnesota and North Dakota, Wilson became interested in Indian life and from 1908-1918 was engaged by Dr. Clark Wissler to gather ethnological material for the American Museum of Natural History. In this work he was sometimes assisted by his brother, Frederick N. Wilson, an artist, whose drawings, notebooks of sketches, and other illustrations are included in the papers.
Other Indian-related material includes records of Gilbert Wilson's 1905 trip to the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North and South Dakota and collected myths and tales from various Indian peoples (some evidently intended as juvenile reading), as well as written lectures and lecture notes on Indian topics.
Also present is some information on Wilson's activities at Wittenberg College (Springfield, Ohio) and Princeton Theological Seminary; his Presbyterian ministries at several churches in Minnesota and North Dakota before, during, and after his period of concentration on Indian studies; his career as professor of anthropology at Macalester College (St. Paul, Minn.) in the 1920s; his writings and sermons; and various members of his family.
These documents are organized into the following sections:
Books by Gilbert Wilson, including
The
Access Restriction: Microfilmed originals are closed.
Use Restriction: The Reports and Photographs subseries from the Hidatsa-Mandan Material comprised of volumes, sketches, and photographs are the joint intellectual property of the Minnesota Historical Society and the American Museum of Natural History (New York). The right to publish these materials in any form depends on permission being given by both institutions. Therefore, assent in writing by the Minnesota Historical Society to a request to publish must be followed by assent in writing from the American Museum of Natural History (Central Park West at 79th street, New York, NY 10024-5192).
M460: St. Paul, Minnesota: Minnesota Historical Society, 1984.
Microfilm reels 1-5 are available for interlibrary loan or sale from the Minnesota Historical Society.
Accession number: 6907; 7274; 7392; 8559; 8691; 9008; 9229; 11,157; 13,347
Processed by: Kathryn Johnson; Additional work by: Lara Friedman-Shedlov, October 2001
Catalog ID number: 09-00039250
The two volumes resulting from Gilbert Wilson's Standing Rock visit of 1905 represents the minister's preliminary work in American Indian ethnology. From John P. Buckley he obtained notes on Dakota arrow points, battle dress, painting customs, the dog travois, and foods; on Dakota courting behavior and on Indian chastity; and on the sun dance. From Mrs. James McLaughlin he recorded a group of twenty Dakota myths and stories -- narratives which were apparently the primary purpose of the visit. Mrs. McLaughlin also contributed information about the Dakota war whoop, the cloudstone, the winter lodge, beliefs about twins, women's dress, and face painting. Concluding this first volume is a brief account on a council Wilson attended, the oratory of which he transcribed stenographically in the second volume.
This council had as its main theme the impending allotment in severalty of Standing Rock lands, for which Indian leaders had petitioned in December 1903. Commissioner of Indian Affairs Francis Ellington Leupp was present to answer questions about the allotment provisions, as well as to hear Indian representatives describe their people's needs and to express their grievances. Many of the latter derived from what the Indians considered to be unfulfilled government obligations of the Treaty of 1889. Thus, the material is significant not only because it is of historical and psychological import concerning the usual complex relations between Indians and whites, but because it reflects Standing Rock Dakota attitudes at the time of the breaking up of their communal tribal life -- an important change. Since Wilson's recording method was necessarily hurried and somewhat fragmentary, a typescript of the text has been provided together with some explanatory notes.
The Hidatsa-Mandan reports (and the four sets of drawings) and album of photographs comprise some of the most highly respected ethnological work ever done on the American Indian. Wilson's studies represented an enormous increase in the data for the analytical student of culture and also vividly portray the tribal life of the Upper Missouri Indians. The narratives are unusually full and even somewhat integrated because of the family relationship of the three chief informants used throughout Wilson's extensive work: Buffalo Bird Woman, born about 1839; Wolf Chief, her brother, born about 1849; and Goodbird, her son, born about 1869. Perhaps because of Wolf Chief's and Goodbird's devotion to the Christian faith, they were more open and comfortable describing the magical and ritualistic dress of old-time Hidatsa culture. Buffalo Bird Woman, although the oldest and most conservative of the three informants, has a long memory, which is captured in the vigilant and careful recording of Wilson.
The Hidatsa-Mandan reports are enhanced by a large photograph album with numerous images that accompany the written text of the volumes. They are also illustrated by many sketches, diagrams, and loose photographs, although those available in this collection form only an insignificant part of those done originally for the American Museum of Natural History. Thirteen of the volumes have tables of contents.
These volumes are copies of the reports originally sent by Wilson to the American Museum of Natural History.
The report of 1908 begins the Hidatsa studies. This volume contains two versions of the "Story of the Burnt Arrow" (meaningful as an explanation of the three wavy lines down the sides of Hidatsa arrow shafts); "Long Arm," a Hidatsa tale; several accounts of the origin of Hidatsa societies; and some Arikara and Mandan creation myths.
The report of 1909 is in two parts, the first of which is devoted to the earth lodge with six excellent plates by Frederick Wilson. The second part discusses diversified topics: the origin of the Mandans and of their Okipa ceremony; Hidatsa customs and beliefs concerning childbirth; the Ghost's Town (where the dead go); fish traps; building an earth lodge; Hidatsa bands and origin of the Crow tribe; Poor Wolf's own account of his tattooing (see Hairy Coat's account in Frederick Wilson's 1912 report); prairie turnips; arrow points; rakes and digging sticks; the game of Umakiheke; Minnie Enemy Heart, the medicine woman; buffalo paunch and buffalo skin buckets; tent-making; face painting; building a dancing booth; elk horn tweezers; and songs.
Many Hidatsa myths and legends from various informants are recorded in the 1910 report. Courtship, marriage, birth, baby care, and tattooing are commented on, and urination and defecation mores are noted. "The Mystery Story of Old Cedar Man" is told. Hidatsa arts and crafts are briefly touched upon: pottery, mats, rakes, tepees, bird snares, tent covers, eagle pits, tobacco culture, reed whistles, elk teeth ornaments, uses of squash blossoms, basketry, bone grease, bull boats, and "cow's udder as diet."
The report for 1910 describes the making of elk bone and Rocky Mountain sheep horn bows, bowstrings, arrows, arrowheads, bow cases, quivers, and glue, and contains memoranda on the use of these. Also included are Wolf Chief's recollections of Old Fort Berthold Indian village, an explanation of the term "band father," and remarks about the purchase and initiation into men's, women's and girls' age societies and into the White Buffalo Society. Miscellaneous data are supplied concerning Hidatsa childhood customs (baby care, urination, encouragement devices, hair-clipping, games, child punishment, boys' fighting); ideas about crime (fighting over women, saving of murderers' lives, punishment by the Black Mouths for lone buffalo hunting); beliefs about child burial; indwelling powers of human beings and the symbols of those powers; the Babies' Houses; children's tales; ceremonial tales; arts and crafts (fishing, bull boating, robe painting, grass work, honor marks on leggings, bird quill work, deer whistles, snares, clay pottery, dice baskets); dice games; toothaches; and beliefs about worms. More scraps of tales explaining Hidatsa band origins are related, and "The Story of Matatope" furnishes a "correction" of Catlin's version. Several songs are recorded.
The 1912 volume is an excellent primary source on Indian agriculture, covering the following phases and activities: the beginning of a garden ("plowing," burning off, planting corn, deer-horn rakes, the garden as woman's property); sunflower seed (planting, harvesting, threshing, pounding, sacking, parching, cooking, making and use of sunflower seed balls); corn cultivation (planting, Buffalo Bird Woman's garden at old Fort Berthold, destructive animals, the use of scarecrows, watching platforms, gardeners' songs, hoeing, husking, storing, cooking, the husking feast, harvesting corn, drying the braided corn, threshing corn, "ash balls" from burnt cobs for seasoning, seed storing, "seed traveling," different varieties of corn, making hominy with lye); squash cultivation (planting, sprouting seeds, harvesting, squash blossoms, selecting seed squash, drying, protecting squash from rain, boiling, squash pits, squash dolls); bean cultivation (planting, threshing); garden raking, weeding; use of manure; fallowing; theory of frost; division of agricultural labor; introduction of potatoes and vegetables by the government; cache pits; making a drying stage (children's swings); the watchers' stage; the buffalo bone how; threshing booths; tobacco cultivation (planting, harvesting, drying, oiling with roasted buffalo fat, trade with the Dakota, beliefs concerning); and gathering wild turnips. The making of a buffalo scrotum basket, used for gathering tobacco blossoms, is described as well as the construction of a bull boat. Especially interesting is the section on native drinks (bone-pounded broth, dried-meat broth, fresh meat broth, paunch broth, "yellow liquor," teas). Indian engineering skills are suggested in the notes on the building of a Mandan Sacred Lodge. A few informants discuss honor marks for men and women, but this subject is treated much more fully in the 1916 report.
Reports by Frederick Wilson in 1912 including material on Hidatsa dwellings, much of it referring to drawings found in his brother's report for 1909 and elsewhere. Besides descriptions and measurements of Hairy Coat's and Small Ankle's lodges, another version of Buffalo Bird Woman's account of honor marks for women is presented and may be compared with that recorded by Gilbert Wilson in his 1912 report. Frederick Wilson's discussion of basket-making in this volume is probably the only source available on that Hidatsa craft and is significant because he constructed a basket himself under Buffalo Bird Woman's direction. The section on tattooing of Poor Wolf as told by Hairy Coat is not available in the other reports. Other notes touch upon saddles, arrow straightening, mutilation of enemies, and the Mandan Sacred Lodge.
The 1913 report is in two parts. The first is mainly significant for Goodbird's autobiographical narrative, which affords many intimate glimpses into Hidatsa earth lodge life and for Buffalo Bird Woman's reminiscences about the dog, which add much to our knowledge of a slightly investigated phase of Indian culture. She gives the physical characteristics of the Hidatsa dog and tells of dog eugenics, "smoking the puppies," castration, dog feeding, kennels, gathering wood with dogs and their training in pulling the travois, names of dogs, making a dog travois, and the family dogs in the Small Ankle Lodge. The "domestication" of other animals is mentioned: captive eagles, prairie grouse, hawks, snakes, coyotes. Miscellaneous notes fill out the rest of the volume: fishing customs and beliefs, Butterfly's winter count, how the Mandans joined the Rees, roofing an earth lodge, origin of the Hidatsas (two accounts), the palisades of Like-a-Fishhook Village, making moccasins, honor marks on leggings, porcupine quill bone polishers. Two stories are told by Wolf Chief and Buffalo Bird Woman.
The second part of the 1913 report adds Wolf Chief's knowledge of Hidatsa dogs to that of Buffalo Bird Woman. His information provides useful checking data on many of the same topics discussed by his sister but includes also some commentary on pet dogs, dog-calling, signals, moving camp with dogs, dog leaders, Dakota dogs, traditions about dogs, eating of dog meat, and old customs (a woman's suckling of a beloved puppy). Wolf Chief is Wilson's principal informant on the horse's place in Hidatsa culture. He speculates about the origin of the horse among his people, mentions several Hidatsa beliefs about the horse, and describes with much detail the care of the new-born colt and castration as performed by Big Black Spot. General topics include breeding stallions, stallion service, the gentle care of pregnant mares, horse corrals, carrying tent poles by horses, horse breeding, names of horses, hobbles, and bridles (diagrams are made of six kinds). "A Typical Day's Herding by Boys" not only gives to Wolf Chief's narrative the human touch essential to insights, but also contains interesting digressions: the customs of cleansing lungs and stomach and painting the body with white clay after the morning bath; breakfast; the lunch fixed by the boy's mother; the exhortation by the father; sweeping the corrals with native brooms; the boy's dress and equipment as he rides off with the family herd; Hidatsa hairdress; horsemanship during battles; tricks used in capturing gophers; boys' archery practice. Further experiences tending to reconstruct the design of Indian life and other important digressions are found in Buffalo Bird Woman's "A Hunt Made Afoot with Dogs," which is an account of a hunting party made in the late 1860s by six Hidatsa couples, and "Tribal Hunt to the Yellowstone," a general excursion by the tribe during which Goodbird was born. These two narratives tell of Hidatsa dress, the various camps made, the people's activities on the march, their food preparation and eating customs, their camp fires at night, their sleeping positions in the lodge and the arrangement of their baggage, their hunting and butchering of game, their ferrying across and travel up and down the Missouri River, the loading of pack animals, the making of tent covers, and ways of tying tent poles. Lively anecdotes, such as that involving the baby Goodbird and his fall form the bull boat into the river, are scattered throughout these reminiscences.
Sketches illustrate the text of the report of 1913 (volumes 13 and 14).
In the report for 1914 Buffalo Bird Woman's story of the hunt is continued. A feeling of the Indian's workaday world is caught by such descriptions as those of meat piles (guarded by white bead cloths on sticks, waving like flags), the loading of bull boats and the positions of the paddlers, the hunters' wearing of white sheeting around the head, the building of dried buffalo meat into paunches, the bull boat fleet in action on the Missouri River, and its hasty landing for an unexpected opportunity to hunt. Especially significant is Buffalo Bird Woman's testimony regarding face painting. Two lengthy series of recollections about the Grass Dance, its meaning, its purchase from the Devil's Lake Dakotas, its organization and procedure, together with personal experiences relating to it (war party's journey to the Standing Rock Reservation, the killing of End Rock) are set down as told by Goodbird and Wolf Chief. Then follows the narrative of Wolf Chief's first war party as a boy of 16, from which may be impressively realized the warmth of Indian comradeship during a war experience and a sense of the everlasting practice of Indian ceremonialism. Again, interesting customs are noted: the announcement of warlike intentions by hanging sacred objects outside the lodge; departure ceremonies; special salutations among war party members; the white sheeting headdress, the turban (used by spies), caps, hairdress, and face painting; Wolf Chief's "water boy" duties in initiating inexperienced warriors; war party songs and dancing; the stationing of guards; the use of spies; and the leader's prayers to his Medicine Man. The story of Wolf Chief's life makes available many more precise details necessary to the adequate comparison of informants' accounts. Impressions of family life (nursing babies, prayer for early childbirth, a smallpox scare), omens, Hidatsa feeling toward snakes, the killing of two Dakota and Point Village and the celebration following, boys' fire test play and other activities teaching discipline, and the building of a winter earth lodge are some of the topics discussed. Also included in this volume are notes on the buffalo rib sled, Indian stocking, the owl haircut, divorce and the separation of families, wild potatoes (and other agricultural products), sage and its uses, burial in sitting position, making of the "lazy back" (marriage seat for husband), wife beating, custom with unborn calves, removal to winter camps, children's calling of spirits from old homesites, butchering a deer and packing it on a horse, fleshing hides in frames, building a winter lodge, illnesses of young men, native brooms, fire screens, and perfumed pillows. Buffalo Bird Woman's story of her first marriage is outstanding, as is her account of the courtship by her second husband, Son-of-a-Star. A few stories again are told, and miscellaneous notes cover a variety of customs and beliefs.
The 1915 report is in two parts. The first begins with notes obtained in 1909 but not reported. Fragments of commentary deal with patterns on leggings, ways of indicating welcome to an earth lodge guest and of warning a host when calling, breech clouts, wetting the inside of leggings to enable a warrior to stick on his pony, meal times, food preparations, running practice, the war pony's accoutrements, and courting customs. Much of this corroborates fuller information from other sources. The same kind of potpourri continues with Calf Woman's interview on the White Buffalo Society (considered unreliable by Wilson) and with remarks about lice, wooden bowls, ghosts, firewood gathering, childhood sports, blessing the corn fields, bird hunts, fish traps, the village cleanup, swimming, tobacco cultivation, and the hunting lodge. "An Eagle Hunt Without Ceremonies" concludes the volume.
Part two of the 1915 notebooks finishes the long eagle hunt narrative by Wolf Chief, who also tells the stories of Old Brown Man and Fringe Wing. Narratives involving numerous tribal practices follow: deer hunting; Wolf Chief's first buffalo hunt (an experience with his father); curing snow blindness; capturing a porcupine in its den; the story of Wolf Chief's first sweetheart and his attitude toward polygamy (his courting dress, waiting at his girl's lodge entrance, "catching" her in his robe, her mother's vigilance, the girl's wanting to be purchased, their lovemaking, her marriage to another, his grief, his seduction of her after her marriage, his later indifference toward holding a wife who wanted another man); child husband-and-wife play; trailing; follow-the-leader games; foot-racing; bloodletting; a daughter's training; illegitimate children; agricultural notes; making a bark basket; songs sung by watcher on stages; hair switches; caps; deer horn saddles; pounded boiled meat; smoking customs; importance of virginity for young men seeking a vision; rank of Hidatsa gods; serving of meals; Hidatsa "yellow hair." Stories appear throughout the volume.
Diagrams illustrating the text of the 1915 report (volumes 17 and 18).
A long section in the 1916 report discusses the widely argued subject
of honor marks. The Hidatsa system is explained quite thoroughly by
Wolf Chief. The use of gull feathers, grass ornaments, and painting
in honor marking, as well as the more commonly known use of eagle
feathers, is analyzed. The responsibilities of war party leaders and
their appointed spies are well described, but the functioning,
personal qualities, and authority of chiefs are treated only
briefly. Wolf Chief marks what Wilson calls
Sketches illustrating the text of the 1916 report (volume 20).
The next report is for 1918 (apparently no field work was done in 1917). This final volume begins with more earth lodge material. Perhaps the most interesting section, however, is the winter count (1833-1876) by Butterfly (see also the 1913 version) and the partial verification of this historical narrative by Buffalo Bird Woman. Also included are notes on the Xodo people; the Adaxadute; lances, spear-headed bows, war clubs; Small Ankle's fishing; store implements; arrow points; scrapers; Hidatsa anvil and hammer; Wolf Chief's names; kneading the spine as a cure for fatigue; and buffalo horn wedges. A long section is devoted to a buffalo hunt in the Yellowstone country but it is from a man's point of view (Wolf Chief's) and it is not a repeated account of Buffalo Bird Woman's narrative found earlier in the collection. Wolf Chief's material on the horse in this volume adds much to that given in the 1913 report and his chapter, "The Miati," tells of instances of homosexual behavior among his people (see also Frederick Wilson's 1912 report). Two tales are also given by Wolf Chief. A short piece by Buffalo Bird Woman comparing Indian life in former times with that of the present appropriately concludes the report.
Sketches illustrating the text of the 1918 report (volume 22).
Hundreds of photos depicting Mandan and Hidatsa Indian camps and activities. Most of the photos are dated and described.
Includes 18 photographs mounted on pages with descriptions of their contents and 16 loose photographs which are mostly undated and not described. Some of the mounted photographs appear to be duplicates of photos included in the album. Also included is a letter describing a series of photographs taken in 1903. It is not clear whether the photographs being described are among those in the folder.
Much of the Hidatsa-Mandan material was typewritten from the eighteen notebooks in the Wilson collection. Four of these in entirety (volumes 3, 4, 5, and 6) and others in part are in diary form. They give some impression of Wilson's day-to-day field work on the Fort Berthold Reservation; they are suggestive of the difficulties he overcame; they mention friends who assisted him; they describe, at times, Indian life of the twentieth century (dancing in volume 4; a Fourth of July celebration in volume 6); and, perhaps most important of all, they reflect both Wilson's personal relations with the Indian people and his own personality. Little of this is available from published material, which is strictly non-ethnocentric.
The other Gilbert Wilson notebooks (volumes 24 through 36) have interest too, despite the fact that the typewritten reports largely duplicate them in more readable form. Some of them hold material that Wilson apparently never sent to the museum or published. For example, Wolf Chief's "Story of White Man's Influence" (volume 30) is an interesting account of Hidatsa acculturation. Others contain the notes Wilson made during his original interviews. All of them tell much of his method. Most of the articles are keyed to the typewritten museum reports and may be compared with them.
Volume 31 is a diary/notebook of Frederick Wilson. Part of the material in this volume was transcribed in his report of 1912 (volumes 12A and 12B).
These notes, though scanty, reveal something more of the motivation behind Wilson's field work and hint at his philosophy of history.
This lecture is an example of how Wilson used field material on the lecture platform. Also included in the volume are miscellaneous notes concerning church work with Indians.
Articles by Wilson on Indian lodges, basket making, honor marks, and other Indian lore.
Clippings of a serial column, apparently printed in
The collections of Indian myths and legends in the papers suggest that the desire to collect such material for juvenile reading early prompted, in part, Wilson's Indian study.
This volume also includes some sermons written by Wilson during 1911-1929.
Pen and ink sketches, prints, paintings, and other art work done by Frederick N. Wilson to illustrate his brother Gilbert's books on the Dakota Indians.
The painting is similar to an illustration on page 26 of
Includes prints of illustrations included in the book, plus four original pen and ink drawings.
Includes prints of pen and ink drawings illustrating the book. Drawings are arranged in the order they appear. The page in the book that the drawing appears upon is noted on the back.
Includes prints of pen and ink drawings illustrating the book. Drawings are arranged in the order they appear. The page in the book that the drawing appears upon is noted on the back.
Unidentified drawings and prints.
Correspondence, a scrapbook, sermons, and other materials documenting some of the Wilsons' other activities beyond Indian research. Papers include information on Gilbert Wilson's education, church work, and academic career; and Frederick Wilson's work as a commercial artist.
This volume also includes Indian legends, undated and 1904-1906.
This volume also contains clippings of "Buffalo Bird Woman's Story," 1917.
Includes clippings and other data on Gilbert Wilson's activities as Wittenberg College (Springfield, Ohio), including information on oratorical contests in which Wilson participated; his career at Princeton University, mentioning Woodrow Wilson; his pastorates at Moorhead and Minneapolis, Minnesota; his work on Indian legends and life; his activities as professor of religion at Macalester College (St. Paul, Minn.); and family information.