Schoolcraft, Henry R.:

$600 · Offered by William Reese Company

INQUIRIES, RESPECTING THE HISTORY, PRESENT CONDITION AND FUTURE PROSPECTS OF THE INDIAN TRIBES OF THE UNITED STATES. After a long term as an Indian agent, Schoolcraft lost his position because of politics, and spent some years trying to support himself as a writer. He eventually engineered a position as Indian Historian to the U.S. Government, and produced his massive six-volume work on American Indians at the government's expense. This circular, sent by Schoolcraft to all Indian agents and traders, was the opening salvo in his project, positing questions in 348 separate areas to obtain information. The questionnaire is highly revealing of mid-19th-century attitudes toward Indians. See Brian Dippie's excellent book, Catlin and His Contemporaries (University of Nebraska, 1990), for a full account of this and other Schoolcraft books.

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