Our homes and offices are dotted with photographs which capture a moment in time and our world is dominated by visual records which we take for granted. But documenting people and events once relied on the skills and talents of individuals who provided slice of life renditions with their art. In 1832 George Catlin journeyed up the Missouri River as part of his quest to document the manners and customs of the Native Americans. Fortunately one of his stops included Fort Union and the Mandan Villages. It was here that Catlin recorded the lifestyle of the Mandan people in his sketches and paintings. When he returned to the East, Catlin organized his many painting and sketches into a traveling exhibit which he unsuccessfully attempted to sell to the United States government in 1838. Catlin’s Gallery, his compilation of works, toured America from 1837-1839 and Europe from 1839-1851. Catlin made numerous copies of his works based on the popularity of the Gallery, which was seized for debt in 1851. The Gallery was acquired by the Smithsonian in 1879.

On this date in 1928, a darkened oil painting arrived from London, England to the George Will home in Bismarck. Will, a prominent Bismarck businessman and historian, had purchased the painting by Catlin which depicted the 36-year-old painter dining with the famous Mandan chief, Four Bears. This oil painting was purchased from Elvira K. Will by the State Historical Society of North Dakota on March 9, 1963. This work is virtually identical to another painting by Catlin, dating from 1865-1870, from the Paul Mellon Collection in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

Catlin not only painted the Mandan but he also kept a journal and when combined with the paintings, they provide a significant record of the time period. Lyle Gwin of Fort Berthold, a descendant of Four Bears stated, "It’s going to help our future generations because the oral tradition is like a dying fire. It’s just that the embers are still there and just need to be fed so the sparks fly, so I’m hoping with my children we can feed it and Catlin’s stories.... are going to be in the center of those embers." The Four Bears images are even more significant in that within five years, Four Bears and many of his band would be dead, victims of small pox.

The painting on display in the North Dakota Heritage Center is a proud memorial to the legendary Chief Four Bears and also to George Catlin, a man who ventured into the frontier armed with a pen and a paintbrush to record history.

By Jim Davis

Sources:
Interview with Lyle Gwin, Fort Berthold by Mark Halvorson, Curator of Collections Research, State Historical Society of North Dakota on October 7, 2004 Museum Collections.
The Bismarck Capital March 1, 1928
History of North Dakota by Elwyn B. Robinson University of Nebraska Press, 1966

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