National Museum of the American Indian

Ferdinand Anthony Stahl photographs from the Peruvian Amazon

Summary

Collection ID:
NMAI.AC.141
Creators:
Stahl, Ferdinand Anthony, 1874-1950
Dates:
1925
1928
Languages:
English
.
Physical Description:
3 Negatives (photographic)
18 Photographic prints
6 Copy negatives
Repository:
Photographic prints and negatives taken by Seventh-day Adventist missionary Ferdinand Anthony Stahl amongst indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon. These include the Asháninka (Campa/Chuncha), Yagua (Yahua) and Amahuaca communities.

Scope and Contents

Scope and Contents
The majority of the photographs in this collection include portraits of indigenous community members in the Peruvian Amazon taken by Ferdinand Anthony Stahl while on Mission for the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Some of the photographs include images of Ferdinand Stahl and his wife Ana posing with community members and it is unclear who the photographer was for these images. The photographs were shot in 1925 and 1928 in the Ucayali (Atalaya Province), Junin (Chanchamayo Province) and Loreto regions in Peru. The bulk of the photographs were taken among the Asháninka (Campa/Chuncha) and includes images of women weaving; group portraits along the Río Perené with canoes; as well as posed group portraits in front of the Stahl's Mission. There are also photographs of Yagua (Tahua) tribal members posed in traditional dress.
Negatives include N14915-N14917. Prints include P07956-P07965, P08614-P08619, P09483-P09484. Copy negatives include N36121-N36124, N36262-N36263. The copy negatives were created by the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation (NMAI's predecessor museum).

Arrangement

Arrangement
Arranged by catalog number.

Biographical / Historical

Biographical / Historical
Ferdinand Anthony Stahl, 1874-1950, was a Seventh-day Adventist missionary to South America. Along with his wife Ana, Stahl converted to Seventh-day Adventism in 1902 and trained as a nurse at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Battle Creek, Michigan. In 1909 the Stahls, along with their children, were sent as missionaries to La Paz, Bolivia by the General Conference in order to evangelize the indigenous communities in the area. In 1911, they moved to the Peru side of Lake Titicaca, establishing schools among the Aymara and Quechua communities. In 1920 the Stahls moved from Lake Titicaca to the headwaters of the Amazon in Iquitos, Peru where they established the Metraro Mission Station and launched mission boats downriver. They returned to the United States in 1939.
See "Ferdinand Stahl, Missionary to Peru" Adventist Heritage - Vol. 12, No. 2, summer 1988 by Robert G. Wearner for more information.

Administration

Author
Rachel Menyuk
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Ferdinand A. Stahl in 1927 (N14915-N14917) and part of a 1929 purchase along with ethnographic objects (P07956-P07965). It is unclear when the remainder of the prints (P08614-P08619, P09483-P09484) were acquired by the Museum.
Processing Information
Processed by Rachel Menyuk, Processing Archivist, 2020.

Using the Collection

Conditions Governing Access
Access to NMAI Archives Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Conditions Governing Use
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from National Museum of the American Indian Archives Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiphotos@si.edu. For personal or classroom use, users are invited to download, print, photocopy, and distribute the images that are available online without prior written permission, provided that the files are not modified in any way, the Smithsonian Institution copyright notice (where applicable) is included, and the source of the image is identified as the National Museum of the American Indian. For more information please see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use and NMAI Archive Center's Digital Image request website.
Preferred Citation
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Ferdinand Anthony Stahl photographs from Peruvian Amazon, image #, NMAI.AC.141; National Museum of the American Indian Archives Center, Smithsonian Institution.

Related Materials
See Box 307, Folder 7 in the Museum of the Amrican Indian, Heye Foundation records (NMAI.AC.001) for an original catalog list of Peruvian and Bolivian Artifacts purchased from Stahl by the MAI in 1927.

Keywords

Keywords table of terms and types.
Keyword Terms Keyword Types
Asháninka (Campa/Chuncha) Cultural Context Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Yagua (Yahua) Cultural Context Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Amahuaca Cultural Context Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Amazonia Cultural Context Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Peru Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Missionaries Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Indians of South America -- Peru Cultural Context Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Missions -- Peru -- Photographs Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid

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