The Grace F. Thorpe Collection (1900-2008) includes documents, photographic prints, slides, negatives and other materials that encapsulate the breadth of Grace Thorpe's life and work as a WWII veteran, Native rights activist, and dedicated daughter, mother and family member. This includes material from her personal, military and professional life. ...

This collection consists of personal papers and photographs dating from circa 1905-1960 and all relating to U.S. Allotting Agent Ralph Aspaas (1876-1939), his family, his travels around the United States southwest, as well as his work on the Jicarilla Apache Reservation (N.M.) and Tohono O'odham (Papago) Reservation (Ariz.). The bulk of the materia...

The Peratrovich family papers include correspondence, personal papers, and newsclippings related to civil rights work done by Elizabeth and Roy Peratrovich in Alaska in the mid-twentieth century.

Includes Parker's recollections of preliminary efforts in the 1940s to plan a representative and effective pan-Indian organization; of the creation of the National Congress of American Indians and highlights of its history, 1952-1962, when Parker was actively affiliated with it, and Recording Secretary; and of a number of people involved in its initial and continuing stages. Also includes remarks by Helen Peterson, 1953-1961 Executive Director of the organization, concerning the threat of internal pressure to it.

The collection of Kimowan McLain, significant First Nations artist, contains materials related to his artistic practice and his personal life. The materials include not only photographs of his art, completed and in-progress, but also sketchbooks and journal entries that give important context to his major works and artistic practices. The materials range from his early career in the early 1990s as a magazine editor to his solo and group exhibitions to his time as an art professor at various universities and images of his final works in 2011. McLain balanced both Western and Native artistic methods and history in his work, his archive provides valuable insight into the swiftly evolving and often contested world of contemporary Native American art.

Alexander Gardner (1821-1882) was a photographer best known for his portraits of President Abraham Lincoln, his American Civil War photographs, and his photographs of American Indian delegations. This collection contains 61 albumen prints that were shot by Gardner circa 1866-1868 and held in General William T. Sherman's personal collection. Photographs depict American Indian tribes and Peace Commissioners involved in the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty; photographs shot along the Union Pacific Railway, Eastern Division in 1867; and photographs of American Indian delegations visiting Washington, D. C. from 1866-1868.

This collection contains 11 glass plate negatives photographed by Matilda Inez Murphy Sprinkel, circa 1904-1910. Sprinkel and her husband Frederick Kemper Sprinkel were trading post operators and possibly Indian Agents on the Rosebud Reservation when she shot these photographs. It is possible that some of the photographs may have been shot by Frede...

The William Ockleford Oldman Archive research materials are comprised of digital surrogates of the business records of Oldman held by the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. William Ockleford Oldman (1879 – 1949) was a British collector and dealer of ethnographic art and European arms and armour. His business W.O. Oldman, Ethnographical Specimens, London was active between the late 1890s and 1913. These records include detailed information about his purchases and sales of objects including names of original sources for objects he acquired and sold. Oldman dealt extensively with the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, the predecessor institution to the National Museum of the American Indian between 1909 and 1937. This provenance information is critically important to documentation of NMAI's collections and related research.

The Reuben A. Snake, Jr. Papers, located in the Cultural Resource Center of the National Museum of the American Indian, contain writings, correspondence, biographical materials, and written materials relating to the Native American Church which document the literary and political activities of this Winnebago tribal leader.

The Edward S. Curtis photogravure plates and proofs for The North American Indian include photogravure printing plates and associated proofs made from Curtis photographs and used in the publication of The North American Indian volumes 1-9 and 12-19. The bulk of the images are portraits, though there are also images of everyday items, ceremonial artifacts, and camps.