Pictures of Native Americans (NARA)
A selection of some 200 images that portray Native Americans, their homes and activities. The images come from repositories in the National Archives, mainly the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Bureau of American Ethnology, and the United States Army.
A collection holds over 18,000 photographs (Record Group 75)
Kiowa Anko calendar on buckskin. National Identifier: 523631
Digitized Native American Reservation Records: Photos
Federal agencies, especially the Bureau of Indian Affairs, documented the Native American residents of reservations as well as their living and working conditions. The photos in the entries document daily life, work (especially farming), construction projects, houses, reservation schools, and traditional crafts.
Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (Library of Congress)
Indexes thousands of photographs from the LOC collections. Search for the topic, tribe, or individual of interest.
Native American History and Culture: Finding Pictures
An overview of LOC Prints & Photographs Division visual resources, including photographs, drawings, engravings, lithographs, posters, prints, and architectural drawings, related to North American indigenous communities. Includes search strategies and tips
Photographs of Native Americans (American Antiquarian Society)
The collection features the work of several known photographers including William H. Jackson (1843-1942) and Jack Hillers (1843-1925) as well as many unknown artists and represents thirty-nine tribes. Images span from 1859 to 1910 and come in several different formats, including stereographs, cabinet cards, and cartes-de-visite.
Photographic Collection at the Research Library of the American Museum of Natural History
The collection consists of over one million black-and-white photographs including approximately 850,000 negatives and 900 collections of photographic prints containing 125,000 individual photographs. In addition, there are more than 200,000 color transparencies, including 35 mm slides and over 55,000 lantern slides, many hand-colored, that were once used for lectures and loaned to schools throughout New York State. Digitized items sample various collections held by in the Museum . Use Search to find items of interest.
Mohave man, 1902. Photographer: Ales Hrdlicka.
Object identifier: 41542
Images of Native Americans from Bancroft Library (UC Berkeley)
Some collections in the library are:
Government Surveys - In 1867, the U.S. Congress authorized western explorations in the lands gained by the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and the Mexican–American War in 1848. This produced four great surveys of the West: King (1867), Powell (1869), Hayden (1871), and Wheeler (1872). In addition to cataloging natural resources and mapping the new territories, these surveys recorded the location and population of Indian tribes.
Anthropological Documentation -- In documenting the languages of Californian Indian tribes, C. Hart Merriam took copious photographs, mostly of the people and places he encountered in his field work. The images depict individuals, dwellings, artifacts, and related geographic regions. Some Alaskan and other North American Indian images are also present in his collection.
Indigenous Community Posters - The Intertribal Friendship House (IFH) is one of the oldest and still operating "urban Indian centers" in the United States. In addition to the initial goal to record oral histories of community members, the project also embraces local activities, events, and organizations; hence a collection of posters and other graphic materials that promote various events and other themes pertaining to Native American culture, history, and politics.
The Robert B. Honeyman Jr. Collection of Early Californian and Western American Pictorial Material contains more than 2300 items, ranging from original oil paintings (such as the image depicted below) to engraved souvenir spoons. Scattered throughout are various portrayals of Native Americans.
Denver Public Library Digital Collections
Over 30,000 photographs from the holdings of the Western History and Genealogy Department that illuminate many aspects of the history of the American West.
Photographs of Native American People & Places in Montana (Montana State University)
More than 500 digitized photographs by James W. Schultz, showing Montana's Native American people (including the Arapaho tribe) and places in and around Browning, Montana and Glacier National Park during the early 20th century.
A finding aid to the collection available here
Indian Peoples of the Northern Great Plains Digital Collection
Compiled from the collections of Montana State University, the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, and Little Big Horn College in Crow Agency, Montana, the collection holds photographs, ledger drawings, serigraphs, paintings and other media. The site provides a searchable photograph database.
Plenty Coups, Crow Absorkee Apsaalooka, St. Xavier, Montana, Montana State University. Photographer: Earl Snook. Object Identifier 1906
Photographing the American Indian (The Massachusetts Historical Society)
Presents photographs of Native Americans from the central and western United States collected during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Edward S. Curtis’s The North American Indian (1907-1930)
A 20-volume set including over 1500 illustrations and 700 portfolio plates portraying the traditional customs and lifeways of eighty Indian tribes. The work is organized by tribes and areas encompassing the Great Plains, Great Basin, Plateau Region, Southwest, California, Pacific Northwest, and Alaska.