HISTORY INTO ART AND ANTHROPOLOGY - Snite Museum of Art ...

Fig. 8
Shred of Sword Bearer’s shirt in bottle.
Department of Anthropology, University of Notre Dame
The aggrandizement of this Indian skull as a “relic” suggests Lindesmith’s rationale
for such theft and also reflects the attitude that shaped his cataloguing practices.
In recording the artifacts he gathered, the collector noted the provenance as well
as what he considered the historical and/or cultural significance of each item. For
example, his notes accompanying the Lakota remains and burial plank mentioned
at the beginning of this essay include the assertion that “the reason for placing the
dead on trees or posts is to prevent wolves from getting at them.” 25 His comment
reflects ignorance of the spiritual context of the scaffold-burial custom and its
importance in Lakota culture. In this and other instances, Lindesmith imposed his
own beliefs and biases onto his descriptions.
Father Lindesmith was one of many Euro-Americans who gathered and catalogued
Western and Native American artifacts, most notably Meriwether Lewis, William
Clark, George Armstrong Custer, and the artist Frederic Remington. These collectors’
historical legacies depended in large part upon perpetuating romantic notions
of the West by means of the region’s material culture. Like Custer and Remington,
Lindesmith used artifacts to legitimize myth and mold his own identity. His notes
for the squirrel rifle he loaned to a neighbor during the Civil War illustrate this
tendency:
When during the Civil War, David Todd, governor of Ohio, called on the
Squirrel hunters of the state to hasten at once to the line of danger, against
the approaching Confederate Army. Andrew Sothammer came running,
late at night, almost out of breath to get my rifle. Of course I let him
have it, and all the bullets, lead and powder I had, along with the bullet
mold. We spend [sic] a good part of the night in molding bullets; and on
the following morning, he and other squirrel hunters took the first train
for the front in defense of the Union, the State of Ohio, and the City of
Cincinnati. This is the rifle. 26
Although the U.S. Army had denied Lindesmith the opportunity to serve in the
war, the loaned squirrel rifle, which saw use during the conflict, provided evidence
to help authenticate his loyalty to the Union cause. This example is one of many
demonstrating how Lindesmith redefined himself through his collection.
Going west offered Lindesmith an opportunity to feel, act, and serve as an American.
And as a priest, marginalized by rampant sentiment that sought to cast Catholics as
un-American, he regarded his Western adventure as proof positive of his identity
as a stalwart citizen. 27 Lindesmith sought to defend Catholicism against the roiling
anti-Catholic movement by conflating his religion with material culture. He firmly
believed that the acquisition and display of objects resonated with a meaning
relevant to marginalized Catholics, who would embrace evidence that proved they
were American and that might hinder discrimination and violence (fig. 9).
Lindesmith’s characterization of the significance of a Catholic altar stone he
obtained in September 1882 offers another example of how he sought to find and
express an American national identity through artifacts:
The broken altar stone was used by Rev. John S. Venneman S. J. on the
Montana missions during 3 years. He had dispensation to use it. He
traveled at least 24 days each month. He gave me the stone. . . . This stone
was carried many thousands of miles, among whites, Indians, soldiers,
trappers, miners, explorers, and frontiers men of every kind on car[t}s,
boats, stages and even muleback and often afoot through almost impenetrable,
mountains, bluffs, cooleys [sic], rocks, canyons, forests, Badlands,
prairies and over rivers without bridges— at all [hours] of the [day] and
night—not knowing at what minute they might fall into the hands of
road-agents or hostile Indians by mistake. 28
For Lindesmith, this traveling altar stone symbolized the rugged, masculine Wild
West and the dangers associated with its unsavory characters and unforgiving
terrain. Possessing it gave him something tangible to help prove that he, like the
stone, had survived the West. Although the object was only about ten inches tall, it
was also, in his words, a “moveable Catholic Church” 29 ; as such, Lindesmith relied
on the story surrounding it as evidence that the Catholic Church deserved recognition
and respect in America’s Western narrative.
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