IDNO

P.8731.ACH1

Description

On Catalogue Card: “Pe-Ji-Grass. Blackfeet.” [typed text]

Full-length profile portrait of Chief John Grass (also known as Pe-Ji, Pah-Zhe, and Mathó Wathákpe (Charging Bear)), a Blackfoot Teton Sioux man. He wears a floor-length feather headdress, dentalium shell neck ornament, a peace medal on a fur band, a knee-length tunic over a white shirt and leggings with decorative beadwork panels down the side, and moccasins. He holds a pipe in his left hand, and a feather fan in his right. [JD 9/1/2007]

Place

N America; United States of America; District of Columbia; Washington D.C.; (North Dakota; Fort Yates)

Cultural Affliation

Native American; Plains; Niisitapi [historically Blackfoot]; Teton Sioux; Blackfeet

Named Person

Pe-Ji (Grass); also known as John Grass (Pah-Zhe), and Mathó Wathákpe (Charging Bear)

Photographer

?Bell, Charles Milton

Collector / Expedition

Date

circa 1888 - 1891

Collection Name

Mounted Haddon Collection

Source

Bureau of American Ethnology

Format

Print Black & White Mounted

Primary Documentation

Other Information

Biographical Information: John Grass was a hereditary chief of the Blackfeet. He was known as the Statemam of the Sioux. He was born on the Grand River about 1837 the son of Charging Bear and a mother who was of the Two Kettle band. John Grass lived on the Reservation at extreme southwest corner of what became Sioux County. He was appointed Chief Justice of the Indian Court at Fort Yates. Chief Grass died on May 10, 1918.
c. 1837-1918. John Grass's English name came from the Dakota "Pezi," meaning "Field of Grass"; he also was sometimes called Mato Wtakpe (Charging Bear). He was a son of Grass, a Sioux leader of the early nineteenth century. He spoke a number of Dakota dialects as well as English, so he was one of the few peaople in the Dakotas who could communicate with nearly everyone else.
Indian agent Major James ("White Hair") McLaughlin set up Grass, Gall, and other Sioux as rival chiefs to Sitting Bull after the latter had surrendered in 1881, in an attempt to break Sitting Bull's influence over the Sioux. Over Sitting Bull's objections, Grass signed an 1889 agreement that broke up the Great Sioux Reservation. He probably was bowing to threats by Indian agent McLaughlin that the U.S. government would take the land with or without Sioux consent. Even after the land was signed over, the government reduced the food allotments on Northern Plains reservations, intensifying poverty and suffering; this action increased tensions just before the massacre of Big Foot's people at Wounded Knee.
For more than three decades, Grass served as head judge in the Court of Indian Offenses of the Standing Rock Reservation. He died at Standing Rock in 1918.
[Source: Famous Indian Chiefs, www.axel-jacob.de/ chiefs17.html, JD 12/4/2007]

Biographical Information: John ‘Charging Bull’ Grass. Birth: 1837. Death: May 10, 1918. Lakota Chief. Born to the Blackfeet Teton band of the Lakota Sioux, son of Pezi, a hereditary Lokota chief. Grass would inherit his position from his father. His warrior name was Ma-tow-a-tak-pe or Charging Bear and he fought at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Grass and Gall served as rivals to Sitting Bull after the latter surrendered in 1881. In 1888 President Grover Cleveland met with Sitting Bull, Gall, and Grass to establish the Standing Rock Agency which was confirmed in 1889 despite Sitting Bull’s negative stance. Grass did not participate in the Ghost Dance, the fear of which led to the death of his rival Sitting Bull. For more than three decades, Grass served as Chief Justice in the Court of Indian Offenses of the Standing Rock Agency at Fort Yates. During the summer of 1913, with 500 in attendance, Chief Grass adopting Alfred Burton Welch, U.S. Army Captain, as his son. Grass died on the Agency at about age 80 and was buried at Fort Yates in the Catholic cemetery. (bio by: Iola) [Source: www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=191, JD 12/4/2007]

Related Image: A portrait of John Grass is held at the National Anthropological Archive, Smithsonian, with the following information:
Creator: Bell, Charles Milton 1848-1893
Title: John Grass 1888
Contained in: Photographs of famous Indians
Phy. Description: 1 photograph Cabinet print
Cite as: Photographic lot 87-2P (part), Smithsonian Institution National Anthropological Archives
Culture: Dakota
Subject-Name: Grass, John Chief
Local Number: NAA INV 10000101, OPPS NEG 33,052
[Source: http://siris-archives.si.edu, JD 12/4/2007]

Related Image: Although there is not a copy of this image on the Smithsonian website, the date of 1888, coincides with when President Grover Cleveland met with Sitting Bull, Gall, and Grass to establish the Standing Rock Agency , in Washington D.C.
A possible second date is the photograph by Charles Milton Bell in February 1891 when a delegation of forty-one Dakota men (including John Grass) visited Washington D.C. Reference NAA OPPS NEG 3307 B. These dates, place names, and photographer’s name have therefore been entered as possiblities for this photograph. [JD 12/4/2007The Photographer field has been amended accordingly. [JD 8/23/2013]

Bibliographical Reference: Alfred Haddon wrote a 32 page typescript memoir 'Among the Blackfeet Indians of Montana', which is in the Haddon Papers in the Manuscripts Room of the Cambridge University Library. It was published by Gidley, Mick (ed.) 1982. 'A. C. Haddon Joins Edward S. Curtis: An English Anthropologist among the Blackfeet, 1909', Montana, Vol. 32, autumn, pp. 20-33. [AH 1/24/2017]

Bibliographical Reference: Anita Herle describes Haddon's Blackfeet research and the 2014 visit to Browning, Montana to return copies of Haddon's photographs and related documents as part of a Leverhulme-funded Blackfoot Network in a joint article: Brown, Alison and Tony Crowford and Anita Herle. 2015. 'Storied Landscapes: Enlivening Blackfoot collections in UK Museums'. Journal of Museum Ethnography. [AH 1/24/2017]

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Jocelyne Dudding 13/4/2007]