Child Artisans at the Fort Shaw Indian School 1892-1910

Kristi D. Scott

Arts and Craft class at Fort Shaw Indian School, circa 1900. [Montana Historical Society Photograph, MHS 947-400]

Thirteen intricate low-relief woodcarvings were produced over one-hundred years ago by child artisans at the Fort Shaw Industrial Indian School in central Montana. These pieces now reside in the Smithsonian’s vast repositories in Washington DC and were the focus of my master’s thesis in 2009 while at Montana State University. These carvings are an example of material culture serving as portals, taking us to a place in time where the artifacts originated. As we re-imagine the stages of production and subsequent collection, facets of collective memory and individual knowledge are revealed. The carvings have been out of sight from most descendants, community members and mainstream society for so long that they have nearly been forgotten. When further investigated in my thesis, Child Artisans on the Northern Plains: Woodcarving at the Fort Shaw Indian School 1892-1910, each carving revealed intricacies about the lives of the artists who created the wood carvings while students and the individual who collected the group of carvings before they were donated to the national museum. 

Thes child artisans whose carvings are housed at the Smithsonian include Leatha Alder, Assiniboine-Sioux; B. Alvero, Assiniboine-Sioux; Rose Aubrey, Blackfeet; Mollie Buckle, Assiniboine-Sioux; Carolina Heath, Assiniboine-Sioux; Mary Johnson, Blackfeet; Charley Mitchell, Assiniboine-Sioux; Chester Pepion, Blackfeet; Willie Williamson, Blackfeet; Louisa Wirth, Assiniboine; and one unknown artist. Over one hundred years ago these particular child artisans worked skillfully and diligently to create relief carvings that most skilled adults could not emulate.

Star Carving, circa 1900, Artist Louisa Wirth, Assiniboine, Age 12. Photo credit: Kristi D. Scott, National Museum of Natural History, Washington D.C.

While many of the thirteen wood carvings depict floral and floral-like designs, the one made by Louisa Wirth stands out with a geometric design of an eight-pointed star. A perfectly proportioned and well-balanced design sets in the center of Louisa’s 6” x 6” low relief carved wooden plaque. Decorative corners with cut-outs frame the star’s rays, and feature perfectly carved curved interiors. The multi-pointed star appears to rise out of the center of the wood block, with an intricate addition of a smaller, yet similar figure, within the larger star design. Both the larger and smaller star-like figures have beveled edges/planes. The entire composition is framed by a smooth raised quarter inch border around the outside edge of the piece. The background between the border and the star has been skillfully carved away to allow the central design to protrude. A final step may have been the subtle dimpling of the background adding dimension to the completed work.

The creator of the carving featuring the eight-pointed star was Louisa Wirth. She was nine years old and one of the inaugural students who arrived at the government school in Fort Shaw, Montana. A fire at the Fort Peck agency school, located much closer to her family home in the northeastern corner of the state, prompted her transfer to Fort Shaw with two of her sisters. The Wirth sisters, Lizzie, Louisa and Nettie, joined the first group of students who arrived at the military fort turned new school in December of 1892. Additional background about Louisa’s life can be gleaned from Linda Peavy and Ursula Smith’s publication about the girls’ basketball team from Fort Shaw who traveled to the World’s Fair in 1904. Louisa’s older sister, Lizzie, is featured in their book as one of the championship female basketball players. A separate conversation with Bill Thomas, the great- grandnephew of the Wirth sisters, revealed that Louisa was a child of an Assiniboine mother and a German father. Mr. Thomas shared with me that Louisa Wirth navigated two distinct worlds from a very young age. Wirth’s carving investigate in this account of the groupings from Fort Shaw is especially significant as the eight-pointed star is culturally linked to Assiniboine and Lakota people. While the creation of this carving is merely a glimpse at one of the many experiences that Lousia Wirth had over her lifetime, it communicates a great deal about courses offered to female students at Fort Shaw and her own artistic aptitude.                              

Alfred C. Hawley (1838-1911) was a veteran of the Civil War who later served as an agent for the Department of Indian Affairs. Among Hawley’s accomplishments are a noteworthy compilation of Indian artifacts that include these carvings, which reside in the Smithsonian’s anthropology collections. The group of wood carvings were donated to the Smithsonian in the 1930s by the family of Hawley yet are deeply embedded in the federal educational saga that began several decades earlier. The woodcarvings were created at the school and then collected by Hawley, who visited the Blackfeet Reservation during the school’s tenure. They have not been entirely out of sight to the American public since their donation to the Smithsonian. Blackfeet historian and Smithsonian curator, John C. Ewers mentions two examples carved by male students in his work on Plains Indian Sculpture. My thesis and subsequent talk September 14, 2024, is unique in that it considers boarding school artifacts as visual narratives or texts that fit into the expanding field of material culture studies. The intersecting lives of students, instructors, curators and researchers culminate in a single artifact at times that present a continuum of experiences, stories and values.

More information about the Fort Shaw carvings and child artisans can be found at the links below:

Wood Carvings at the Smithsonian: https://www.si.edu/search/collection-images?edan_q=fort%20shaw&edan_fq%5B0%5D=place%3A%22Fort%20Shaw%20Indian%20School%22

“Child artisans of the northern plains: woodcarving at Fort Shaw Indian School, 1892-1910” Master’s Thesis by Kristi D. Scott:  https://scholarworks.montana.edu/items/cf58ff8b-f8dc-4a06-9568-c8bae4e946f9