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Dispatches from Home: WWII Posters

5/31/2020

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About a month ago, I was on a video call with  members of the Humboldt Bay CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) and one of the members was talking about the necessity of planting a garden in case grocery supply chains were heavily impacted by the current COVID crisis. He mentioned that they worked similar to Victory Gardens in WWII. A few days later, I saw an advertisement somewhere by some garden supply company encouraging people to plant their Victory Gardens, no doubt as some kind of relief from Shelter in Place boredom for customers and slowing sales for the company. I remembered seeing some kind of Victory Garden posters that were produced in WWII, and I was pretty sure were in the Clarke collections. It’s interesting to see when little snippets of history, often disguised as nostalgia pop up here and there, especially in advertising. It’s a powerful tool. Thanks to Mad Men for helping me become more cognizant of that.
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​Last week, I went by the Humboldt County Historical Society with a stack of 57 posters, mostly from WWII. I had been talking the Archivist Jim about doing some kind of joint online exhibit on the posters, including posters from WWI that the Historical Society has in its collections. The main barrier for the Museum was that we didn’t have a way to digitize the posters. I tried a tripod and a camera, but the quality was subpar at best. Thanks to a grant they received a few years ago, the Historical Society has a large format scanner that we could borrow to scan the posters. I had seem them at Humboldt State, but had never used one, so it was a good opportunity to learn something new. It was a good opportunity to test out the equipment, and understand how to work with large files.
​The posters are pretty large, some of them are almost 40 inches wide and are twice as long, while others are smaller. With the exception of about two of them, they are in stellar condition with minimal tape marks or pinholes. I’m not entirely sure that they were ever used.  Most are from Cecile’s original collection, some were donated by individual donors over the years. 
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​These posters are really interesting to spend time looking at, and get more interesting as you learn more about them. They were produced by the Office of War Information to promote full engagement of the civilian population in supporting the war effort however possible. Some were positive, like the “Plant a Victory Garden” or “Buy War Bonds”, asking people to take action with attractive images and artwork. The ones I was most surprised to see were the ones that used fear as a motivating feature to get people to not do something- like talking about anything related to the war effort when outside of work (if you were in a war industry). The phrase “loose lips sink ships” came into being thanks to one of these posters. The idea was that spies for enemy countries could be anywhere, and information on the war effort could lead to incredible losses for the Allies. 
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When Jim and I were going through the posters, I told him that I was pretty sure most were from WWII, but a few WWI posters could be peppered in. I recognized the helmets shown in the pictures below as indicative of WWI era uniforms, but the inclusion of the Jeep and WWII era firearms said otherwise. These details, along with other details we noticed from processing the posters and discussions we had made the 3 hours of scanning feel like they went by very quickly. Some of the thoughts that came up appear in the Clarke's webpage about WWII posters here. 
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​It took some figuring out on how to get the files from the Historical Society to the Clarke, as the files were almost 50 gigabytes of data. I had to get a thumb drive large enough to transfer them over, then convert the files to be small enough they could be shared online. It’s a process I’m still working with, but it’s giving me a chance to learn how to manage collections as they go digital, which will be really important as we continue digitizing.
​I’ve been seeing many people writing about the explosion of digitization that is taking place now that museums and archives are closed to the public. Digitization has been an important and often sidelined part of being in a museum, not so we can get rid of the originals and free up space, but to make materials more accessible to the public. When everything is digitized, if a researcher contacts us for pictures of say, Ferndale, we can do a search on our database, compile the photos, and send them their way. It saves them a trip here, and it saves the photos from being looked through and potentially damaged (minute damage happens even when the most careful people handle items!). it also allows us to reprint images for exhibits, postcards, and other uses without needing to rescan images.
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​Since we’re closed to the public and not running events, we have some breathing room to take on these long range, necessary projects that are all the more important now that people are staying home and looking for things to do, like maybe research for a historical article they’ve always wanted to write. It’s a way for us to continue engaging the public even though they can’t physically be here.
So, without further ado, I’ve included a few of the posters we’ve scanned in this article and below. My plan is to get all of them up on our WWII memorial webpage, which can be seen here, but it may take some time. So here’s a teaser! Click on any of the photos below for a larger image. 
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Dispatches from Home: Cool Runnings(tories)

5/25/2020

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I try to get clever with the titles for these blog posts, this one may just be a little over the top. But maybe it worked as an eyecatcher? Anyway, you're here now, so let's get on with it!
Unfortunately, as far as I know, Humboldt County hasn't had a bobsled team, but we have had a good number of sports stars come out of our region. I like to think that it's because there's so much room out here and clean air compared to other parts of the state, making it a great place to get out and get some fresh air (when the weather is nice!). Today, I'll be sharing some stories of locally, nationally, and internationally famous runners and sports races. Go ahead and curl up on the couch with a cozy blanket for some Cool Runnings(tories).

"Cinder-Elta" - The Story of Elta Cartwright

​In the 1920s, women were not legally entitled to participate in sports teams at school, including universities (the famous Title IX made access to women’s sports a rights in the 1970s) as women’s participation in sports was thought to be unladylike. Men’s sports were plentiful, but it was usually due to perseverance or incredible successes that women’s sports were established. In the 1920s, a woman named Elta Cartwright helped to elevate the place of women’s running in Humboldt County and became the first woman to be on the United States Olympic track team.
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​Elta Cartwright was born in Eureka, CA on December 21, 1907. She graduated from Eureka High School in 1924 and moved on to Humboldt State Teacher’s College, as Humboldt State University was known as then, to train to be a teacher. She was known for her speed as a sprinter and, in an interview from the 1980s, mentioned that she had looked at going to school at Stanford, but didn’t because there weren’t adequate running facilities there for someone who wanted to train for the Olympics. Elta won her first national track meet in 1925, along with a 1926 national track meet in Philadelphia. Due to her rising star status, the 1927 national track meet was held at Eureka High School, Elta's home track. This track was made of cinder, earning Elta the nickname "Cinder-Elta".
​Elta’s Coach, Laura Herrion, took racers from Humboldt State to New Jersey to try out for the Olympics in 1926, where she tied for the world record in the 100 meter dash, at 12.6 seconds and made the Olympic team. She was known by many at the time as the greatest woman athlete in America at the time.
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​The Olympics in 1928 were held in Amsterdam, and the team had to take a boat across the Atlantic to get there from the east coast. The boat offered little in terms of space for practice, but some running did take place on board during the 5 day voyage. Unfortunately, Elta was seasick and didn’t end up qualifying for the semi-finals. Elta’s coach, although she wasn’t allowed to attend, sent a bouquet of roses to Elta following the conclusion of the race with a note “as in defeat, so in victory.” The coach for the team, according to Elta, favored his own racers on the team and didn’t allow a recovered Elta to race in the relay team, which made it to the semi-finals against Canada.
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When she returned to Eureka, Elta received a hero’s welcome, with a decorated train to pick her up and take her from San Francisco to Eureka, and a parade. She quit racing upon returning and became a teacher.
​Elta, while she was still in school, taught for a time in Petrolia. In a recorded interview, Elta mentioned that one of her motivating forces for becoming not only a teacher but a great teacher was from a comment made by her supervisor, a Mr. Finnity, who said that her sisters were better teachers than she would ever be. She spent her career teaching and passed away in 2001.
Elta was inducted into the HSU Athletics Hall of Fame in 1959, and was the first woman to be inducted.

The Redwood Empire Indian Marathon

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​The year was 1927. Highway 101 connecting the rural Northern California coast was completed about a year ago, and tourism to the area needed some encouragement. The Redwood Empire Association, made up of the chambers of commerce of towns along the 101 including San Francisco, Eureka, and Grant’s Pass were looking for a sensation to attract media attention to the area- and tourists. 
​Thus the Redwood Indian Marathon was devised. It was a 480 mile run from San Francisco’s City Hall to Grant’s Pass, all along the 101. The Redwood Empire Association thought one additional component would attract extra attention- if the race was limited to Native American runners. This wasn’t an unusual publicity stunt, and demonstrations of Native Americans running long distance happened in the southwest around the turn of the century. Some Hopi runners were noted to have run 130 miles in 24 hours. The popularity of these runs for spectators was growing in 1926 and usually took place at fairs. A plan was devised to bring the publicity-generating run to the recently completed (but still partially dirt) Redwood Highway. 
Click here to see a silent movie advertisement to encourage visitation to the Redwood Empire
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From the Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection. this is an image of Native American men running at the Coliseum in Los Angeles. It includes a description: "Here we see Indians from the Sherman Institute at Riverside, with their ancestors' hardihood and endurance, running in the Los Angeles Coliseum. Will one of these Americans win in the Olympic? The Olympic marathon is about 26 miles, the distance of the original marathon of 490 B.C., when Philippides ran to Athens with news of the Greeks' victory over the Persians at Marathon, cried, "Joy, we win," and fell dead. Photo dated: February 25, 1927."
​Marketing for the race leaned heavily on racial stereotypes about Native individuals – one advertisement for the race claimed that the race would be “Like a flash-back to the days when red braves sped overland afoot with messages from tribe to tribe will be the scene presented by these genuine tribesmen pressing on almost continuously for from ten to fifteen days to reach their goal.”
​For the Redwood Indian Marathon, 11 individuals signed up, 4 were from the Karuk Tribe, and three of those were brothers: John, Gorhum and Marion Southard. Henry Thomas was the fourth Karuk tribe runner. Organizers wanted to make the men seem “authentically Indian” so they gave them running personas like “Mad Bull” and “Flying Cloud”.  Three runners were brought in from the Zuni tribe in New Mexico and sponsored by different counties in California. Images of five of the runners are shown below:
​The rules were simple- the runners had to make it from San Francisco to Grant’s Pass. Each could have a supply car, and could set their running and resting schedules. While they had the option of staying in hotels along the route, most chose to stay alongside the road. The main rule was that the runners had to stay on the Redwood Highway and could not catch a ride from motor vehicles.
​Along the route, various pranks were pulled, with residents dressing up as runners and passing through towns hours before the actual runners did, causing whole towns to run out in the streets and cheer the “runner”, then being shocked and confused when the actual runners came into town.  This happened at least twice, once in Geyserville and once in Arcata.
​Since long distance communication was unavailable on the more remote parts of the route, the organizers decided that the communication could be done through smoke signals (in sticking with the stereotyped "Native American-esque" theme of the race). There were telegraph lines in towns along the route so those were more frequently used.
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Petaluma Egg Basket. California State Library.
​Along the road, towns gave the runners gifts of cash for being the first runner through the town, eggs (in the case of Petaluma, which was known for its egg production at the time), and prunes from Healdsburg.
Click here for a video of the runners making their way through Richardson's Grove in Southern Humboldt
​It was a long race to say the least. After day 4 of running, it was a five-man race, as most runners had fallen far behind or dropped out due to exhaustion or injury (one was hit on the back with a camera tripod and later had to drop out from injury). John Southard and Henry Thomas were the frontrunners, but eventually Southard pulled ahead and completed the race in 7 days, 12 hours, and 34 minutes. Thomas came in second eight hours after Southard arrived in Grant’s Pass. The third and fourth place runners arrived the next day, and the 5th-7th place runners arrived sometime after 9 days, and their times were not recorded. Four runners dropped out of the race.
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Elta Cartwright shakes hands with "Flying Arrow", one of the racers during the 1928 Redwood Empire Indian Marathon.
​The race was held again the following year, and Thomas won. A third race was in the works when the stock market crashed, dragging tourism down with it.
In 1987, the race was run again by members of the Grant’s Pass High School and at the end of the race John Southard was waiting to congratulate them.

Sources:

Elta Cartwright Articles
https://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/ca/elta-cartwright-1.html
https://hsujacks.com/honors/humboldt-state-athletics-hall-of-fame/elta-cartwright/5

Redwood Indian Marathon articles
https://oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/indian_redwood_marathon_redwood_empire_run_/#.XrM-PahKiUk
This article as a day-by day breakdown of the race, and is definitely worth a read!
https://ultrarunninghistory.com/redwood-indian-marathon/
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Dispatches from Home: Humboldt County and the Humble Hot Air Balloon

5/17/2020

3 Comments

 
In the decades leading up to and just after the turn of the century, Humboldt County residents and visitors took to the skies in an innovative but also scary way - hot air balloons. As Jim Garrison, Archivist for the Humboldt County Historical Society explains below, ballooning was both a beloved spectator sport and incredibly hazardous for those who participated.

The story, for us, begins in the 1880s. Balloon ascensions had been a fad with growing interest in the United States since the earliest domestic ascents in the 1780s. As time went by the "sport" attracted more and more "eccentrics" and thrill-seekers, willing to risk their lives ascending to the clouds in a hot-air or gas-filled balloon. As exhibitions of men flying in balloons became more commonplace, the audiences began to demand more and more. Soon it wasn't enough for an "aeronaut" to simply ascend to the heavens and back again; they needed to see something more daring, more thrilling, and more dangerous. ​
By the 1880s, performers needed to put on much more elaborate shows. Balloonists, who frequently granted themselves the title “Professor” to add a scientific air of intrigue to their shows, flirted with disaster, performing death-defying acrobatics while suspended on a trapeze, before cutting away from the balloon and parachuting to the ground, often while performing more acrobatics! ​
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"Godfrey's Balloon Ascension, Fortuna 1911" Humboldt State University Special Collections
They used special balloons, set up quite differently from a modern Hot-Air or Gas Balloon. They typically had no basket like we are accustomed to seeing, and they had no safety straps, or harnesses; performers worked largely untethered, relying on the strength of their arms to keep them from plummeting to earth and an early grave. For more than a few this was not enough, and newspaper headlines and shocking stories of tragic accidents followed these spectacles wherever they went.
Humboldt County was no exception when it came to the ballooning craze, and audiences flocked to see the aeronauts perform in communities throughout Humboldt County - Eureka, Samoa, Arcata, Blue Lake, Ferndale, Fortuna, Rohnerville, Loleta, Garberville, and Hupa all advertised balloon ascensions between the 1880s and the 1910s. ​
It is not entirely clear when the earliest ascension took place in Humboldt County. The big event might have occured sometime in the Summer of 1889. "Professor" E.T. Owings was to launch his balloon from Eureka's Union Street ball park on the Fourth of July, but had to cancel when the balloon burst while being filled. The event was rescheduled for August 10th, but, just as the balloon was about to launch, someone "accidently" let out the gas. It is unclear at this date whether Professor Owings ever lived up to his promise to launch a balloon in Humboldt - but I’ll keep looking!

Con Artists, Stunts, and Pet Monkeys"
The Story of Miss Hazel Keyes and Jennie Yan Yan

The daredevils who put on these performances were typically working the crowds in some way to try to get more money for their show. Sometimes their time was paid for by the group that commissioned them for the event, but other times the aeronauts solicited contributions directly from the crowd to make it worth their time. Often they would have a gimmick.
​This was the case for the next aeronaut to make the news in our county: Miss Hazel Keyes. Miss Keyes had a long and successful ballooning career, making 150 ascents during the 1890s. Miss Keyes had a couple of partners over her years as an aeronaut, including her first and second husbands, who sometimes posed as a rival, partner, brother or other character in their attempts to put on a show for the audience. She was mostly known, however, for taking a pet monkey named Jennie Yan Yan, on her ascents. Jennie Yan Yan had her own parachute and jumped alongside Keyes.
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Hazel Keyes, Oregon Historical Society
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Keyes and Jennie Yan Yan posing with their balloon and parachuting equipment in a studio. Oregon Historical Society.
In 1891 Miss Keyes was to have launched from the South Park Race Track in Eureka on March 17th. According to the Ferndale Enterprise, the crowd had to celebrate St. Patricks Day without seeing Miss Keyes risk her life, as the ascension was called off, either from high wind or a burst balloon, depending on what paper you read. One witness claimed the balloon was set loose after the wind picked up, carrying away some of the staging it had been attached to, and “nearly killing” a small boy in the crowd. Keyes went on to perform for Humboldt crowds the following week when she ascended and made a parachute jump from 800 feet. Keyes may have jumped at only 800 feet to avoid being blown too far from where she wanted to land.
The performer was scheduled to make an ascension and parachute jump from the North Spit the next Sunday, however, before the launch the performer and her “brother” engaged in a very public, and expletive-laced, argument about who would make the ascent. During their theatrics the balloon was “accidently” let go, and the launch fizzled while the crowds shouted “fake!” Keyes and her “brother” left town on the next steamer. Hazel Keyes would continue on the balloon circuit for five more years, making her last recorded ascent in South Dakota in 1896.
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A poster advertising Keye's performance in Washington State in 1893. Washington State Historical Society

A Near Miss for "Professor" Hagal

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Balloon being filled with hot air. Humboldt State Special Collections.
In 1892 an aeronaut named Frank P. Hagal (also Hagle) made a series of balloon ascensions around the county. Beginning with a June ascension and parachute descent in Samoa, Hagal followed with two launches in Ferndale. The “professor” filled his balloon on the school house grounds and rose to a height of only four-hundred feet before parachuting to the ground, amazing and delighting the Cream-City spectators.
Hagal next visited Rohnerville on July 30th, 1892, where things did not go quite as smoothly. Hagal filled his hot-air balloon and was just beginning his ascent when members of the crowd saw that the balloon was on fire and shouted, alerting the aeronaut of his peril. Hoping he could climb high enough to safely parachute before the balloon collapsed, Hagal stuck with the balloon hanging on until the last second. Too soon the fire burned through and Hagal was dashed violently to the ground from a height of a hundred feet! The “professor’s” insensible form was collected and taken to his hotel, where it was discovered that he would live to risk his life another day. ​
Hagal made several more ascensions in Humboldt including launches in Fortuna, Eureka, and Samoa in September of 1892. For a time Hagal worked with his daring wife Nellie, a working-class girl who quit her waitressing job to tour the balloon circuit with Hagal before marrying him. The marriage was short-lived and ended in tragedy when Nellie was killed when her parachute failed during a show in Monrovia, California in 1895.

Humboldt County's Worst Balloon Accident

In 1897, Humboldt County had its worst Balloon accident, resulting in the tragic death of George Weston Daggett and an assistant T.P. Tapscott. The services of “Professor Weston” had been secured by the Eureka Fourth of July Committee to perform a balloon ascension, parachute jump, and a slack-line exhibition for the holiday.
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It had been decided that, on account of the wind, the launch would be made from a sheltered point on 12th Street, between the alder trees. On the appointed hour the “Professor” and a crew of helpers arrived at the chosen destination, along with a crowd of hundreds of onlookers. The balloon was inflated and at the order to let it go it shot into the air, carrying not just Weston, but also, T.P. Tapscott, an unfortunate assistant who had been caught up in the ropes.
The balloon soared into the air, forcefully jerking Tapscott off of his feet and into the air. Weston had not anticipated having the weight of two men on this flight, and the balloon failed to achieve sufficient altitude in time to avoid a collision with the alder trees. Tapscott fell from the ropes entangling him, dropping to the ground from a height of some twenty-five feet. Landing on his head, Tapscott sustained brain injuries and a compound fracture of his leg. Weston was dragged by the balloon through the alder trees before falling from his trapeze, and sustained major injuries himself, including fractured ribs and head injuries. Both men died in the hospital later that night. ​

Summertime Entertainment: A Schedule of Performances Held in 1899

Humboldt had multiple aeronauts to choose from when “professor” Tom E. Godfrey and “professor” Richard Earlston (sometimes Earlson) both brought their acts to communities around the county in the summer of 1899. Earlston started it off with an ascent in Garberville on June 10th, followed by another on July 5th. It is likely that the “prof” did more jumps somewhere between these two events, but either the local news sources didn’t cover it, or I just haven’t found it yet!
Earlston made an ascension and parachute landing again in Rio Dell on the 16th of July, followed by a show in Ferndale on the 23rd. The balloon rose to a height of about fifteen-hundred feet, the “professor” doing stunts on his trapeze perch during the ascent, before parachuting to a landing in Francis Field behind the Catholic Church.
On the 30th of July Earlston ascended to a height of 2,500 feet, in a launch from Blue Lake. To his dismay, Earlston found his knife to be too dull to cut his parachute away and was forced to ride the balloon to the ground. Although this is the accepted practice for balloonists today, the daredevils of the late Victorian Era were much safer landing with a parachute, which they could control to some degree. More than one balloonist was dragged by their out-of-control balloon, and some were killed or maimed in a bad landing.
On August 12th of 1899 Earlston made another ascent from Ferndale, followed by one in Fortuna the following afternoon. These jumps apparently went off without a hitch, however, the Ferndale Enterprise speculated after each on how many times the “professor” could go on to press his luck before being killed. ​
Earlston next appears in the local papers on August 23rd of the following year (1900), when it is reported by the Ferndale Enterprise that he had been convicted of vagrancy in Ukiah and sentenced to serve 60 days in jail. This was not the “professor’s” first run-in with the law; in 1897 he had run afoul of the police after running away and eloping with 14-year-old Bulla Minot in Los Angeles. ​
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Tom E. Godfrey performed for Humboldt County audiences in 1899 as well, making balloon ascensions and parachute jumps at Campton’s Park near Rohnerville, and other locations around the county and state. Godfrey’s career seems to have lasted for quite a while; his name appearing in papers around the state with some frequency between 1898 and 1912, particularly in the Colusa area. ​

Stay safe out there, everyone, and don't forget to share this with your friends! Special thanks to Jim Garrison at the Humboldt County Historical Society for this riveting and fascinating glimpse into Humboldt County's past! You can learn more about the Historical Society through their website here
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Dispatches from Home: Baskets, Baskets, Baskets!

5/3/2020

1 Comment

 
A few years ago, before I started working at the museum, I was wandering around Old Town and I stopped by to visit the Clarke Museum. I checked out the Main Hall and went into Nealis Hall, where I was faced with literally hundreds of baskets of all shapes, sizes, and colors. I walked through the exhibits but when I walked out, I felt like how one feels when they are walking through a forest that they aren't familiar with and someone asks them what kind of plants they saw. I once heard a professor somewhere over at HSU refer to a similar feeling as experiencing the "green blur" while driving down the road.

I knew I saw baskets, but the sheer numbers made it hard to comprehend what I had seen. It wasn't until I started working at the Museum and started learning more about the collections that I began to see the things that made not only different types of baskets different from one another, but recognizing individual baskets. I've come to a much greater appreciation and understanding of the baskets through learning more about them and their regional importance. Of course, there's always more to learn about them, their makers, and the context of their creation and use.

So here's a handy basic identification guide for the next time you come in the museum or visit another one of our local museums that has basketry on display. Keep in mind these are general guidelines- weavers definitely do new things with time, inspiration, and the influence of external forces so there are baskets out there that don't fit into the general identification criteria.

Baby Baskets

​Baby baskets are probably one of the most recognizable baskets in the collection due to their open weave structure (which also floats in water) , their slipper shape, and lifeline. Children would be tied into the baskets with fabric or furs, and baskets also frequently include an openweave dish that shades the child from the sun. they can be worn in a backpack like fashion for transportation. The lifeline is strip of leather or twine with beads, shells, obsidian, or other materials that goes above the baby to represent who the baby is, protect them, and offer some entertainment for the child while they are in the basket.  The basket even includes an option for a disposable diaper- moss goes in the pointed part of the “slipper” for use as a diaper.
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Cooking Baskets

These typically medium sized baskets feature a raised band that goes around the center of the basket and designs that are typically in tan or light brown rather than red or black. They are made with spruce root, which expands when it comes in contact with water, making the baskets virtually waterproof.

Eating Bowls

​These bowls resemble the size of modern ceramic bowls, and also feature the strengthening center band from cooking baskets.
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Cooking basket on left, eating bowl on right. This cooking basket may have been made for the trade, as it lacks a strengthening band.

Storage Baskets

These can range in size, much like how plastic tubs used for storage today range in size. The largest storage baskets may be 3 feet tall and 2-3 feet wide to hold acorns for storage or large items, while smaller ones may be around a a foot wide and a foot tall. Patterns and colors vary, but tend to be a bit more plain.
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Hopper Baskets

Hopper baskets are used in processing acorns. They have a reinforced hole in the bottom, steep incline, a rock is placed underneath it. While they may appear to be broken baskets that are repurposed, they are made specifically for this purpose. 
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Flour Trays

Flour trays are large and circular, and are used for leeching bitter tannins out of ground acorns. They can closely resemble gambling trays, and oftentimes it's hard to tell the difference between the two. Made for the trade flour trays are often incredibly detailed in their design work.
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Gambling Trays

Gambling trays can come in different sizes and, as previously mentioned, closely resemble flour trays. They are circular and detailed in their design work.
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Tobacco Baskets​

​Tobacco baskets can be identified quickly- they are usually egg or teardrop shape with a lid that ties on usually with leather straps. Designs can vary greatly. They are usually one of two sizes, small or large. Traditionally, small baskets were for carrying tobacco on the go and larger ones were for tobacco storage at home. The tobacco cultivated in this region is not the same as tobacco cultivated on the East Coast, it is a local variety.
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Trinket Baskets

The term trinket basket covers a wide swath of sizes and designs of baskets. Structurally, they generally lack the strengthening band that appears on eating bowls and cooking baskets. The designs are usually more elaborate, can include innovative elements, and are sometimes not even circular but oval. They oftentimes include black work made from maidenhair fern, bear grass dyed with alder bark, or porcupine quills dyed with wolf moss. Some include open weave elements, lids or handles, especially on post-contact baskets.
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Caps

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​Basket Caps are frequently mistaken for overturned bowls- however they lack the strengthening band at the center of the basket but oftentimes have one near the lower rim. Design work is featured on the top, middle section, and lower sections of caps (particularly for fancy caps) while some caps are plain (like work caps). Fancy caps include detailed design work, and sometimes feature dentalium shells, beads, or woodpecker scalps. Some weavers interviewed in the 1980s said that porcupine quills dyed yellow with wolf moss were used for weddings, but that might not hold true for all weavers, families, or villages. Some work caps in the Clarke collection were made with spruce root that would swell when it came into contact with water, allowing the cap to be used to hold water.
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Miniature Baskets

​Miniature baskets are simply identified by their size- small! They are oftentimes mini versions of larger baskets. They take a lot of skill and dexterity to make.
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Carrying Baskets

​Carrying baskets can be identified a few ways. They are open weave- made of sticks and open- you can see through them. They can be circular and tall or circular and short with handles,  some are cone shaped and include a leather strap worn on the forehead. They are used in the collection of acorns, carrying supplies like firewood, and transporting other items.
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Wall Mats

​Wall mats are decorative weavings usually hung on the wall. They provide weavers an opportunity to try new designs and an opportunity for new weavers to practice skills. The outer rims of the mats are usually arching sticks woven into one another.
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Medallions

Medallions are small, circular woven pieces that appear typically on necklaces, but can also appear on hair barrettes and other personal adornments. 
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Post-Contact Basketry Work

Basketry made post contact continues to use traditional designs, innovative weaving patterns, and baskets woven for the trade. This kind of work includes baskets made in the Victorian period that catered to Victorian-era purchasing habits and sentiments (Collecting Native-made items for curio cabinets). Weavers were also inspired by the changing world around them , incorporating post-contact materials into their weaving work. 
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Dispatches from Home: Let's Take a Trip to the World's Fair

5/1/2020

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It crosses my mind about once a week how it would be absolutely great to go on a road trip. Gas is cheap, the weather is getting nicer - and then I remember that there's a pandemic and we all need to stay home to get this thing over with. So this week, I went through the archives and looked for some things relating to the World's Fair and Humboldt County's presence in three of them. Humboldt County made a showing in these fairs to help promote tourism and travel to the region as travel became easier, safer, and faster.
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​The World’s Fair, now oftentimes referred to as World Expo, is commonly said to have started in 1851, when the United Kingdom hosted “The Great Exhibition” which showed off the manufacturing prowess of the United Kingdom at the time. People from across the country and around the world came to this and future expositions to learn about new advancements, different cultures (although oftentimes the cultural exhibits were racially biased and skewed), and new places. Humboldt County shows up in at least three Expositions: The 1893 Chicago World’s Fair (also known as the Columbian Exposition), the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco, and the Golden Gate International Exposition in 1939.

The 1893 Chicago World's Fair

​The fair opened May 1, 1893 and closed October 30, 1893 and took place at Jackson Park on the shores of Lake Michigan. Each state had its own building that housed exhibits- California’s was a 3 story Mission-style building that was the second largest in the fair after Illinois. The State sent 156 train car loads to Chicago to fill the display. Like all of the buildings built for this exposition and many buildings in other expositions, the buildings were made to be temporary. For the Humboldt County exhibit, the organizers got $5500 from the Board of Supervisors and local businesses, which totals to about $155,000 in today’s money. County residents Frank A Wick and John Dolbeer of Steam Donkey fame, nominated fellow resident Martha Herrick to lead the exhibit setup.
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​Herrick was born December 11, 1841 in South Bend, Indiana. Family history traces her lineage back to a Brigadier-General who helped George Washington sign treaties with local tribes. Martha went to St. Mary’s College. She arrived in California in 18589 via Panama to visit a sick brother and married Rufus F. Herrick in San Jose the following year. Her husband worked with local native people. According to Leigh Irvine, who wrote a biography on Herrick along with dozens of other notable Humboldt County Citizens in 1915, Mrs. Herrick and her husband “together... did much for the red men, treating them with kindness and consideration, protecting their rights and at all times according them justice and fair treatment” and were given the “most of the wonderful collection of Indian relics”. 

​Mrs. Herrick was well known for her knowledge on local tribes and according to Irvine,
​“ received gold and silver medals from the Anthropological Societies of the United States and England for her knowledge of the lost arts of the Indians. She is the author of a treatise on the habits and customs of the Indians of Humboldt county (extracts from which were published in the Ethnological Bureau of Smithsonian Institution), which is recognized as an authority on Indian sanitation. Another work along this line is now being compiled by her, its publication being eagerly awaited by those interested in Indian lore, Mrs. Herrick being recognized as the best authority on the history of the Indians in the Humboldt district, as well as on the general county history.”
​With those kinds of accolades, it’s no surprise that Dolbeer and Wick picked out Herrick to run the Humboldt County exhibit, as items from local Native people were popular display pieces at the time due to the prevailing assumption that local native cultures were on the cusp of disappearing completely across the country. Humboldt County of course was a hard place to travel to and these expositions provided a glimpse (granted a biased one towards the settler perspective) into the culture and lifestyles of the area.
​Herrick took up the job and with a full time assistant and part time assistant, constructed an exhibit in a 1300 foot space representing Humboldt County. Herrick wasn’t the only Humboldt County resident representing at the fair – A.W. Ericson was the fair’s official photographer.
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A photo of the Humboldt County Exhibit courtesy of the Humboldt Room/Special Collections at Humboldt State University
​The exhibit brought the Humboldt county ‘wilderness’ to the Chicago fair, filling the space with taxidermied animals, ferns and other living local plants, rocks, native artifacts and displays of foods from the area, including “vegetables of unusual size”. Herrick was also able to secure one of Seth Kinman’s presidential Elk Antler chairs, whalebone chair, and Kinman’s famous mule skull fiddle. Herrick received an award for her exhibit and remained in Chicago through the duration of the fair leading tours and giving lectures.
​At the end of the fair, the money raised in the county had run out before Herrick had a chance to get her return ticket home, so she had to sell some of her collections she had brought with her to raise enough money. Some of the baskets sold because the base of the collection at the Field Museum. Herrick attempted to be reimbursed by the county for the money she had to spend to get back to Humboldt County, but the Supervisors denied her the money.

The 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition

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​In 1915, the World's Fair was hosted in San Francisco, under the title of the Panama Pacific International Exposition. The fair was to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal and an opportunity for San Francisco to share their recovery from the devastating 1906 earthquake. 
​Humboldt County participated in a few different ways-
  • There was a “Humboldt County Day” celebrating Humboldt County residents who descended on the fair en masse.
  • Humboldt County also had an exhibit which included the redwood log that later became the Stump House and the Lentell Map which is now on display at the Clarke.
  • A local Yurok  woman trained as a nurse in San Francisco led the parade the opening day of the Exposition. Her name was Bertha Thompson and the article discussing her, penned by Emma Freeman, made the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle.
​The Humboldt County display contained images from Emma Freeman’s California Indian portrait series (which can be most easily found in Peter Palmquist’s With Natures Children), items representing Humboldt County’s incredibly diverse and plentiful agricultural industry, and images of the redwood forests. Souvenir books and pamphlets were also produced for these fairs lauding the natural, cultural, and industrial features of the area.
The following photos are glimpses into some of the booklets of images sold at the Exposition- cameras were not common features of the tourist outfit yet, so people purchased books, programs, and postcards to share views of the exposition with their friends and families back home. Click on the photos to view larger versions!

The Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939

​The 1939 fair, the Golden Gate International Exposition took place in San Francisco on Treasure Island, which was dramatically altered to host the event. This exposition celebrated the completion of the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco-Oakland Bridge. A notable aspect of this exposition was that, according to one news story,  a 364 foot tall redwood tree, noted as the world’s tallest tree, was brought to be put on exhibit in the Redwood Empire building, which housed the Humboldt County exhibit.
Booklets from this event highlight that access to the "Redwood Empire" was easier than ever with the addition of the traffic-free Golden Gate Bridge.
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A promotional video for the World's Fair
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