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orn in a tipi on the plains of southwestern Oklahoma, Hor- ace Poolaw (1906–1984) en- deavored to be a photographer from the time he was a teenag- er. He left school after the sixth


grade and apprenticed himself to professional photographers in his hometown of Mountain View in order to learn the trade. The young Kiowa man succeeded in documenting his multi-tribal community from the 1920s to the 1970s, when his eyesight finally failed him. He created a vast record of local history, leaving behind more than 2,000 negatives, most of which have never been developed, much less exhibited. Many of these images can be seen in the National Museum of the American Indian’s current exhibition, For a Love of His People: The Photography of Horace Poolaw (on view at the Museum in New York until Feb. 15, 2015). As we view them today, Poolaw’s images


document a critical point in history – post- reservation, post-missionization, post-forced- acculturation by the U.S. government – when American Indians were relatively invisible in the broader fabric of American society. They also record his great interest in the military, both the warrior traditions of his tribe and the personal service of himself and his family. One of his most prominent subjects was his nephew, First Sergeant Pascal Cleatus Poolaw, who has been called the most decorated American Indian serviceman in the history of the United States military. Through his own service in the military


Horace kneels in front of a P-40 Warhawk at MacDill Field. Tampa, Fla., ca. 1944. 45UFL59


and after, Poolaw photographed veterans’ homecomings, honor dances, Kiowa military societies and even funerals. While events hon- oring veterans may seem almost common- place in an America today that has endured more than a decade of war, during Poolaw’s era they were the center of community life. The particular prominence of the military in Poolaw’s photographs speaks not only of the legacy of military commitment that defined his generation, but of a martial history that is uniquely Kiowa.


SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 11


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