FROM CARD: "...WHALE EFFIGY SET WITH ABALONE.=NISHGA (NISGA'A). WHALE EFFIGY: LOANED: 4/18/1967 VANCOUVER ART GALLERY. RETURNED: 12/12/1967. LOANED: NATL. INSTIT. OF HEALTH 5/1/71. RETURNED: 11/9/71. LOANED: WHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART 9/10/1971. RETURNED: 2/9/72. LOANED TO THE S.I. CENTENNIAL COMM. 7-9-75. LOAN RETURNED MAR 22 1990. LOAN: CROSSROADS. SEP 22 1988. ILLUS. CROSSROADS OF CONTINENTS CATALOGUE; FIG. 374, P.273. LOAN RETURNED: JAN 21 1993." "Amulet depicting a sea creature, probably a whale" according to Crossroads of Continents, illus. Pl. 231, p. 269. "Killer whale amulet made from walrus ivory."Described p. 302 in Barbeau, Charles Marius. 1953. Haida myths illustrated in argillite carvings. [Ottawa]: Dept. of Resources and Development, National Parks Branch, National Museum of Canada. Identified as bone carving with abalone shell inlays, representing the Killer-Whale with Gunarhnesemgyet on his head.This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.Source of the information below: Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center Alaska Native Collections: Sharing Knowledge website, by Aron Crowell, entry on this artifact, listed as number E9813A, http://www.alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=507 retrieved 4-24-2012: Amulet, Tsimshian. The amulet portrays the story of Gunarhnesemgyet, whose wife is abducted by a white killer whale. As the whale speeds away from the village she shouts, "My people, come for me!" Gunarhnesemgyet follows in his canoe and eventually rescues her from the whale with the help of cormorants and the whale's servant, Gitsaedzan.

FROM CARD: "PAINTED BY MR. WALTERS. BOX? OF A CHIEFTAINESS. (TSIMSIAN)."

Blanket 89193 is similar in design to the one Illus. Fig. 564a, p. 374, in "The Chilkat Blanket" by George T. Emmons, Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. 3, part 4, 1907.Blanket robe woven of wool from mountain sheep and cedar bark fiber. The shape is pentagonal, with the bottom edge diverging from the rectangular form by dropping lower in the center, forming a chevron shape. The upper edge is bound by whip stitching a thin leather strip (0.5-0.8 cm wide) with brown fur attached so it makes a fur border. The two sides are finished with 10 cm long cotton fringe sewn to the sides. The bottom has a fringe (warp) of 50 cm long of natural off-white wool, with cedar bark fiber twisted with the fringes. In addition to the fringes and fur, the woven material has been finely finished with a natural off-white wool border reinforced on the sides with additional strands. The design is in dyed wool in black, yellow, and turquoise, along with natural off-white. The design has a central panel and two side panels, separated only by a thin off-white line, the whole framed by a double border of yellow on the inside and blank on the outside with thin lines of off-white and black to separate the border colors and the border from the design. There is a 20 cm long piece of red binding tape attached at one end at the back of the shawl and a tab where a second one apparently was attached earlier.Per artists Delores Churchill and Evelyn Vanderhoop, 2015, the side fringes were added later to this blanket and are not traditional.Alan Zuboff, Linda Wynne, Shgen George, weaver, and Ruth Demmert made the following comments during the Tlingit Recovering Voices Community Research Visit, March 13-March 24, 2017. The blanket is Tlingit made and features a diving whale design. The diving whale design is not clan-specific, and so weavers did not need permission to use it, which allowed for widespread use. The Tsimshian started doing these designs first, and a Klukwan leader got ahold of one of these items, and his wife took it apart to figure out how it was made. This object may have been an early design later widely adopted by the Tlingit. The fur on this object may be sea otter or beaver, but it may be too short for sea otter. The side fringe is made of twine and discoloration of the fringe may be due to storage.

FROM CARD: "INDIAN TRADITION SAYS THIS BIRD BROUGHT THEIR ANCESTORS OVER FROM ASIA. REDUCED COPY OF COLOSSAL CARVING. COLLECTOR'S DESCRIPTION ON REVERSE. COLLECTOR'S DESCRIPTION AND LEGEND: "HAIDA INDIANS, FORT SIMPSON B. C. AND TONGASS, ALAS. REDUCED COPY OF COLOSSAL CARVING ON POLE AT FT. SIMPSON, B. C. THE INDIAN TRADITION IS THAT THIS WAS THE SACRED BIRD WHICH BROUGHT OVER THEIR ANCESTORS FROM ASIA. IMAGES OF WHICH ARE SEEN UNDER EACH WING. COPIES OF THIS SACRED BIRD ARE FOUND IN VARIOUS FORM ALL THROUGH ALASKA. V. COLYER."This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.Source of the information below: Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center Alaska Native Collections: Sharing Knowledge website, by Aron Crowell, entry on this artifact http://alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=510, retrieved 4-24-2012: Crest pole figure (model) This carving of a thunderbird carrying human beings beneath its wings was copied from a totem pole that stood in front of a Tsimshian or Haida clan house at Port Simpson, British Columbia during the mid-19th century. Vincent Colyer, an artist and Board of Indian commissioner who purchased this model of the pole, wrote on a paper tag still affixed to the back that, "Indian tradition is that this was the sacred bird which brought over their ancestors from Asia." This interpretation has not been verified and the story of the image in clan history has yet to be recorded.

FROM CARD: "LOAN: CROSSROADS SEP 22 1988. ILLUS.: CROSSROADS OF CONTINENTS CATALOGUE; FIG.59, P. 58. LOAN RETURNED: JAN 21 1993."This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.Source of the information below: Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center Alaska Native Collections: Sharing Knowledge website, by Aron Crowell, entry on this artifact http://alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=525, retrieved 4-24-2012: Nose ornament or nose ring, Tsimshian. High ranking men wore abalone shell nose pendants like this one. As young boys they received nasal perforations to hold pendants or pins, while girls had their lower lips pierced for labrets. Most abalone shell (also called haliotis) was acquired in trade from coastal tribes to the south, in exchange for eulachon oil, blankets, and spoons that the Tsimshian carved from the horns of wild goats and sheep.

FROM CARD: "ORNAMENTED WITH THE THUNDER BIRD."