From card: "One 10" boat paddle and one sail boat thwart 5 3/4" long (parts of northern type canoe) were transferred back to the Division of Ethnology from the Division of Engineering, January 25, 1934. 5/9/66 Summarized from fragments of a 'Swan' data card: This model and others are made to exact proportions of full length Haida canoes. They are exact representations of modern (1883) Haida canoes. GEP"

FROM TYPED CATALOG CARD: "PINNED TO ONE OF THESE SPECIMENS, ON EXHIBITION IN JUNE 1949 WAS THE FOLLOWING HANDWRITTEN NOTE [note is in James G. Swan's hand]: "MINIATURE HAT WORN BY THE MAKAHS. THE MAKAHS MAKE HATS OF A VARIETY OF PATTERNS, BUT THIS FORM IS THE ONE USUALLY WORN BY THEMSELVES. OTHER KINDS ARE SOLD TO THE WHITES AND ARE SIMPLY IMITATIONS OF THE SHAPE OF OUR STRAW HATS. FROM WHAT I CAN LEARN FROM THE INDIAN TRADITIONS I INFER THAT THE SHAPE OF THIS HAT, WHICH RESEMBLES THE CHINESE HAT, WAS FIRST INTRODUCED BY THE PARTY OF CHINAMEN WHO WERE BROUGHT OVER BY MEARES FROM CHINA IN 1788, AND ASSISTED IN THE BUILDING OF THE SCHR. "NORTH WEST AMERICA" WHICH WAS BUILT IN NOOTKA SOUND IN THE SUMMER OF THAT YEAR. NEAH BAY, W. T. MAY 24, 1856. J.G. SWAN."" [A memo in the accession file indicates that the original of this handwritten note was added to the accession papers in 1949, at the request of Department of Anthropology curator John C. Ewers, and it is indeed in the microfilmed copy of the accession file.] FROM THE MORE RECENT TYPED CATALOG CARD: "NOTES FROM SWAN'S ORIGINAL PAPERS: "MINIATURE HATS WORN BY THE MAKAHS. THE MAKAH MAKE HATS OF A VARIETY OF PATTERNS, BUT THIS FORM IS THE ONE USUALLY WORN BY THEMSELVES. OTHER KINDS ARE SOLD TO THE WHITES AND ARE SIMPLY IMITATIONS OF THE SHAPES OF OUR STRAW HATS. FROM WHAT I CAN LEARN FROM THE INDIAN TRADITIONS I INFER THAT THE SHAPE OF THE HAT WHICH RESEMBLES THE CHINA HAT, WAS FIRST INTRODUCED BY THE PARTY OF CHINAMEN, WHO WERE BROUGHT OVER BY MEARES FROM CHINA IN 1788, AND ASSISTED IN THE BUILDING OF THE SCH. "NORTH WEST AMERICA" WHICH WAS BUILT IN NOOTKA SOUND DURING THE SUMMER OF THAT YEAR. NEAH BAY, W. T. MAY 24, 1865"." From 2 old museum tags with the hats, as of 2008: "Miniature hats - worn during rain. Made from roots of the spruce tree split into fine strands. Inner cap made from cedar bark and grass." "Miniature conical hats such as are worn by the Indians of W. T. Neeah Bay. J. G. Swan."Though the catalogue lists E1036 as consisting of 4 miniature hats, as of 2008 there are 5 miniature basketry hats with this catalogue number. One is plain/undecorated, height 6 cm., diameter 14.5 cm. Four are black-brimmed painted hats, The four black-brimmed hats range from 8 cm. - 11 cm. in height, and from 15.5 cm. - 18 cm. in diameter. The four black-brimmed hats are illustrated Fig. 9, p. 58 in Ostapkowicz, Joanna, 2010, "Nuu-chah-nulth and Makah Black-brimmed Hats: Chronology and Style," American Indian Art Magazine, 35(3).

FROM CARD: "30209-11. LOCALITY: ALASKA (NOT ALL)*. REMARKS: ILLUS. IN BAE 3RD AR: #30211 ON PL. XV, FIGS. 25-7, P. 175 **. **FROM NOOTKA, BRIT, COLUMBIA. "

FROM CARD: "CLASP BROKEN. INVENTORIED 1979." FROM CARD: "BRACELET.---MADE OF SILVER COIN, HAMMERED OUT FLAT AND TURNED INTO REQUIRED SHAPE. ORNAMENTED WITH TOTEMIC CARVINGS. SECURED ABOUT THE WRIST BY A CLASP. WIDTH, 2/3 INCH. TLINGIT INDIANS (KOLUSCHAN STOCK), ALASKA. 19,541. COLLECTED BY JAMES G. SWAN."

From card: "Illus. in USNM AR, 1888; Pl. 40, fig. 204; p. 316. Illus. in The Far North catalog, Nat. Gall. of Art, 1973, p. 175. From: page 49, Boxes and Bowls catalog; Renwick Gallery; Smithsonian Press; 1974, (object illus. on same page): "Animal-form bowl; wood; carved in relief, Length: 10; Haida, Skidegate, British Columbia; 'Food dish; mountain demon and crow'; Collected by James G. Swan; October 1883." Illus.: p. 195, Pl. 240c, Celebrations catalogue, Smithsonian Press, 1982; from Celebrations caption: "Crow Feast Dish, ca. 1850-83, 4 1/8 x 10 x 6 (10.5 x 25.4 x 15.3); Wooden bowls were used to serve seal oil and candlefish oil, two highly prestigious foods. This bowl shows two aspects of the human-spirit transformation: Crow with his human soul emerging from his mouth and the shared human-bird soul with its characteristic recurved beak in Crow's tail." Loaned R. H. Lowie Museum, 12-31-1964; returned 2-15-1966. Loaned: Vancouver Art Gall. 4-18-1967; returned 12-13-1967. Loaned to the National Gallery of Art, October 20, 1972; returned 5-29-1973. Loaned Renwick Gal. 11-7-1976; loan returned 8-24-1976. Loaned to Renwick 2-4-1982; returned 6-1983. Loaned to SITES- Treasures 5-10-1984; returned 11-21-1984." Jay Stewart and Peter Macnair 7-20-2005 identify this as oil dish; raven with human.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=633 , retrieved 2-4-2022: Bowl. On this feast dish for serving seal or eulachon (candlefish) oil, a carved Raven holds a small human figure in its beak, recorded by collector James G. Swan as the representation of a "mountain spirit." A hawk with a short, curved beak is depicted on Raven's tail. The bowl came from the Haida Gwaii village of Skidegate in 1884 [sic, should be 1883], and is still saturated with the oils it once contained.

Accession file identifies original #88, Catalogue Nos. E20870 - 73, as 4 baskets from Koutznow [i.e. Hutsnuwu people], Alaska. Anthropology Catalogue ledger book lists locality as Chatham Strait.

FROM CARD: "SALMON RIB DESIGN."