The Elizabeth Cole Butler Collection. Collected: Elizabeth Cole Butler

The Elizabeth Cole Butler Collection. Collected: James Mooney

Gift in memory of Isaac M. Bates by his children and grandchildren.

The Elizabeth Sickler Smith Collection; Gift of her grandson, Edward Conyngham.

The Elizabeth Cole Butler Collection.

The Elizabeth Cole Butler Collection.

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. George K . Voss.

The Elizabeth Cole Butler Collection.

As Plains Indian peoples were confined to reservations in the late nineteenth century, women artists, who created the majoirty of beadwork and quillwork, began to apply their skills to a wider variety of objects. [...] The fully beaded doctor's bag illustrates how beadworkers were able to take commercially made objects and turn them into uniquely Native American artistic expressions.

Plains Indian people frequently made lightweight rawhide containers to hold a variety of objects. Flat envelopes and cylinders were the most common shapes, although the Lakota frequently made boxes. As part of their household duties, women laboriously made and decorated these containers from buffalo hide or cowhide that had been dried and scraped of their hair. Once the rawhide was processed, it was cut into a predetermined pattern and then folded and laced into shape. Painted geometric designs usually ornament the rawhide containers.