Smithsonian American Art Museum
Kee-món-saw, Little Chief, a Chief
George Catlin, born Wilkes-Barre, PA 1796-died Jersey City, NJ 1872 · 1830
George Catlin described Little Chief, a chief of the Kaskaskia/Miami, as “half-civilized, and, I should think, half-breed . . . This young man is chief of the tribe; and I was told by one of the Traders, that his mother and his son, were his only subjects.” Catlin probably painted this portrait at Fort Leavenworth (in today’s Kansas) in 1830. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 2, no. 47, 1841; reprint 1973)
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