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Information on the Lewis and Clark Expedition
Building
the Museum
| Clark's Collection
In 1821, after losing the race for Governor of the new State of Missouri, Clark was appointed Superintendent of Indian Affairs at St. Louis by President Monroe. This newly-created position made Clark the representative for U.S. Government negotiations and provisions for all Indian nations north and west of St. Louis. In addition to the prestige and importance of this position came expanded opportunities to collect Indian artifacts. <TOP>
Clark's Indian Museum was
open to "any person of respectability at any time," according to
the St. Louis Directory of 1821. Many Easterners used a tour of
the museum as their introduction to the wild west beyond. All western
travelers stopped there, because those proceeding further west moved
into Indian territory and needed to obtain a pass to do so from
Clark. Famous visitors to the museum included the Marquis de Lafayette,
Prince von Württemberg, George Catlin, William Drummond Stewart,
Prince Maximilian of Weid-Neuweid, Karl Bodmer, and the Sac chief
Keokuk. Perhaps the most detailed description of Clark's Museum
was penned by Bernard, Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, who saw the
collection in 1826. He was guided through the museum by General
Clark's secretary, Mr. Alexander, who showed him "articles of Indian
clothing of different kinds, and various materials...Besides, several
weapons of different tribes, wooden tomahawks, or battle-axes, in
one of them a sharp piece of iron to strike into the skulls of their
prisoners; another made of elks-horn, bows of elks-horn and of wood,
spears, quivers with arrows, a spear head of an Indian of the Columbia
river...Mr. Alexander showed us the medals which the Indian chiefs
have received at different periods from the Spanish, English and
American governments, and the portraits of the various chiefs who
have been at St. Louis to conclude treaties with the governor, who
is also Indian agent."
George Catlin first visited the museum in 1830, and was inspired to collect Indian artifacts on his western travels. General Clark fully supported the efforts of the young artist to chronicle vanishing Indian lifeways and cultures. Prince Maximilian, who passed through St. Louis in 1833, left an account in his Travels which provides a glimpse of the museum in use as an Indian council chamber. He noted that "General Clarke, with his secretary, was seated opposite to the Indians, who sat in rows along the walls of the apartment. We strangers sat at the General's side, and near him stood an interpreter, a French Canadian. The Indians, about thirty in number, had done their best to ornament and paint themselves; they all looked very serious and solemn, and their chief sat at their right hand.... This conference lasted above half an hour." At some point, probably near the end of his
life, William Clark made a list of the items in his museum, which
survives today at the Missouri Historical Society. The great majority
of the 201 items cataloged were Indian artifacts, representing the
Cherokee, Chippewa, Choctaw, Delaware, Menominee, Sauk, Shawnee,
Winnebago, Arikara, Assiniboine, Comanche, Hidatsa, Iowa, Mandan,
Pawnee, Ponca, Osage, Oto, and Taos nations. The most common artifacts
were 45 pipe stems of Indian ceremonial pipes. A large amount of
clothing was also displayed, including 18 pairs of moccasins, 11
men's suits (shirts and leggings), 2 women's dresses, necklaces,
belts and garters. Weapons included ten Indian war clubs, 6 bows,
3 bow covers, 3 quivers with arrows, 3 shot pouches, a spear, a
knife, and two scabbards. No one knows what became of all these artifacts. Clark family tradition holds that a scoundrel named Albert Koch, who ran another St. Louis museum in the early 1830s at the corner of 4th and Market Streets, asked for the loan of items from the Clark Museum for use in his own museum, then absconded with them to Europe. Another version of the tale states that Clark gave Koch permission to take the artifacts to Europe in 1832. Whatever happened, by the time of Clark's death in 1838 the museum building was empty. It has been theorized by ethnologist John C. Ewers that a portion of Clark's collection is preserved in Bern, Switzerland, and survives to this day. The history of Clark's Museum did not end with the demise of the Clark collection, however. Dr. William Beaumont rented the empty museum building from General Clark in May 1838, and used it as a temporary home. Dr. Beaumont was a U.S. military surgeon whose experiments resulted in the first scientific understanding of the process of human digestion. During that same spring of 1838, a young army lieutenant named Robert E. Lee was in town with his family. Needing quarters, the Lee family rented the two-room cottage at the rear of the Clark mansion. Lt. Lee was in St. Louis on official army business. A trained engineer, he was expected to prevent the continual silting of the harbor of St. Louis. Lee's efforts literally saved the commercial life of the city. Amazingly, for one month in 1838, three world-renowned figures lived on the same block in St. Louis: William Clark, William Beaumont, and Robert E. Lee. General Clark died on September 1, 1838 in the home of his son Meriwether Lewis Clark on Broadway in St. Louis. His mansion house and the museum building were torn down in 1851 and replaced by the Union Buildings, warehouses four stories tall which, in the wake of the great fire in 1849, were described as being "fireproof throughout," according to the Missouri Republican of January 17, 1851, "even to the window frames, which will be of iron." <TOP>
|
The
Museum of Westward Expansion continues a tradition
started by William Clark in 1816, when he created the first museum
west of the Mississippi river in St. Louis. Clark, the famous explorer
who with Meriwether Lewis successfully traversed the continent to
the Pacific Ocean, settled in St. Louis after his return in 1806.
Clark was appointed governor of the Missouri Territory and Superintendent
of Indian Affairs for Missouri by President James Madison in 1813.
As a result of his prosperity in the fur trade and his station as
territorial governor, Clark was able to purchase a plot of land
in April 1816 at 101-103 Main Street in St. Louis, at the corner
of Vine Street. This property is now on the grounds of the Gateway
Arch, near the spot where a grassy area called the "north triangle"
is located. Millions of visitors pass this area each year as they
walk from the Parking Garage to the Arch. 
Charles
Willson Peale ran the most prestigious of all. Many of the plants,
animals, and Indian artifacts collected on the Lewis and Clark Expedition
were displayed in Peale's museum. Apparently Governor Clark saved
some of the artifacts from the expedition as well, and continued
to collect items from the American Indian visitors he received in
St. Louis. These were the items which were put on display in his
museum in 1816. <
William
C. Preston, the 21-year-old son of a prestigious Virginia family,
visited the museum in 1816, and left the earliest account we have
of its appearance. "On the day of the solemn diplomatic session
the Governor's large council chamber was adorned with a profuse
and almost gorgeous display of ornamented and painted buffalo robes,
numerous strings of wampum, every variety of work of porcupine quills,
skins, claws, horns, and bird skins, numerous and large calumets,
arms of all sorts, saddles, bridles, spears, powder horns, plumes,
red blankets and flags...In the center of the hall was a large long
table, at one end of which sat the governor with a sword lying before
him, and a large pipe in his hand. He word the military hat and
the regimentals of the army." Several other descriptions of the
museum survive. Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, who visited in 1818, noted
the "skins of remarkable animals, minerals, fossil-bones, and other
rare and interesting specimens" in addition to American Indian items.
An
entire Sioux tipi was also listed, which was painted with a "History
of a battle between the Sioux & Pawnees & the Socks Fox."