The Canyons of the Green and Colorado Rivers had been successfully navigated by only a few parties, in 1911 when the brothers decided to attempt the trip. They successfully took the first motion pictures of the thrilling journey riding the rapids of the Colorado from Wyoming to Mexico. Ellsworth published the account in “Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico.” Almost an entire issue of The National Geographic was devoted to the trip. The movie was later shown at the Canyon running continuously at their Canyon studio from 1915 until Emery’s death in 1976. In 1977 a thirty minute documentary was made of Emery’s life and works and In 2004, “The Kolb Brothers: Grand Canyon Pioneers” aired on public television. The Kolb studio is now part of Grand Canyon National Park. It has exhibits and early video of the Kolb brothers on the Colorado and photographing the canyon.

11 x 14 inches.
Bromide gelatin silver print.
Excellent condition.

Edward S. Curtis (1868-1952) began photographing Native Americans in the mid 1890’s. He sold the images in his successful downtown Seattle studio. The soft focus sepia-toned images appealed to many who viewed Indians as heroic characters of a vanishing race.

Curtis was fortunate to gain recognition and endorsement from President Theodore Roosevelt and financial backing from J.P. Morgan. In 1906 J.P. Morgan gave Curtis $75,000 to pay for the fieldwork necessary to create the images. Morgan stipulated however, that this money could not to be applied to the cost of writing, editing or publishing the 20 volume North American Indian project. In order to raise money for the publication, Curtis sold subscriptions for the ethnographic text illustrated with high quality photogravures taken from his glass plate negatives. He hoped to find enough subscribers to print 500 sets but he was only able to find 222 subscribers.

Curtis travelled thousands of miles carrying large glass plate negatives to take tens of thousands of photographs of 80 tribes. His intent was to document traditional Indian cultures, record information on the languages, customs, and dress of the tribes and to write biographical sketches of many of the tribal leaders.

This was one of the many photographs taken by Curtis that were not published. The Library of Congress produced an exhibition and Gerard Hausman and Robert Kapoun published a book on some of the unpublished photographs in 1995.

Bromide photograph.
6 ¾ x 4 ½ inches.
“Curtis 726 II” in negative.
Framed to museum specifications (“Floated within the mat.)