The Plains Hudson Museum Virtual Tour Video Transcript

[Light drumming and singing]

Visual: The logo of the Hudson Museum followed by the dynamic entry of an image of a museum exhibit with the text “Native American Galleries Tour: The Plains” followed by a map showing major regions of North America.

Voice of Narrator: Native Americans of the Great Plains and First Nations of the Canadian Prairies were traditionally nomadic hunters and gatherers.

Visual: A herd of buffalo grazing in a field with forest behind follow by an expanse of grasses blowing in the wind.

Narrator: Some were horse cultures that followed herds of buffalo and game animals, while others hunted but also were semi-sedentary and practiced some agriculture.

Visual: Two images in succession. The first is a black-and-white image of a group of around 20 tipis spread over a lightly rolling grassy landscape. The second is a darker image, sepia-tone, and shows around 10 tipis, some with painted patterns, and the silhouette of a person with their back to the camera.

Narrator: Housing consisted of tipis, which featured wooden lodge poles lashed at the top and spread out in a circle at the bottom. The hide covering, stretched over the poles, kept out the weather. The tipi was designed to be put up and taken down quickly and the hide cover and poles could be transported from one location to another as they moved across the landscape.

Visual: A blocky bag with leather strap, lashings, and tassels. It is painted with linear and diamond motifs in yellow, green, and red.

Narrator: Among the Hudson’s holdings is material culture from the Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowa, Sioux, and Dakota.

Visual: A wooden club consisting of a handle with attached wooden ball and a ground-stone spike, decorated with a cluster of black-tipped white feathers. A label below it reads “HM1374”.

Narrator: Most of the items in our holdings are personal items: tools and weapons.

Visual: A tool with a finely-serrated metal bit and hide-wrapped handle. A label below it reads “HM1490”.

Narrator: Some were collected in the mid-1800s, while others are recent works.

Visual: A breastplate made with two rows of cylindrical beads attached with a strip made of rows of blue beads, black at the top. Hide tassels with multi-colored beads decorate the edges and the center features beaded ornament of red with white and black details.

Narrator: Many were decorated with elaborate geometric beadwork designs.

Visual: A pair of heavily beaded cuffs with hide fringe and feathered tassels. The beads are tiny and form diamond and square motifs in white, red, black, orange, green, and light blue.

Narrator: The glass beads used in these pieces represent post-Contact trade, as they were produced in Europe. Sometimes the region that the piece came from can be tied to the colors of beads used and the designs.

Visual: A hide bag with rounded bottom edge and top featuring many holes for a draw-string. It is decorated with a botanical motif in green with white and red accents and has a hide fringe.

Narrator: Prior to Contact, porcupine quills and mineral pigment designs were used to decorate items.

Visual: A rawhide shirt, incomplete or open at side and arm seams. It features beaded panels at throat and on each breast with motifs of American flags, crosses, and other patterns in many colors, as well as a fringe made of tufts of dark hair.

Narrator: Among the holdings are examples of clothing, such as this Cheyenne shirt with an American Flag motif and scalp locks made from horsehair,

Visual: A rawhide dress in a museum exhibit. The sleeves, shoulders, and chest are fully beaded in light blue and white with cross motifs in red and yellow. The front has beaded hide tassels scattered across it and the sleeves and hem are fringed. This is followed by a detail image of the beadwork at the neckline, showing how they were attached in short rows.

Narrator: and this Cheyenne girl’s dress. The beads add extra weight to the piece as well as adding prestige and honor to the item.

Visual: A quick series of images: a heavily beaded pair of hide shoes in white with small decorative elements in light blue, red, yellow, and black; a metal cuff with holes and posts that allow it to be made bigger or smaller with a label reading “HM2668”; a silver ornament shaped like a simplified bird in flight with an attached ring; a pair of heavily beaded hide leggings in white with blue, red, and yellow arrow motifs labeled “HM1277”.

Narrator: We also have moccasins, German silver armbands and a pectoral, leggings, and headdresses,

Visual: A headdress labeled “HM1274” with a beaded headband in white with green and red crosses and red and yellow diamonds. The large feathers stand up straight in the front and begin to lay down as they more toward the back. Each feather has a smaller tuft of yellow attached at the tip.

Narrator: such as this golden eagle feather headdress, sometimes referred to as a “war bonnet”. To wear such a headdress, the wearer would need to have earned the privilege by showing great bravery in battle. Headdresses were also worn for ceremonies.

Visual: A hat made of buffalo hide with long brown fur sporting a pair of black horns on the sides labeled “HM1275.1”.

Narrator: Other forms include this buffalo hide headdress with horns.

Visual: In rapid succession: A beaded knife sheath with hide fringe and beads in white with red and blue forming diamond motifs; a beaded pouch with circular base and narrow neck beaded in stripes and checks of white, red, yellow, turquoise, and blue; and a rectangular bag with hide fringe at bottom, also heavily beaded including red beading at base of fringe.

Narrator: In addition to examples of clothing, the Museum has a number of other domestic objects: knives in beaded knife sheathes, a shot pouch, and a pipe bag.

Visual: A shirt in a museum case. It is made of white leather with fine fringe at the arm attachments, chest, and waist. The chest fringe is attached with a beaded strip. This transitions quickly to a wider shot of the case, showing a second, simpler shirt, and a flat, colorful bag.

Narrator: Hide that was not tanned, but just scraped, stretched and dried, is referred to as parfleche.

Visual: A long bag or case of hide with lacing and handle of braided hide. The bag is painted in red and blue.

Narrator: Parfleche was used to make containers for war bonnets

Visual: The bag previously seen in the museum case – it lays flat, folded neatly, and is made of hide painted with diamond and triangular motifs in red, green, blue, and yellow.

Narrator: and for household tools and containers for food storage, like this piece.

Visual: A buffalo hide, seen from the skin side, painted with a scene of horses and riders in a wide variety of colors. This briefly transitions to the video footage of buffalo grazing, then back to the painted hide.

Narrator: In the late-19th Century, the US Government, ranchers, and the railroads, destroyed the basis of Plains culture – the buffalo – hunting them to the brink of extinction. Wars, forced assimilation, and reservations undermined Plains culture, yet, today, communities continue to reclaim their cultural heritage and celebrate their traditions and perpetuate them for future generations.

Visual: Logo for University of Maine.