Catlin, George, 1796-1872

George Catlin (July 26, 1796 – December 23, 1872)[1] was an American lawyer, painter, author, and traveler, who specialized in portraits of Native Americans in the American frontier.

Traveling to the American West five times during the 1830s, Catlin wrote about and painted portraits that depicted the life of the Plains Indians. His early work included engravings, drawn from nature, of sites along the route of the Erie Canal in New York State. Several of his renderings were published in one of the first printed books to use lithography, Cadwallader D. Colden's Memoir, Prepared at the Request of a Committee of the Common Council of the City of New York, and Presented to the Mayor of the City, at the Celebration of the Completion of the New York Canals, published in 1825, with early images of the City of Buffalo.[2][3] Catlin was born in 1796 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania In 1823, he studied art in Philadelphia and became known for his work as a portraitist.[4] After a meeting with "tribal delegation of Indians from the western frontier, Catlin became eager to preserve a record of Native American customs and individuals."[4] Catlin began his journey in 1830 when he accompanied Governor William Clark on a diplomatic mission up the Mississippi River into Native American territory.[4] St. Louis became Catlin's base of operations for five trips he took between 1830 and 1836, eventually visiting fifty tribes. Two years later he ascended the Missouri River more than 3000 km (1900 miles) to Fort Union Trading Post, near what is now the North Dakota-Montana border, where he spent several weeks among indigenous people who were still relatively untouched by European culture. He visited eighteen tribes, including the Pawnee, Omaha, and Ponca in the south and the Mandan, Hidatsa, Cheyenne, Crow, Assiniboine, and Blackfeet to the north. There he produced the most vivid and penetrating portraits of his career. During later trips along the Arkansas, Red, and Mississippi rivers, as well as visits to Florida and the Great Lakes, he produced more than 500 paintings and gathered a substantial collection of artifacts.[citation needed] George Catlin met Clara Bartlett Gregory in 1828 in her hometown of Albany, New York. She was eager to escape her family home, not getting along with her father's third wife. After a brief courtship, Clara and George married on May 11, 1828; she was 19, and Catlin was 32.[20] After their marriage, she accompanied him on one of his journeys west. They eventually had four children.[21] Clara and his youngest son died while visiting Paris in 1845.[22]

Catlin died on December 23, 1872, aged 76 years in Jersey City, New Jersey.[1]

George Catlin, artist and author, was known especially for his paintings of Indians. Born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, he practiced law until his talent for painting led him to join a group of artists in Philadelphia in 1823. Catlin concentrated on portrait painting in Washington, D.C., until 1829, when he saw a delegation of visiting American Indians in Philadelphia. He then resolved to devote his life to preserving the appearance and character of the vanishing Indians and for forty-two years traveled extensively in the U.S. West and lived among the tribes. Catlin wrote many books and articles related to his experiences.