Model Totem Pole
Captain Dorr F. Tozier (1843-1926), by 1909;
Purchased from Tozier by the Washington State Art Association, Seattle, WA, 1909-1916 [1];
Transferred from the Washington State Art Association to the Seattle Land Improvement Company, Seattle, WA, 1916-1917;
Purchased from the Seattle Land Improvement Company by the Museum of the American Indian-Heye Foundation, New York, no. 70044, 1917-1931 [2];
Transferred from the Museum of the American Indian-Heye Foundation to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1931 [3].
NOTES:
[1] National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, object documentation, accession lot 1917.0085. Tozier’s collection was displayed at the Ferry Museum of Art in Tacoma, WA from 1900-1909. Upon its purchase by the Washington State Art Association, it was moved to Seattle, but when the Association failed to make its scheduled payments, the collection’s title was transferred to the Seattle Land Improvement Company, which sold most of the collection to the Museum of the American Indian-Heye Foundation. For more on the Tozier collection’s history, see John M. McClelland, Jr., “The Great Tozier Heist,” Columbia 40 (Summer 1992): 41-45.
[2] The Museum of the American Indian-Heye Foundation was founded in 1916 by George Heye (1874-1957) and opened to the public in New York City in 1922. In 1989, the remaining collection was transferred to the Smithsonian Institution and became part of the National Museum of the American Indian.
[3] In 1931, the Nelson-Atkins co-sponsored two archaeological expeditions with the Heye Foundation: one to Colombia that was directed by Gregory Mason, and a second to the Orinoco River region of Venezuela, directed by Herbert S. Dickey. The partage agreement between the two institutions specified that if the value of the found objects did not match the dollar amount invested by the Nelson-Atkins, the Heye Foundation would transfer objects from its own collection to the Nelson-Atkins to make up the difference, while also giving the Nelson-Atkins an opportunity to purchase additional objects from the Heye Foundation. When the archaeological excavations failed to meet expectations, this was one of a group of objects that were transferred/purchased from the Heye Foundation’s collection to the Nelson-Atkins.
