Chat
|
Daily Search
|
My GenForum
|
Community Standards
|
Terms of Service
|
|
|
D. Charles Bristol (Omaha Charley)
(Collector of the Bristol Exhibit of Early Indian Relics in the Historical Society's Museum.)
D. Charles Bristol, commonly called Omaha Charley, was born at Canandaigua, N. Y., March 17, 1934. His father was a native of Connecticut and his mother of New York state. His first occupation was that of brakeman on the Chicago, St. Paul & Minneapolis railroad, but he soon established a trading post thirty miles east of Black River Falls, Wis., before he was twenty-one years old. He has followed the business of Indian-trader most of his life, doing business with the Chippewa. Miami, Potawatomi, and Winnebago.
Mr. Bristol came to Decatur, Neb., in 1867, when he was thirty-three years old and has lived in the state most of the time since - on the Omaha and Winnebago reservations, at Pine Ridge, Gordon, Rushville, and finally at Homer. In 1865 he was married to Miss Mary Thompson of Union City, Penn., but they parted and she became the wife of Judge Robert Wilson of Neligh, Neb. In 1881 he was married to Lettie Hunter, an educated woman of the Winnebago. Four boys were born to them: William T. in 1891; Chas. D. in 1886; Albert H. in 1897; and Harold, 1909. He bought a farm adjoining Homer in 1883 and has resided there most of the time since.
It was customary among the plainsmen, in the early days, to apply significant nicknames to one another, such as Buffalo Bill, Wild Bill, Pawnee Charley, etc. Thus Mr. Bristol became known among his associates as Omaha Charley, probably because he was closely associated with the Omaha tribe.
Mr. Bristol has a comfortable home in Homer, and he and his estimable Indian wife are devout church workers, highly respected by their many neighbors and friends. On my recent visit to them he remarked, "Of course, I have been pretty wild and a great sinner, but with the help of God, I am trying to live right and do right by everybody." Not a home in the state is more neatly kept, and its owner has plenty of this world's goods to make his old age enjoyable. His originally strong constitution served him so well that in spite of exposure and other hardships and irregular living, he is apparently still in vigorous health.
Many years ago he conceived the notion that a collection of apparel, household utensils, weapons, etc., illustrating customs and manners of the Indians in their own habitat, would be of great and lasting interest to the general public, and he undertook his task with characteristic industry and acumen. It is a custom among the Indians to present a friend or benefactor with some part of one's costume. Sometimes one will remove his moccasins for such a purpose, going back to his lodge barefooted. Many important chiefs of the plains tribes have been Omaha Charley's friends, and he was it keen judge of fine workmanship. The best specimens he could buy or otherwise procure were added to his collection from time to time.
He took special interest in such articles as possessed historical value and he obtained many of this class. During the seventies he toured many of the larger cities of the country with his collection, including a band of Indians to exhibit them. Later he expanded his show with a theatrical organization which performed in many of the leading theatres of this country and Europe. On retiring from this business he erected, at Homer, a building especially designed for the display and preservation of his collection; but afterward he and his wife gave it up to and for their church and removed their collection to a small frame building near their home. When I first visited Homer in 1905, the collection was arranged in cases and packed in boxes in this building.
Mr. Bristol and his wife were eventually persuaded to place the collection on exhibition in the rooms of the Nebraska State Historical Society, where it has remained ever since. When I was packing the collection at Homer for shipment to the Historical Society, a Mr. Buck Walter, who lived there, pressed upon Mr. Bristol his check of three hundred dollars for one of the buffalo robes, but in vain; so the Historical Society obtained the collection intact. Of course this treasure is displayed at great disadvantage in the very crowded space in the Society's rooms.
I have, noticed that even in the largest museums east of the Mississippi River, there is almost a dearth of early Indian relics, and no other state in the Union has so complete a collection of them as Nebraska. Mr. Bristol's name and fame are destined to be perpetuated in his collection; for the lifework of this picturesque frontiersman will be appreciated more and more as knowledge of its historical and ethnological value spreads.
(written by E. B. BLACKMAN)
Notify Administrator about this message?
Followups:No followups yet |
| http://genforum.genealogy.com/bristol/messages/507.html | ||
 |
Link to GenForum Add Forum |
|