Native American Art

hand-spun wool and woven in colors of red, cream, dark brown, and overdyed black; classic banded design intercepted with quartered, halved, and whole serrated diamonds
74.5 x 56 in.
late 19th century

Johnson N. High (1842-1909) was born in Richland, Ohio and died in Partridge, Kansas. After serving in the Civil War, he was appointed as a US Special Agent for the Bannock and Shoshone Indians on the Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho Territory in 1870. Around the same time, he adopted a Paiute child named Lena Rivers High. Lena died of pneumonia at Blackfoot, Idaho in 1885. Eventually High retired from service and moved back east.