1974 Indian Burial Ground
DESCRIPTION
An evocative educational poster addressing Native American burial grounds and the loss of ancestral lands through the poetry of William Cullen Bryant.
The poster reproduces verses from William Cullen Bryant’s poem "An Indian at the Burial-Place of His Fathers," in which an imagined Indigenous speaker mourns the disturbance of ancestral graves and the transformation of familiar lands by settlement and agriculture. Bryant (1794–1878), a prominent American poet and newspaper editor, used the poem to criticize aspects of dispossession, although its perspective remains that of a 19th-century non-Indigenous writer. Beneath the text, a circular sepia-toned photographic image shows a burial-ground setting with grave markers and stones, surrounded by a broad golden ring and a rectangular border. The heading appears in oversized yellow block letters across the upper portion of the sheet.
Published in 1974 by the Perfection Form Company of Logan, Iowa, the work belongs to a series of twelve educational prints depicting prominent Native American figures and aspects of Indigenous history. Originally produced as classroom teaching materials, the posters combine historical imagery with bold typography and vivid colors characteristic of 1970s graphic design. Original examples are scarce on the market, and a complete set of twelve is preserved in the Special Collections of Johns Hopkins University's Sheridan Libraries.
CONDITION
1200 W. 35th Street #425 Chicago, IL 60609 | P: (312) 496 - 3622