PHOTOGRAPHING OKLAHOMA HISTORY
When Hume stepped out of the wagon in unchartered Oklahoma Territory, just after dark on New Year’s Eve 1890, she had no idea what her life would be like. She was 32 years old, a well-educated doctor’s wife, with two young sons. She was determined to help her husband succeed in Anadarko as physician for the Kiowa, Comanche, and Wichita Agency. Using her first camera, Hume began taking detailed, powerfully historic photographs of her Native American friends and the area. Hume became one of America’s first female photographers, chronicling the acculturation of the Southern Plains Indians, expansion into their territory by American farmers and tradesmen, and blending of the two cultures. Her photographic work ended by 1910, due to failing health. Her photographs might have languished in obscurity had it not been for historian Edward Everett Dale, head of the University of Oklahoma’s history department. In 1927, she donated more than 750 negatives. Her collection includes 1895 black-and-white photographs, including images of Quanah Parker and Kiowa children. She lived to see some of her images published, used to illustrate books, included in documentaries, and exhibited around the United States.
