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R.T. King Photograph Collection

 Collection
Identifier: MSS 0371

Scope and Content

The R.T. King Photograph Collection contains slides of Seminoles collected by R.T. King, a graduate student at the University of Florida, as a part of his dissertation research. King took some of the photos, but the collection also contains slides produced by William D. Boehmer and other photographers, including Willard R. Culver, whose photographs of the Seminoles appeared in National Geographic Magazine. Subjects depicted in the collection include Seminole agriculture, education, tourism, the signing of the Seminole constitution and charter, and celebrations such as Field Day and Chalo Nitka. People with important connections to the tribe are also detailed, including Billy Bowlegs III, Albert Devane, Billy Osceola, and Betty Mae Jumper. A few of the images were commercially produced and purchased from the Okalee Indian Village and Crafts Center and Musa Isle Indian Village. King also reproduced historic paintings by artists such as James F. Hutchinson and engravings by Theodor de Bry to illustrate Seminole history, which he combined with the Seminole photographs he collected, for a presentation before the Alachua County Historical Society in 1978. He created a similar slideshow for an open house at the Florida State Museum (now the Florida Museum of Natural History) in October 1980.

Dates

  • Creation: 1939-1965
  • Creation: Majority of material found within 1950-1960

Creator

Access

The collection is open for research.

Biographical/Historical Note

Robert Thomas King was born in 1944 in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. He spent most of his childhood in Florida and Georgia, where he developed an interest in Southern history. From 1966 to 1968, King served in the military as part of the United States Army's Third Armored Division in Germany. In 1971, he completed a bachelor's degree in history at the University of Florida, followed by a master's degree in 1973. While working on a Ph.D. at the University of Florida, he served as a consultant to the Southeastern Indian Oral History Project. He received funding from the Doris Duke Foundation that allowed him to live near the Brighton Seminole Reservation from 1972 to 1973, where he conducted research for his dissertation. He earned his Ph.D. in 1978 and in 1979 became the chief oral historian at the Indiana University Oral History Research Center (IOUHRC). In 1980, he then served as the IOUHRC's assistant director. He left the IOUHRC in 1983 to become director of the Oral History Program at the University of Nevada Reno. He wrote or edited a number of works based on oral history interviews, including The Free Life of a Ranger: Archie Murchie in the U.S. Forest Service 1929-1965 (University of Nevada Press, 1991) and Always Bet on the Butcher: Warren Nelson and Casino Gambling, 1930s-1980s (University of Nevada Press, 1994). He retired in 2009, after twenty five years as head of the Oral History Program.

Portions of the slides in this collection were taken by William D. Boehmer. He was born in Jonesburg, Missouri in 1905. In the 1930s, accepted a position teaching at a Sioux reservation in South Dakota. In 1938, he and his wife Mary "Edith" Meier Boehmer moved to Florida, when the Bureau of Indian Affairs hired him to teach students at Brighton Indian Day School. After the school closed in 1954, Boehmer continued to work with Seminoles in positions that included Educational Field Agent and Community Services Officer. He retired in 1966. Boehmer, an amateur photographer, took over two thousand photographs of the Seminoles. In the 1970s, he donated his negatives to the National Anthropological Archives of the Smithsonian Institution. William D. Boehmer died on November 22, 1990, at the age of 85.

Extent

.25 Linear feet (1 box (includes 1,081 slides in 6 boxes))

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

Slides of Seminole photos taken by R.T. King, and also collected by him from various sources, as a part of his dissertation research. A significant portion of the slides were produced by William D. Boehmer while he worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Arrangement

The slides retain their original numbering. The slides were divided into groups that were identified with a letter of the alphabet; each slide was numbered within its group. Slides moved from the Capron collection to the R.T. King Photograph Collection have been labeled according to the order of Kodak boxes in which they were originally stored and then individually numbered. The slides arranged by R.T. King and used for an open house at the Florida State Museum have been kept together but were drawn from throughout the Capron addition. They have been labeled "King" and individually numbered.

Physical Location

University of Florida Smathers Library Building

Acquisition Information

R.T. King donated his slides to the Florida State Museum and from there they were transferred to the University of Florida Department of Special and Area Studies Collections.

Related Material

A folder of photos attributed to R.T. King are included in the Louis Bishop Capron Papers. The Department of Special and Area Studies Collections also has Seminole music recorded by William D. Boehmer. Transcripts of oral history interviews of King and Boehmer are available online in the digital collections of the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program. Other photographic collections of William D. Boehmer can be found at the Smithsonian Institution's National Anthropological Archives and the Seminole Tribe of Florida's Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum.

Bibliography

Sources consulted by Bridget Bihm-Manuel while writing this finding aid:

Processing Notes

All slides were removed from their original sleeves and placed in slide boxes. Almost four hundred slides originally attributed to Louis Bishop Capron and included with his papers were identified as slides collected by R.T. King and moved to the R.T. King Photograph Collection.

Title
A Guide to the R.T. King Photograph Collection
Status
Completed
Author
Finding aid created by Bridget Bihm-Manuel
Date
December 2016
Description rules
Finding Aid Prepared Using Dacs
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
Description is written in English.

Repository Details

Part of the Special and Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida Repository

Contact:
George A. Smathers Libraries
PO Box 117005
Gainesville Florida 32611-7005 United States of America
352-273-2755