In 1871, American naturalist John Wesley Powell made his second geographic expedition into the American West. With him was John K. Hillers, whose job was to take photographs that would took show people in the rest of the world what the West was like. Hillers took this photo of two Ute girls.
The image is high enough resolution that, it can be used with a Smart Board. However, you can also print it out on 8 1/2 x 11 paper. To access the high resolution image for printing or projection, right click on the image. Click “View Image” or “Open image in new tab”). To print, click “print.” In the print preview, click “Page Setup.” Choose “Portrait” for the orientation. Set all headers and footers to “blank.” Set margins to “0.” Then print.
Look to the Seven Strategies for help in generating questions for your classroom. Possible questions include:
- Strategy 1: What are you looking at?
- Strategy 2: What was the purpose of this photograph?
- Strategy 4:Where are the girls in the photograph? (a desert or other dry region somewhere in the West) What are they wearing? (dresses made from animal skins) What are they carrying? (some kind of container) How are they carrying them? (on their backs, using some kind of strap around their foreheads) What do you think the girls are doing with the containers?
- Strategy 6: What do you bring to this photograph when you look at it? Do you have ideas about what is “nice” clothing? Do you wonder what it would be like to live the way these girls did?
Extension Activity
Have older students use the internet to discover more about the John Wesley Powell Expedition and find more photographs taken by John K. Hillers.