McKenney and Hall, 1836-1844 - KA-TA-WA-BE-DA. A CHIPPEWAY CHIEF., from History of the Indian Tribes of North - ca. 1841 - T-Shirt

This hand-coloured lithographic portrait shows Ka-ta-wa-be-da, a Chippewa leader, framed in a bust-length vignette on a vertical page.

Visual Elements & Composition

Parchment cream fills most of the design, giving the portrait the warm, aged tone of printed paper. The sitter is set within a vertical rectangle and seen from the shoulders up, so the eye goes straight to his face. Sage grey-green marks his coat, while warm skin tan, dark brown and navy blue appear in small areas, including the dark headband with two feathers. The lettering reads KA.TA.WA.BE.DA. and A CHIPPEWAY CHIEF., which names the subject directly on the image.

Meaning & Symbolism

The headband and feathers signal the sitter's standing as a leader, and the plain, formal framing gives him the dignity of an official record. The portrait comes from History of the Indian Tribes of North America by Thomas McKenney and James Hall, published between 1836 and 1844. The lithographs were drawn from original oil portraits held in the War Department's Indian Gallery, and McKenney, then Superintendent of Indian Trade, set out to document tribal leaders for a Euro-American audience. The project belongs to a period of rapid territorial change, and its collection remains an important, historically complicated source for how Indigenous leaders were pictured in the nineteenth century.

Carrying the Portrait on a Tee

A portrait this size reads best at chest height, where the bust-length figure and the printed name can be seen whole. The vertical composition suits the front of a shirt, and the cream field lets the sitter's face and the lettering stand out clearly against the fabric.