People of the Big Voice ─ Photographs of Ho-Chunk Families by Charles Van Schaick, 1879-1942

People of the Big Voice tells the visual history of Ho-Chunk families at the turn of the twentieth century and beyond as depicted through the lens of Black River Falls, Wisconsin studio photographer, Charles Van Schaick. The family relationships between those who “sat for the photographer” are clearly visible in these images—sisters, friends, families, young couples—who appear and reappear to fill in a chronicle spanning from 1879 to 1942. Also included are candid shots of Ho-Chunk on the streets of Black River Falls, outside family dwellings, and at powwows. As author and Ho-Chunk tribal member Amy Lonetree writes, “A significant number of the images were taken just a few short years after the darkest, most devastating period for the Ho-Chunk. Invasion, diseases, warfare, forced assimilation, loss of land, and repeated forced removals from our beloved homelands left the Ho-Chunk people in a fight for their culture and their lives.”

Tom Jones is an assistant professor of photography at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His work may be found in the National Museum of the American Indian and the Chazen Museum of Art. Michael Schmudlach serves on the Wisconsin Historical Society’s Board of Curators and has a lifelong relationship with the Ho-Chunk. Matthew Daniel Mason is an archivist at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. Amy Lonetree an associate professor of American studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz and coeditor of The National Museum of the American Indian: Critical Conversations. George A. Greendeer has been the Ho-Chunk Nation’s tribal genealogist since 2000. Tom Jones, Amy Lonetree, and George A. Greendeer are enrolled members of the Ho-Chunk Nation.