The Iowa

A GROUP OF IOWA


The material forming the greater part of the present monograph is reprinted verbatim et literatim from certain portions of volume 1, Numbers 1, 2, and 3, Washington, November 30, 1876, of Foster’s Indian Record and Historical Data. The complete work so far as carried out consists only of the three parts here mentioned, printed in folio and comprising four numbered pages each. The editor, Dr. Thomas Foster, who termed himself “Indian historiographer” hoped to be able to publish the sheet weekly “should funds permit.” Evidently lack of finances or the small amount of interest shown in the venture determined against its continuance as it ceased with the third issue.
During Foster’s connection with the Indian Bureau at Washington, John Q. Smith held the position of Commissioner of Indian Affairs and it is not improbable looked with little favor on the scheme. In any event the Record is a desideratum in most collections and as such, even a portion of it may not be amiss in this reprint. Unfortunately its short existence did not permit of finishing the sketches of the Iowa or Winnebago, though it would appear that in the instance of the former but little more would have been added. It is hoped however, that in the foreword the more necessary data are given and that it is appropriately terminated.
In the absence of any cognate facts referring in detail to the Iowa tribe it has been deemed best to reprint Foster’s sketch in its entirety from the Record and to add to it, as appendices, some features which will be of special interest and value to the student of American aboriginal history and ethnology. In this textual portion will be found much from Schoolcraft’s Indian Tribes of the United States, also extracts, some of considerable length, from the first volume of the Minnesota Historical Society’s Collections, 1850-56, and Neill’s History of Minnesota. Nevertheless such facts as are garnered from sources of this character although purloined, are to be welcomed, and in a certain sense it may be considered fortunate that all of the material is not wholly original.