Fort+Union,+Mouth+of+the+Yellowstone+River,+2000+Miles+above+St.+Louis

Date: 1832
 * [[image:http://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=http://americanart.si.edu/images/1985/1985.66.388_1a.jpg&max=460 width="375" height="289" link="@http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=4063"]] || Title: **Fort Union, Mouth of the Yellowstone River, 2000 Miles above St. Louis**

Artist: **George Catlin** Born: Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania 1796 Died: Jersey City, New Jersey 1872

Medium: oil on canvas Dimensions: 11 1/4 x 14 3/8 in. (28.5 x 36.6 cm)  Smithsonian American Art Museum Gift of Mrs. Joseph Harrison, Jr.

Accession: 1985.66.388 || “The American Fur Company have erected here for their protection against the savages, a very substantial Fort, 300 feet square, with bastions armed with ordnance; and our approach to it under the continued roar of cannon for half an hour, and the shrill yells of the half-affrighted savages who lined the shores, presented a scene of the most thrilling and picturesque appearance. . . The Fort. . . was built by Mr. McKenzie, who now occupies it. It is the largest and best-built establishment of the kind on the river, being the great or principal head-quarters and depot of the Fur Company's business in this region. A vast stock of goods is kept on hand at this place; and at certain times of the year the numerous out-posts concentrate here with the returns of their season's trade, and refit out with a fresh supply of goods to trade with the Indians. The site for the Fort is well selected, being a beautiful prairie on the bank near the junction of the Missouri with the Yellow Stone rivers; and its inmates and its stores well protected from Indian assaults.” George Catlin painted this landscape in 1832 at the end of his voyage upriver on the steamboat Yellowstone. (Catlin, //Letters and Notes//, vol. 1, nos. 2, 3, 1841; reprint 1973)
 * Exhibition Label: **

Catlin Classroom Map of George Catlin's Route Artist George Catlin: Painter Of American Indian Portraits - Wisconsin Public Radio
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Artist Biography <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 14.3px;">SAAM Collections Page
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