Frank Gouldsmith Speck (November 8, 1881 – February 6, 1950) was an American anthropologist and professor at the
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...
, specializing in the
Algonquian and
Iroquoian
The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.
As of 2020, all surviving Iroquoian la ...
peoples among the
Eastern Woodland
The Eastern Woodlands is a cultural area of the indigenous people of North America. The Eastern Woodlands extended roughly from the Atlantic Ocean to the eastern Great Plains, and from the Great Lakes region to the Gulf of Mexico, which is now p ...
Native Americans of the United States and
First Nations
First Nations or first peoples may refer to:
* Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area.
Indigenous groups
*First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including:
**First Natio ...
peoples of eastern boreal Canada.
Early life and education
Frank Gouldsmith Speck, son of Frank G. and Hattie Speck, was raised in urban settings (in
Brooklyn
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
, New York and
), with occasional summer family sojourns to rural
Connecticut
Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...
. He had two siblings: a sister, Gladys H. (8 years younger), and brother Reinhard S. (9 years younger). The Speck family was well-to-do, with live-in servants that included a German woman, Anna Muller, and a mixed Native American/African American woman, Gussie Giles from South Carolina. Around 1910, Frank married Florence Insley, from Rockland, New York, and they raised three children: Frank S., Alberta R., and Virgina C. Speck. The family lived in
Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, also keeping a summer home near
Gloucester, Massachusetts
Gloucester () is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, in the United States. It sits on Cape Ann and is a part of Massachusetts's North Shore. The population was 29,729 at the 2020 U.S. Census. An important center of the fishing industry and a ...
.
As a young man, Frank developed an affinity for forests and swamps and wild landscapes, and for the Native people who lived in these locales. These interests inspired him to pursue anthropological studies. He was accepted into
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
in 1899. After working closely with professor and linguist
John Dyneley Prince
John Dyneley Prince (April 17, 1868 – October 11, 1945) was an American linguist, diplomat, and politician. He was a professor at New York University and Columbia University, minister to Denmark and Yugoslavia, and leader of both houses of the ...
, who encouraged his interests in Native American Indian language and culture, he was introduced to anthropologist
Franz Boas
Franz Uri Boas (July 9, 1858 – December 21, 1942) was a German-American anthropologist and a pioneer of modern anthropology who has been called the "Father of American Anthropology". His work is associated with the movements known as historical ...
.
Around 1900, during a summer camping trip to
Fort Shantok
Fort Shantok, in Montville, Connecticut, was the site of the principal Mohegan settlement between 1636 and 1682 and the sacred ground of Uncas, one of the most prominent and influential Mohegan leaders and statesmen of his era. Originally part o ...
, Connecticut, while on break from Columbia. Speck was surprised to encounter a group of Mohegan Indian young men about his own age. Burrill Fielding, Jerome Roscoe Skeesucks, and Edwin Fowler introduced him to about 80 other members of their tribe living in Uncasville, near Fort Shantok, in
Mohegan, Connecticut
Oxoboxo River is a census-designated place (CDP) in the town of Montville in New London County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 2,938 at the 2000 census and 3,165 at the 2010 census. The statistical area encompasses the town cent ...
. Speck took a particular interest in
Fidelia Fielding
Fidelia Ann Hoscott Fielding ( Smith; September 15, 1827 – July 18, 1908), also known as ''Dji'ts Bud dnaca'' ("Flying Bird"), daughter of Bartholomew Valentine Smith (c. 1811–1843) and Sarah A. Wyyougs (1804–1868), and granddaughter of Mar ...
, an elderly widow who (unlike most of her neighbors) still fluently spoke the
Mohegan Pequot language. Modern sources suggest that Speck was raised by Fidelia, but there is no evidence in Mohegan tribal records to support this notion. There is, however, no question that Speck's "interests in literature, natural history and Native American linguistics" were inspired by his early encounters with Mohegan people.
At
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
, Speck found his direction for life study as an anthropological ethnographer. He received his BA from Columbia in 1904, and proceeded to initiate fieldwork among the Yuchi Indians, receiving his M.A. in 1905. From 1905 to 1908, he continued his work on Yuchi data, receiving his Ph.D. from the
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...
(1908), with his dissertation supervised by Boas. This ethnography focused on the
Yuchi people of
Oklahoma
Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...
, among whom he worked in 1904, 1905, and 1908.
Career
In 1907, the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) awarded Frank G. Speck a one-year George Lieb Harrison Fellowship as a research fellow at the University Museum (now the
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...
Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology). Assistant Curator of Archaeology and Ethnology
George Byron Gordon
George Byron Gordon (1870–1927) was a Canadian-American archaeologist, who graduated from Harvard University in 1894. While studying at Harvard, he participated in excavations at Copan in Honduras under the direction of John G. Owens in 1891. ...
arranged for Speck to receive a dual appointment, as both Assistant in Ethnology at the University Museum, and Instructor of Anthropology for the University. Speck was assigned to teach the introductory course in Anthropology. The Harrison Fellowship was next held in 1908 by another of Boas's students,
Edward Sapir
Edward Sapir (; January 26, 1884 – February 4, 1939) was an American Jewish anthropologist-linguist, who is widely considered to be one of the most important figures in the development of the discipline of linguistics in the United States.
Sa ...
, a specialist in linguistic anthropology.
Speck received a series of re-appointments in his dual position of Assistant in Ethnology/Instructor of Anthropology until 1912, when he was appointed as a full-time faculty member in the new Department of Anthropology. By 1913, after a contentious split with Penn Museum Director Gordon, Speck was appointed as Chair of the Department. He headed the Department for four decades, stepping down only after his health failed in 1949.
Speck was unique among many anthropologists of his generation in choosing to study American Indians close to home, rather than people of more distant lands. The pressures of relocation, boarding schools, cultural assimilation, and economic marginalization had, however, caused many Native American people to lose traditional lands, material, and culture. Speck found that his work constituted, in effect, a "salvage operation" to try to capture ethnological material during a time of great stress for Indigenous people. He began his efforts among Native Americans in New England, and soon expanded to regions as far afield as Labrador and Ontario in Canada.
Among his students at Penn, Speck nurtured a generation of prominent anthropologists, including:
A. Irving Hallowell
Alfred Irving "Pete" Hallowell (; 1892–1974) was an award-winning American anthropologist, archaeologist and businessman.
Early life and education
Hallowell was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and attended the Wharton School of the Univ ...
,
Anthony F. C. Wallace
Anthony Francis Clarke Wallace (April 15, 1923 – October 5, 2015) was a Canadian-American anthropologist who specialized in Native American cultures, especially the Iroquois. His research expressed an interest in the intersection of cultural a ...
, and
Loren Eiseley
Loren Eiseley (September 3, 1907 – July 9, 1977) was an American anthropologist, educator, philosopher, and natural science writer, who taught and published books from the 1950s through the 1970s. He received many honorary degrees and was a fel ...
, among many others. Speck also sponsored a few Native American students at Penn: his research assistant
Gladys Tantaquidgeon
Gladys Iola Tantaquidgeon (June 15, 1899 – November 1, 2005) was a Mohegan medicine woman, anthropologist, author, tribal council member, and elder based in Connecticut. and, for a brief time,
Molly Spotted Elk
Mary Nelson Archambaud (born Mary Alice Nelson; Penobscot pronunciation: Molly Dellis; ), best known by her stage name Molly Spotted Elk, was a Penobscot Indian dancer, actress, and writer who was born on the Penobscot Indian Island Reservation ...
. In 1924, Speck arranged to enroll Tantaquidgeon in Penn's College Courses for Teachers. Over time, their positions evolved from teacher/student to intellectual colleagues, and he encouraged her to take charge of independent research projects among Delaware, Wampanoag, and Mohegan peoples. Margaret Bruchac has examined the academic relationship between Frank Speck and Gladys Tantaquidgeon in her book called ''Savage Kin.''
Speck especially loved fieldwork and typically camped and traveled with the people he studied. During an era of extreme social stratification and white elitism, Speck did not hesitate to invite his Native informants to join him in his field research, to offer lectures in his classroom, and to stay in his home. Colleagues and students like Ernest Dodge, Carl Weslager, Loren Eisely, and Edmund Carpenter later recalled that Speck was extraordinarily accepting of, and seemed most comfortable among, Indians and other people of color. William Fenton recalled that Speck would often absent himself from academic functions when Native American informants came to visit him in Philadelphia.
During his fieldwork with the
Iroquois
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
, Speck became close to members of the
Seneca Nation
The Seneca Nation of Indians is a federally recognized Seneca tribe based in western New York. They are one of three federally recognized Seneca entities in the United States, the others being the Tonawanda Band of Seneca (also in western New Y ...
, who marked their relationship by giving him the name ''Gahehdagowa'' ('Great Porcupine') when he was adopted into the Turtle clan of the Seneca people. Such adoptions were a means of assigning a kinship position to outsiders who were welcome guests; they did not, however, constitute tribal membership. Speck was particularly interested in how family and kinship systems underlay tribal organizations and relations to homelands and natural resources. In Canada, he developed maps of individual family bands' hunting territories to document Algonquian land rights. These later became crucial to Native American land claims.
From the 1920s through the 1940s, Speck also studied the
Cherokee
The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...
in the Southeast United States and Oklahoma. Through the years, he worked extensively with tribal elder
Will West Long
Will West Long (c. 1869–1947; née Wili Westi) was a Cherokee mask maker, translator, and Cherokee cultural historian. He was part of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (Cherokee: ᏣᎳᎩᏱ ᏕᏣᏓᏂᎸᎩ, ''Tsalagiyi Detsadanilvgi''). ...
of Big Cove, western
North Carolina
North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...
. Speck credited Long as co-author of his 1951 book ''Cherokee Dance and Drama'', along with his colleague
Leonard Bloom.
Speck was elected to numerous professional associations, where he took an active role on committees, such as the
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...
,
American Anthropological Association
The American Anthropological Association (AAA) is an organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 10,000 members, the association, based in Arlington, Virginia, includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, ...
,
American Ethnological Society
The American Ethnological Society (AES) is the oldest professional anthropological association in the United States.
History of the American Ethnological Society
Albert Gallatin and John Russell Bartlett founded the American Ethnological Societ ...
,
Geographical Society of Philadelphia
The Geographical Society of Philadelphia was founded by Angelo Heilprin in 1891 "to promote the discovery and appreciation of the many wonders of our world." Through grants, it has supported major explorations. It also sponsors educational program ...
, and Archaeological Society of North Carolina (honorary). He conducted work for the
American Museum of Natural History
The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...
in New York, and the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
in Washington, DC.
Collections
Frank G. Speck collected thousands of Native American objects, along with many reels of audio recordings, reams of transcriptions, and photographs, which have been distributed into multiple museums, most notably the Museum of the American Indian (now the National Museum of the American Indian), Canadian Museum of Civilization (now History), and Peabody Essex Museum.
Speck's papers were collected and archived by the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
, of which he was a member. There are also collections of his papers at the
Canadian Museum of History
The Canadian Museum of History (french: Musée canadien de l’histoire) is a national museum on anthropology, Canadian history, cultural studies, and ethnology in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. The purpose of the museum is to promote the heritage of C ...
in
Gatineau, Quebec
Gatineau ( ; ) is a city in western Quebec, Canada. It is located on the northern bank of the Ottawa River, immediately across from Ottawa, Ontario. Gatineau is the largest city in the Outaouais administrative region and is part of Canada's N ...
and at the Phillips Library of the
Peabody Essex Museum
The Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) in Salem, Massachusetts, US, is a successor to the East India Marine Society, established in 1799. It combines the collections of the former Peabody Museum of Salem (which acquired the Society's collection) and the ...
in
Salem, Massachusetts
Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, located on the North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem would become one of the most significant seaports tr ...
Works
* ''The Study of the Delaware Indian Big House Ceremony'' (1931) Harrisburg : Pennsylvania Historical Commission
* ''Naskapi: The Savage Hunters of the Labrador Peninsula'' (1935, reprint 1977)
* ''Contacts between Iroquois Herbalism and Colonial Medicine'' (1941)
* ''The Tutelo Spirit Adoption Ceremony'' (1942) Harrisburg : Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Dept. of Public Instruction, Pennsylvania Historical Commission.
* "Songs from the Iroquois Longhouse." (1942) Program notes for an album of American Indian music from the eastern woodlands, Washington, DC: Library of Congress.
* ''The Iroquois: A Study in Cultural Evolution'' (1945), Cranbrook Institute of Science
* ''The Roll Call of the Iroquois Chiefs'' (1950)
* ''Symposium on Local Diversity in Iroquois Culture'' (1951) Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office.
* ''The Iroquois Eagle Dance: an Offshoot of the Calumet Dance'' (1953)
* ''The False Faces of the Iroquois'' (1987)
*
* ''The Little Water Medicine Society of the Senecas'' (2002)
*Midwinter Rites of the Cayuga Long House (1949)
References
Further reading
* Blankenship, Roy (1991) "The Life and Times of Frank G Speck, 1881-1950" Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. With chapters by John Witthoft, William N. Fenton, Ernest S. Dodge, C.A. Weslager, Edmund S. Carpenter, Anthony F.C. Wallace and Claudia Medoff.
* Bruchac, Margaret M. (2018) "Indian Stories: Gladys Tantaquidgeon and Frank Speck." In Savage Kin: Indigenous Informants and American Anthropologists, pp. 140–175. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
* Darnell, Regna (2006) "Keeping the Faith: A Legacy of Native American Ethnography, Ethnohistory, and Psychology", in ''New Perspectives on Native North America: Cultures, Histories, and Representations'', ed. by Sergei A. Kan and Pauline Turner Strong, pp. 3–16. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.
* Fenton, William N. (2001) "He-Lost-a-Bet (Howanʼneyao) of the Seneca Hawk Clan", in ''Strangers to Relatives: The Adoption and Naming of Anthropologists in Native North America'', ed. by Sergei Kan, pp. 81–98. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.
* Wallace, Anthony F.C. (1986) "The Value of the Speck Papers for Ethnohistory," in 'The American Indian: A conference in the American Philosophical Society', American Philosophical Society Library Publication, No. 2, pp. 20–26.
* Pulla, Siomonn (2000) "From Advocacy to Ethnology: Frank Speck and the Development of Early Anthropological Projects in Canada, 1911-1920, 2000." Masters Thesis, Carleton University, Department of Anthropology.
* Pulla, Siomonn (2003) "Frank Speck and the Moisie River incident: anthropological advocacy and the question of Aboriginal fishing rights in Québec." Anthropologica: 129-145.
* Pulla, Siomonn (2006) "Frank Speck and the Mapping of Aboriginal Territoriality in Eastern Canada, 1900--1950." Department of Sociology and Anthropology Thesis (Ph.D.), Carleton University.
* Pulla, Siomonn (2008). " 'Would you believe that, Dr. Speck?' Frank Speck and The Redman's Appeal for Justice."''Ethnohistory'', 55(2), 183-201.
* Pulla, Siomonn (2011). "A Redirection in Neo-Evolutionism?: A Retrospective Examination of the Algonquian Family Hunting Territories Debates." Histories of Anthropology Annual, 7(1), 170-190.
*Pulla, Siomonn. (2016). Critical Reflections on (Post) colonial Geographies: Applied Anthropology and the Interdisciplinary Mapping of Indigenous Traditional Claims in Canada during the Early 20th Century. Human Organization, 75(4), 289.
Sources
Smithsonian Institution Research Information System
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Speck, Frank
American folklorists
People from Brooklyn
1881 births
1950 deaths
University of Pennsylvania alumni
Columbia College (New York) alumni
University of Pennsylvania faculty
Members of the American Philosophical Society
Linguists of Algic languages
Linguists of Siouan languages
20th-century American anthropologists
Presidents of the American Folklore Society