K.K., Male, Age 24

Exhibit: Belle Starr--Bandit Queen

After viewing this photo, I realized that women maybe weren’t as incarcerated as commonly as men were. The caption states that the only time she went to jail was for one occasion of horse theft. I’m thinking that maybe people in that time didn’t see women criminals as serious threats to society as commonly as men were. Now that I think more about it, that’s probably a major advantage if you’re going to be known as a “Bandit Queen.”

Exhibit: The Workings of the Court

The thing that stuck out to me in this picture is that it was not ever often in that time for a woman to be in a major position of power. It seems like you would always see women in supportive roles rather than leadership roles. All throughout this exhibit we see several pictures of noteworthy men but not a lot of women. It is inspiring to me as I think about how far we have come today.

Exhibit: The Gallows

This correlates with the first picture pretty well. Hanging was a common sentence back in this time. The kiosk in front of these gallows says that over a period of 160 years, only 4 women were sentenced to hanging. I think the most interesting part of the exhibit was the jail part on the upper floor (didn’t get a picture for some reason). For the male prisoners you had a 3 stories of jail cells while the women had only 3 cells in a more run-down fashion. You didn’t really see women portrayed as criminals or remembered as such like their male counterparts.

Comments

DR, Female, Age 24

Exhibit: Lady Desperado One of the pieces that stood out to me the most was the section about Belle Starr. She is the only female with her own section in the museum compared to the numerous displays dedicated to men. I noticed that in this particular section her physical appearance is used to describe her, and she is referred to as “flamboyant” and compared to Cleopatra. Out of all of the plaques with men on them none of them described what they looked like, dressed like, or how they drew attention to themselves like hers did. They were remarked on for their accomplishments or their wrong doings, but she is noted for how she looked. Exhibit Detail: Photo of Belle Starr Another point concerning the Belle Starr section is that any time she is mentioned so are the men in her life. This particular picture shows her picture with a short description underneath that talks about her brother and her father. The museum uses her pictures and titles the boards with h...

GJ, Female, Age 21

Exhibit Detail: John Rogers and his wife Mary On this page are three examples that I found in the exhibits that list the man that is in the picture and only identify the woman as his wife. Luckily this did not happen too much throughout the museum, but it did occur. Exhibit Detail: Music Class In the picture to the right, there are 9 women featured and none of them are identified by name. I thought this was a real shame considering that they were all associated with the Academy that was helping educate Chickasaw girls. The description is also lacking considering the only thing it mentions is the male Reverend who had direction over the school. I feel like the museum missed a prime opportunity in the caption of this photo. Exhibit Detail: Tullahassee Mission, Creek Nation In the picture to the left, the caption only identifies the woman in the picture as William S. Robertson’s wife. Considering they both taught Creek children in the school I believe that th...

DS, Male, Age 24

Exhibit: Domestic Life at Fort Smith When observing the exhibits at the National Historic Site, they show how most of the political establishments and arrangements where created by men with little involvement from women. The exhibits in regards to politics where mostly pictures and summaries of men, with a very few exceptions like Florence Hammersly being a deputy clerk. When it comes to the focus of women in the exhibits, I feel like it was mainly based of domestication. A good example of this is the exhibit "Domestic Life at Fort Smith", where it focuses on the lives of the wife's of political leaders in Fort Smith. Exhibit: Music Class I think this photo is relevant to the idea of women being seen in more of a domesticated role during this time. In my opinion, this photo of Chickasaw girls at Bloomfield Academy in a music class shows how women were even educated in more domesticated roles like the arts, instead of politics. Exhibit: Women...

Infinitely Obscure Lives: Invisibility of Women in a U.S. Historic Site

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