Edward S. Curtis

Curtis met Grinnell by chance while out photographing in the wilderness, Grinnell and colleagues being lost. Curtis guided them back, Grinnell saw his work, and as a result invited him to join an expedition to record Blackfeet culture. Muir and Ridgway were fellow-members of Harriman’s 1899 Alaska expedition, Curtis being a key member (the meeting with Grinnell also led to this appointment). Cunningham worked in Curtis’s studio, though only met him twice, and described him as a determined egoist. Flaherty called on him in New York, aware of shared interests, and found him supportive, sympathetic and father-like.