On the Head-Waters--Burgess Finding a Ford

Frederic Remington

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In summer 1893 Remington visited Yellowstone, America’s first national park, to research an article on its soldiers for Harper’s Weekly. While there, he joined superintendent George S. Anderson and longtime government scout Felix Burgess on an expedition to the park’s backcounty in search of animal poachers. This watercolor depicts Burgess leading a group of mounted soldiers and pack mules through a spongy mountain meadow in search of solid ground. It served first as the study for an illustration accompanying "Policing the Yellowstone" in Harper’s Weekly on January 12, 1895, and later as a chapter illustration in Remington’s anthology Pony Tracks.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art