Dog Sledges of the Mandan Indians, from Travels in the Interior of North America, 1839-43
Aquatint engraving
Ackermann & Co., London
Greenslade Special Collections and Archives
Olin and Chalmers Libraries
Kenyon College

This image parallels later depictions of the "doomed" or vanishing Indian struggling against nature and the onward march of civilization. During the late nineteenth century, the image might have been used to indicate the hopelessness of adhering to traditional cultural customs, their nomadic lifestyle and outmoded methods of travel, demonstrating that Indians were to adapt and assimilate into white society in order to survive.