Alfred A. Hart, photographer. 282. Piute Squaw and Child. Half-length studio portrait of a woman and infant in a cradleboard. Albumen stereoview. Sacramento, California: Alfred A. Hart, circa 1869. View title affixed to mount recto. Mount recto with series title "Central Pacific Railroad. Nevada." Hart's illustrated No. 65 J St. imprint to verso with series title "Scenes in the Washoe Range."  

An intimate ethnographic profile portrait capturing a Northern Paiute mother seated in a wooden chair, holding an infant bundled in a traditional cradleboard outfitted with an arched woven canopy and secured across her forehead with a leather tumpline band. 

Alfred A. Hart (1816-1908) served as the official photographic historian for the Central Pacific Railroad from 1865 to 1869, documenting the construction of the western half of the first transcontinental railroad over the Sierra Nevada and across the Great Basin. While primarily focused on rail beds, trestles, and Chinese labor crews, Hart also produced a series of studio and field portraits documenting the Indigenous Paiute and Shoshone peoples whose lands the railroad traversed. This is an extraordinary and memorable example of his work. 

[Native Americans, Paiute, Northern Paiute, Great Basin, Nevada, Cradleboard, Basketry, Tumpline, Central Pacific Railroad, Transcontinental Railroad, Alfred A. Hart, Alfred Hart, Frontier History, American West] [Photography, Early Photography, Historic Photography, Stereoviews, Stereographs, Albumen Prints, Alfred A. Hart, Railroad Photography, Western Photographers]

Very good condition overall. Both the prints and the mount display only minor and typical handling wear.