Shawnee Home Life Paintings of Earnest Spybuck

a remarkable series of paintings of Shawnee life by gifted Shawnee artist, Earnest Spybuck.Born in Tecumseh in 1883 on the Potawatomi-Shawnee Reservation, painter Earnest Spybuck (Shawnee name Maythela) was educated in the Shawnee Boarding School and at Sacred Heart Mission. For most of his adult life he was a farmer. He lived his entire life in the area that became Pottawatomie County. Earnest Spybuck began painting at around the age of six. His patron was anthropologist M. R. Harrington, who was to feature Spybuck's work in several ethnographic volumes that included material on the Shawnee and the Delaware, because of his drawing ability and his interest in portraying scenes of contemporary tribal life. From the book.