William E. Irwin Photographs collection

Photographs of sites and individuals in Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory, as well as Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and other sites in the American West, circa 1893-1935, chiefly created by William E. Irwin, as well as by his brothers, John Allison Irwin and Marvin Elmore Irwin.

A significant portion of the collection documents American Indians, including Comanche Indians and Kiowa Indians, in the Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory, circa 1893 to 1903. These images created by William E. Irwin and his partner S. Jack Mankins that include portraits of individuals, couples, and families, as well as views of settlements and structures. The collection also includes photographs of the territories and American Indians created by William J. Lenny and William L. Sawyers, circa 1889-1891.

Other substantial portions of the collection include landscape views of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, as well as hunting parties for deer and fowl in the states, circa 1893-1945. Many of the images include members of the Irwin family or property owned by them, such as the Buck Horn Ranch near Lometa, Texas, owned by William Pinkney "Pink" Irwin. Images of Arizona also include overviews of mining operations, especially in and around Bisbee.

A small portion of the collection documents activities in northern Mexico. These images include deer and puma hunting parties in the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains and Mexican-American Border region in 1907 and 1910. Groups of images relate to the Mexican Revolution, 1910-1913, including the aftermath of the Battle of Naco in April 1913, as well as portraits of Álvaro Obregón Salido and Venustiano Carranza de la Garza. Images of other states in the American West document trips to Alaska, California, Colorado, and Yellowstone National Park.

The collection also includes portraits of the extended Irwin family and friends, as well as a small group of ephemera that documents tax receipts for land in Texas.

The collection includes different photographic presentation methods of the same image, including unmounted and mounted photographic prints, as well as cabinet photographs and photographic postcards. Many discrete images in the collection share the same inscriptions in the negative or on their versos. Additionally, photographers frequently printed images of clouds in landscape views using separate negatives.