Tension At White River Reservation
In the late 1870s, white settlers began to increasingly populate western Colorado, unsettling the approximately 800 Utes who resided on a reservation in the northwestern part of the state. Ute warriors led raids against the settlers. Their threats and intimidation made national headlines. The government appointed Nathanial Meeker, a journalist with no understanding of Native American culture, as the Indian agent for this region, known as the White River Indian Agency.
The sixty-one-year-old Meeker assumed his post in May 1878, traveling to the remote region alone. He and the agency’s interpreter repaired buildings and prepared a home for the Meeker family.
In July 1878, Meeker’s wife, Arvilla, and their youngest child, Josephine “Josie,” joined him at the agency. Meeker’s duties were to establish a school for the Indian children, educate the adults in farming methods, and introduce them to the ways of white civilization.
The Native peoples received food and supplies from the agency, but they preferred their traditional, nomadic way of life to learning from white agency officials. Mrs. Meeker operated a store and cared for the sick and elderly. Josie taught at the school, though only three students attended the boarding school. She visited the Ute camps and felt comfortable around the Native people.
In the fall of 1879, Meeker plowed up a horse pasture used by the Utes for grazing. In retaliation, a Ute named Chief Johnson shot Meeker’s horses. A fight ensued between Meeker and Johnson. Two other Utes joined in and left Meeker nearly unconscious. As the threats continued, Meeker sent a note to Washington about the situation, and troops from a nearby post were sent to protect him.
On September 22, 1879, Major Thomas Thornburgh led approximately 200 soldiers toward the White River Indian agency from their base near Rawlins, Wyoming. Four days later, en route, the soldiers encountered Ute warriors who tried to discourage them from continuing to the Indian agency; however, the troops moved forward. The Utes confronted the soldiers again and asked them not to cross Milk Creek. Disregarding the Ute leaders, Thornburgh’s men crossed the creek. The Utes fired on the troops, killing Thornburgh. The soldiers retreated, but the fighting continued. The Utes felt misled by Meeker and headed for the Indian agency.
On September 29, 1879, the Indian agency on the Ute Reservation in Meeker, Colorado, was attacked, killing Indian agent Nathan Meeker and his ten male employees. Five women and children were taken hostage at a remote mountain camp, sparking outrage among white Americans. The hostages included Meeker’s wife, Arvilla; his daughter, Josie; Mrs. Shadruck Price, whose husband was killed in the attack; and her two children. They were held for twenty-three days. During their captivity, the women, having seen their husbands and father killed, feared their future—would they be tortured to death or used as barter?
She-towitch, sister of the great Ute leader Ouray and wife of the White River Ute leader Canalla, ensured the hostages had food and helped care for the two young children. During their captivity, the women made clothes for themselves from Native American blankets and for the young Utes.
On October 21, 1879, Charles Adams, a general in the Colorado militia, rescued the women and children and brought them to Denver. During their stay in town, they were photographed by Bates & Nye.
Life After Captivity
Josie Meeker worked in the office of the Secretary of the Interior at Washington, D. C., until her death from pneumonia on December 20, 1882, at the age of twenty-five.
Arvilla Meeker returned to Greeley and died in 1905 at the age of ninety.
Flora Price remarried and moved to the West Coast.
The Photographers Bates & Nye, a partnership between William L. Bates and Willis A. Nye, was located at the corner of Larimer and Fifteenth Streets in Denver. The firm opened in April 1879 and remained in business for about a year. Afterward, Nye moved to Leadville, Colorado, while Bates remained in Denver.
The firm is best known for its photographs of the women and children the Utes captured during the Meeker Massacre. The firm sold cabinet-sized portraits for 50 cents each. A group portrait was published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated newspaper.
William L. Bates was born in Ohio in 1843 to Aaron Tiffany Bates and Caroline Otis Bates. By 1867, the family had moved to Chicago, Illinois. Bates and his father sold farm machinery. A few years later, Bates became an agent for “health lift,” a total body exerciser. He married Ada T. Austin on January 4, 1872, in Chicago.
In 1876, Bates made at least three trips to Denver, Colorado, before moving there with his wife in 1879. He seemed to have some familiarity with photography before he arrived, as he opened the Bates & Nye studio with Dennis B. Nye in April. They worked together for a year.
In August 1880, Bates opened a gallery in the new Tabor Building at the corner of Sixteenth and Larimer Streets. The studio was located on the upper floor, away from the dusty streets. Patrons took the elevator to the fifth-floor reception room, hung with framed photographs from the studio. “Many of his customers claimed that the view of the western mountains from the reception room’s window is “worth the price of a dozen pictures.” Men and women prepared for their sittings in elegant toilet rooms.
The operating room, where patrons had their portraits made, was lit by diffused light from ground glass, rather than direct sunlight. Patrons could choose a background for their portraits—the studio had the largest collection of studio backgrounds in the West. At least some of his backgrounds were produced by New York City’s well-known artist, L. W. Seavey. Once the negative was exposed, it was processed in the darkroom and, when dry, moved to the retouching room. Bates offered mats and frames especially selected to enhance photos and portraits.
The firm produced a variety of portrait work, ranging from high school students and local businessmen to celebrities passing through town, such as Misses Curtis and Pinneo, equestriennes who competed in long-distance horse races. He copyrighted the latter portraits and sold them for 50 cents each. He exhibited his work at the Colorado Industrial Association’s annual exhibitions.
During the 1881 holiday season, Bates hired extra studio help, including Adolph Muhr as an operator. (Shortly thereafter, Muhr would become Bates’ partner.) The studio was even open for business on Thanksgiving Day. They promised a five-day turnaround for photos.
By early 1884, the firm was facing financial problems. They increased newspaper advertising in hopes of boosting sales, but in October, the press reported that Bates had sold out and moved to Chicago. However, he maintained businesses in both cities for a while. In Chicago, he worked under the studio name of Bates & Rocher, though Henry Rocher was not involved in the business. Meanwhile, the Denver studio operated from November 1884 to May 1885, as Bates & Webb, with John T. Webb probably running the business.
In May 1885, Bates returned to Denver for health reasons. He reopened his studio, exhibiting 100 new pictures from his time in Chicago. He operated this studio until September 1885, when he sold the business to John K. Rose, his longtime retoucher.
Bates and his family lived in Colorado for most of the 1890s. He worked in mining and later ran Denver’s Columbia Hotel. In 1898, the Bates family moved to Cleveland, Ohio. Bates died on March 2, 1909, leaving a wife and two daughters. He was buried at Mansfield Cemetery in Mansfield, Ohio.
Willis A. Nye was born on December 19, 1851, in Wisconsin, to Austin Nye and Betsey Atkins Nye. His father was a farmer who died of disease while serving in the Civil War. His older brother, Dennis B. Nye, also worked as a photographer.
Nye may have begun his photographic career in Springfield, Illinois, around 1872. In June 1873, he took charge of the operating room at C. L. Burpee’s studio in Beloit, Wisconsin. By 1876, Nye settled in Detroit, Michigan, working for three years at various firms as an operator and later as a studio manager. On August 15, 1878, Nye married Myra Augusta Jones in Detroit.
In 1879, Nye lived in Denver, Colorado, where he partnered with William L. Bates under the name Bates & Nye. After a year with Bates, Nye moved to Leadville, Colorado. Alfred Brisbois managed Nye’s Leadville studio, and when Nye moved to Chicago around January 1881, Brisbois took over the space.
Nye moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he joined John E. Beebe’s studio. In 1882, he took over the studio when Beebe shifted his focus to manufacturing dry plate negatives. The following year, Nye attended the annual meeting of the Photographers’ Association of America, where he exhibited his work. He invited attendees to visit his Chicago studio after the meeting to see a demonstration of the Beebe Dry Plates.
In 1887, Nye established a studio in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where his brother Dennis worked as a photographer. It was a brief stay, as he moved to Dubuque, Iowa, the following year. In the spring of 1890, he relocated his studio to Duluth, Minnesota. The St. Louis & Canadian Photographer published an example of his work in its June 1890 issue. In 1892, Nye appears to have left Duluth, but his wife is listed in the Duluth city directory as a photographer with Frederick Johnson.
In the mid-1890s, Nye, based in New York, served as a representative for Hammer Dry Plates. Later, he worked for Eastman Kodak.
Nye died on January 21, 1938, in Washington, D. C. at age 86. He was buried at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.
For more information about the Meeker massacre, see: Troubled Trails by Robert Silbernagel: https://uofupress.com/books/troubled-trails/
Thank you to History Colorado staff: Jori Johnson, Aaron Marcus, and Joy Saliu.
