by Lila Teeters, University of New Hampshire, and Andrew W. Mellon Fellow at the MHS

I came to the Massachusetts Historical Society to conduct legal history. I spend most of my time researching Native American citizenship in the United States, with a particular focus on the lead up to the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act. The cartons awaiting my gaze at MHS belonged to Robert G. Valentine, who served as the commissioner of Indian affairs from 1909 to 1912. This period was critical in the development of policies guiding Native citizenship in the United States, and Valentine’s papers provide an unparalleled look into the ideological underpinnings of federal policies. While I came for legal history, I left with an additional lesson on pedagogy.

People often ask me if I am a teacher or historian first. My master’s degree is in teaching social studies, and I taught high school history for four years before starting my PhD. My answer to their question is usually wonky, as I try explaining that each of those roles encompasses the other. A teacher and historian are one, I say, earning accusations of being sophist. Perhaps it is no coincidence then that some of my favorite archival moments occur when I see my historical actors teaching others about their chosen craft. These sources are usually irrelevant to my primary research, and I tuck them away to be considered later.

As a PhD candidate trying to finish my dissertation, I am particularly drawn to my actors’ advice on writing. The process feels (to use a popular millennial phrase) very “meta,” particularly when the people I write about give advice about the act itself. Composing a person’s history comes with a certain amount of responsibility (a well-worn claim that once again earns me accusations of sophistry), and weighing subjects’ advice feels like a way to honor that responsibility.

Hence my excitement when I came across writing exercises tucked within Valentine’s notes. Valentine taught English and composition classes at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1896-1902, and his papers contain lecture notes, assignments, and musings on prose and pedagogy. One of the exercises he recommends is about depth: “In order for you to determine the qualities of mind,-wealth, discipline, and understanding, which you possess, it is useful to write a very short sketch of

1. Someone you know,
   1. like
   2. dislike
   3. are indifferent to
2. a view,
   1. familiar
   2. unfamiliar
3. a thought
4. a feeling
5. a machine
6. a process
7. a story
8. an argument
9. history”

He recommended that each sketch be around 200 words.[1] Valentine wanted his students to determine if they had the deep knowledge of a subject to condense its essence down to a 200-word meditation—a written crucible of sorts. Compress to assess.

Valentine is an actor whom I find maddening. While I “know” him only through his writings and his policies as Indian commissioner, I at once like, dislike, and am indifferent to him. My “very short sketch” of him encompasses all three:

Born in 1872, Roger G. Valentine was a civic-minded man directed by principle and prejudice. A son of Massachusetts, a father and husband, Valentine assumed the role of commissioner of Indian Affairs in 1909. While he forswore essentialist racial classification of Native Americans, Valentine held other racist views, claiming that Natives needed to be taught self-respect, self-support, and good citizenship. Many of the policies he promoted operated from these paternalist assumptions. Valentine prized civic engagement and held citizenship and patriotism in the highest regard. As commissioner, he attempted to root out corruption, separate church from state, and solicit feedback from Native people. Yet he assumed one of his most prized possessions—US citizenship—would likewise be prized by all Natives. His administration created “competency commissions,” which assessed the “fitness” of individual Natives to be citizens of the United States. While he acknowledged the harm done by American policies, soldiers, and citizens, he almost never questioned why some Natives did not want to become citizens. A controversy, one that threw Valentine’s integrity into question (he and I believe rather unfairly), prompting his resignation in 1912. A long list of joined organizations and committees show his appetite for civic engagement went unabated until he died in 1916 at the young age of 43.

It is comforting to know that Valentine found writing difficult. His papers are speckled with frustrated marginalia and rabid reworkings. He would most likely quibble with my sentence structure just as I grumble at his passive voice. I like the image: historian and subject, united briefly through our common craft.

[1] “Notes from RGV’s composition class, 1902-1903,” carton 17, folder 21, Robert G. Valentine family papers, Massachusetts Historical Society.