STILLWATER – A federal grant totaling nearly $70,000 will allow Oklahoma State University’s library staff to enhance its massive collection of works from noted Native American historian and author Angie Debo.
Debo was a highly regarded scholar of Native American history. She bequeathed her papers, books and literary rights to OSU in 1988, the same year she died in Enid.
Among her works was the controversial And Still the Waters Run, which detailed how, after their forced removal from the southeastern United States, the Five Tribes were deprived in Indian Territory of the lands and resources granted to them by federal treaty. Debo finished the book in 1936, but it wasn’t published until 1940 because of political concerns.
Grant funds will support the continued employment of Kurt Anderson, an OSU faculty member working on the Debo Collection, a humanities research project for the public. The grant was funded through the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The funding will also allow library staff to continue its work on digitizing Debo’s manuscripts, photographs and notes so that they are “more discoverable,” according to Bonnie Ann Cain-Wood, manager of communication services for the OSU library.
Most of Debo’s work is archived at OSU, adding the digitized copies allow patrons to view the photographs and manuscripts more easily. “It expands access to the collection,” Cain-Wood said. By digitizing, “it becomes a comprehensive online resource to the world.”
The COVID-19 crisis has forced most of the OSU library staff to work from home, which turned into a blessing in this particular endeavor. “Our staff got years of processing done with this collection with the staff members working from home,” Cain-Wood said.
The collection is comprised of 1,300 photographs, 64 boxes full of documents, 10 large drawers with maps and documents, 85 reels of microfilm and 593 books that belonged to Debo. The collection also includes a “bit of furniture,” and Debo’s type writer that she used to write her books.
Debo wrote one novel, Prairie City: The Story of an American Community (1944), based on the history of her hometown in Marshall, Oklahoma Territory. She finished her last history book, Geronimo: The Man, His Time, His Place, when she was 85.
Mary Larson, OSU’s associate dean of special collections, is director of the project, titled “Supporting Diversity and Inclusivity Through Library Humanities Initiatives.”
“We have so much content on Debo,” Larson said. “It’s a rich collection that will resonate with a wide variety of people: researchers, the Sovereign Nations of Oklahoma, and individuals with connections to Angie or her hometown of Marshall.”
The Angie Debo Collection consists of manuscripts of publications and presentations by Debo and related legal papers, images, memorabilia, correspondence, notes and diaries.
“The transcripts are a valuable addition to the collection, but the grant will allow us to take this project much further,” Larson said. “With this funding we are building a website that will bring together the varied material in the collection. There are a number of primary sources as well as contextualizing secondary content.”
For more information on the Debo Collection or to make an appointment to view material in person, contact the OSU Library Archives at 405-744-6311 or libscua@ okstate.edu.