A Frontier Milestone — Harper's Weekly, 22 September 1883

This significant original wood engraving, published in Harper's Weekly on 22 September 1883, commemorates one of the defining moments in the history of the American frontier: the laying of the cornerstone of the Dakota Territory Capitol in Bismarck on 5 September 1883 — a ceremony that drew thousands of spectators and some of the most celebrated figures of the age to the windswept plains of the northern Great Plains.

The occasion was extraordinary in its cast of characters. Former President Ulysses S. Grant attended as a guest of honour, lending the ceremony the prestige of the Union's greatest general and two-term president. Equally remarkable was the presence of Sitting Bull — the Lakota holy man and war chief whose forces had defeated Custer at the Little Bighorn just seven years earlier — who delivered a speech that was, characteristically, not translated as given. The juxtaposition of these two figures at the same frontier celebration captures the profound and painful contradictions of the era: the triumphant expansion of American settlement and the dispossession of the peoples who had called these plains home for generations.

The September 22 issue of Harper's Weekly paired its coverage of the Bismarck cornerstone with engravings of the Golden Spike ceremony of the Northern Pacific Railway — the transcontinental line completed that same month — making it one of the most historically rich single issues of the magazine's celebrated run. Together, the Capitol and the Railway told the story of a territory on the cusp of statehood, connected at last to the wider nation by iron rails and civic ambition.

• Publication: Harper's Weekly, New York
• Date: 22 September 1883
• Subject: Cornerstone laying of the Dakota Territory Capitol, Bismarck; featuring Ulysses S. Grant and Sitting Bull
• Medium: Original wood engraving
• Size: Approximately 26 × 40 cm (11 × 16 inches) for the page, the North Dakota Capitol image is 7 x 9 inches.
• Scan: 350 dpi
• Condition: Original antique print — age-toning consistent with period. Any slight tears along the edges of the original print will be repaired using acid-free archival tape. No original prints will be sold where there is damage to the principal image area.

A historically exceptional piece for collectors of American frontier history, Native American history, Gilded Age politics, or Great Plains history — and a powerful, conversation-starting addition to any interior.