A Treasure of Extinct Art

Rare Indian baskets, valued at $9,000 or $10,000, have just been given to the State College of Washington museum of art and natural history by H. C. Stimson of Hollywood Farm, Seattle. They will be known as the Fred S. Stimson exhibit, in memory of the late regent of the college, father of H. C. Stimson. Mrs. Fred Stimson spent 10 years in personal search and study, which resulted in a collection not duplicated anywhere in the world. Many of the baskets show some of the finest art of the red men, and some are extremely rare, being woven by tribes now extinct. Among the baskets, which number 150 or 160, are those made by Indians of Alaska, Western Canada, Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona and Nevada, beautifully fashioned in quaint and curious shapes, all sizes and patterns, some decorated elaborately with bird feathers, others with beads, colored grasses and threads. One, the prize of the collection, Mrs. Stimson was offered $2,000 for by another collector who knew that the only other one of the sort in existence is in the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, D.C. Cases for the exhibition of the baskets will be installed in one of the fireproof buildings, probably the Mechanic Arts building where the art department has its studios in conjunction with the department of architecture.