Coded Photograph?

[Charmin]

Coins/tokens could be Indian Peace Medals ?

Maybe so, SWR . All the Peace Medals I've ever seen in museums, though, are bigger......About the size of the rounds discs the woman in the picture is wearing. The coins in the mans hand look like dollar coins to me .
I guess if this man was involved with some kind of 'secret society' that the meaning of what he was saying in the photo probably died with him.

 

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[vamelungeon]

Did you find this picture online? Maybe this family was celebrating a particular event by going to the photographer's shop. It's hard to tell anything completely out of context.

 

[GoldBack]

Look closely at the child, he's giving the traditional KGC sign. All you have to
do is find the residence they lived in and dig it up.

Not as easy or practical as you make it sound.

 

[alec]

Other than the ramblings of a man who uses modern day gazebos as clues to treasure hidden in the 1800's, what makes you think the KGC coded photographs? And just what kind of code would they be using.

Photographers were not abundant back then and I would think they weren't too cheap either. Do you think the members of the KGC had a practice of getting their photos taken? Why? Were they mailing them to other members, posting them in their homes to identify themselves as KGC? I thought that's what the secret handshake was for.

This gets back to common sense. If they are using a code that anyone can read and it actually is supposed to tell you something other than "we are members" then it has to be a known code that could be deciphered by anyone with the key. That would seem to go against keeping the society "secret". The KGC didn't have any of their own codes, they stole or copied every code they ever used from someone or some place else. To code a photo so any member or even just the upper echilon would be able to read it would require those capable of reading the code to not have to guess at what a symbol might mean which means there would have had to have been an actual code and not just some strange looking poeple who were holding their hands funny or had some weird object in the photo.

 

[uthunter]

This looks like more of a staged family photo than a secret message in the photo.

The photo was done in a photographers studio, very expensive. The photos of the time were quite often staged and many props were used. The boy looks like he is about to faint and is quite afraid of the impending flash.

Many families of the time, when they got their family photo done, dressed in their finest clothes and often wore borrowed clothing. They wore their finest jewelry, and he may be showing off his booty from selling his crops, stock, or a payment of some kind. Or the coins may be the photographers and he thought is would a bit of flair to an otherwise drab photo of a typical Indian family of the area.

There are lots of reasons the coins are there. I have seen photos where the subjects, being dirt poor, save and finally had enough to have a family portrait taken. They wore borrowed clothes, borrowed jewelry, and the coins spread about on the floor and in their hands were borrowed as well. My father has this particular photo on an ancestor and his parents and sibling.

Photos of the time would not have been used for such a frivolous manner as just to show a secret code that not too many people would ever see.

 

[Texas Jay]

For a true history of the Knights of the Golden Circle:

http://knightsofthegoldencircle.webs.com

~Texas Jay

 

[Charmin]

For a true history of the Knights of the Golden Circle:

http://knightsofthegoldencircle.webs.com

~Texas Jay

This is now on my "favorites" list . Thanks Texas Jay .

 

[gazmuth]

The photo was done in a photographers studio, very expensive. The photos of the time were quite often staged and many props were used. The boy looks like he is about to faint and is quite afraid of the impending flash.
.

Actually, in Ponca City, just across the river from the Osage Nation, there was a photographer who had offices in New York City, Chicago and Las Angeles by the last name of Matzene. He took a lot of 'professional' photographs of the natives in the area, and those photos are on record in the Marland Mansion archives. So, as far as the expense, the payment was probably by an oil baron, or possibly someone else. The Osages were wealthy though, for they did not give up their mineral rights.

Now, as far as KGC.... I have ran that rabbit around here in Northern Oklahoma, but have not came up with much. Legends, yes, proof, no. But I am only a novice.

Along the north edge of Oklahoma, from about Alva to Joplin was a wide trail called "Black Dog Trail" which was well travelled by the Osages, so it is possible that they were connected with the KGC.

 

[Rebel - KGC]

For a true history of the Knights of the Golden Circle:

Home - Knights of the Golden Circle

~Texas Jay

THANKS, TJ! I have the SAME info!

 

[L.C. BAKER]

Does this look like a KGC coded photograph? (Ever since I read that book by Bob Brewer, I have been paying more attention to old pictures.)
This is an Osage Indian man and his family---note the hat pulled down over one eye and the two coins in his hands. Looks to me like he's trying to 'say' something. Has anyone ever heard if there were Native American Sentinels?
This picture isn't mine--I found it online and thought it was worth sharing.

My guess would be he is injured and possibly missing an eye. The coins may be representing his unwanted allotment and the love of his family over the white mans allotment that he has yet to spend.

just my two cents,L.C.

P.S. Charley Antwine is listed as colored....does that mean Indians were considered colored in Oklahoma? Or is this man actually colored and married to and Indian? The fact is, that the Indian lands that were ceded by them after the war were in deed settled by freed Negros.

"Then came the shooting of Garfield, to whom we were looking for countenance of our plans, and we were obliged to stop short. The question of the occupancy of the lands by negroes had, after a good deal of correspondence, resolved itself into definite shape. All that was needed to be done was the issue of an executive order from the President, and the Territory would be opened to settlement by negroes. We were full expecting this action from Mr. Garfield when he was stricken down. Indeed, we had an assurance which satisfied us that this would be done, and I hoped to be able to declare all obstacles in our colonization plan removed when I got back from Washington."

The position which Mr. Turner had taken regarding these lands of Oklahoma, and which, he believed, was about to be recognized by the administration, was very briefly this.

These lands were ceded back by the Indians shortly after the war to the Government on the understanding that freedmen were to be colonized on them. Mr. Turner holds that they are made by the terms of the transfer from the Indian tribes to the Government, the heritage of the Negroes, and that justice requires that the right of the Negroes to acquire homesteads on the lands should now be recognized. All that is wanting to bring this about is the executive order spoken of. Post Dispatch.

L.C.