Club is made of single elk antler. Base of antler is carved into the head of a snack. Snack has black beaded eyes and leather fangs. Inside of snack is a carved animal shape with red painted eyes and leather legs. Inside of mouth is painted red. One of the tips of the antler is carved into a snake head with blue beaded eyes and leather fangs. Antler is pierced with buckskin thong between decorated tip and undecorated tip. Tied to buckskin thong is buckskin fringe. Club is 20.75 inches in length.
Purchased from the Logan Museum of Anthropology's Heath Collection in 1956. Albert Green Heath was born in 1888 in Chicago, Illinois. He attended Williams College and then the University of Chicago, graduating in 1912. Heath became an avid collector and dealer of Native American objects at an early age, developing an impressive collection which he called the Museum of Amerind Arts or the Museum of American Indian Art. Heath traveled extensively throughout North America buying, trading, and selling Native American objects. His summer home in Harbor Springs, Michigan afforded him the opportunity to develop relationships with the local Odawa population. An amateur anthropologist, Heath recorded detailed information on the former owners and provenance of items in his collection.
Heath was very interested in preserving his collection for entertainment and education purposes. When he died in 1953, his cousin Helen Friedmann, Beloit class of 1918, pushed for the collection to go to Beloit College. In 1955, despite interest from other museums 2,635 objects were sold to the Logan Museum of Anthropology for $9,000. In order to recoup the acquisition expense, the Logan Museum sold "duplicate" items, giving museums first priority. The sale was later opened to private collectors and the public. Of the full collection of 2,635 objects, 1,699 were sold and 936 became part of the Logan Museum's permanent collection.
Catalog card remarks say ceremonial club is from Wind River Reservation, Wyoming.