After the 1933 project

Revisiting the Anishinaabe Basketmakers

Information will be added in the near future

1935 Planting of Seeds from the Ethnobotanical Laboratory Collections

In the summer of 1935, Volney Jones oversaw a project growing out seeds from the Ethnobotanical Laboratory collections. Corn, beans, and sunflower seeds were selected from the collection.  Over 50 varieties of corn were selected for planting, including corn from Walpole Island. The majority of  these varieties originated from Indigenous communities in the southwestern United States.

The seeds were grown in a garden at the University of Michigan Botanical Gardens, which at that time was located south of the center of Ann Arbor. Jones never wrote a report on this project. As a result, the purpose of this planting and how the seeds were selected is unknown. The only records from this project are handwritten notes describing the plants at the time of harvest in September 1935. These notes record the number of hills that were planted for each variety of corn, the date the ears were harvested, the number of ears harvested, and descriptive information about the corn plants, such as height and number of suckers.  On average, four hills were planted for each variety of corn and there were an average of three plants per hill. At the time of harvest, Jones selected a few cobs of each corn variety to add to the Museum of Anthropology collections. The fate of the other harvested ears is unknown.

Publications

Jones, Volney H.
1935 A Chippewa Method of Manufacturing Wooden Brooms. Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 20:23-30.

1936 Some Chippewa and Ottawa Uses of Sweet Grass. Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 21:21-31.

1937 Notes on the Preparation and the Uses of Basswood Fiber by Indians of the Great Lakes Region. Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 22:1-14.

1948 Notes on the Manufacture of Cedar-Bark Mats by the Chippewa Indians. Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 32:341-363.

Kinietz, Vernon, and Volney H. Jones
1942 Notes on the Manufacture of Rush Mats Among the Chippewa. Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 27:525-537.