A Guide to the
Lorenzo D. Creel Papers
Collection No. 82-01

Lorenzo D. Creel (1853-1926)

Lorenzo Dow Creel was born in Parkersburg, West Virginia on April 12, 1853. He attended Marshall College in West Virginia and Duff's Business College in Pittsburgh [Pa.]. From 1884 until 1891, he served on the faculty of the Tri-State College, Angola, Indiana, and in 1900 he began his career with the federal government in the U. S. Census Office. His work with the Indian Service started in 1902 and continued for twenty- one years. He served in various capacities, working with the Indians in the states of Oklahoma, Nebraska, Montana, Nevada, Florida, and Utah.  Lorenzo Creel retired from the Indian Service in 1922 and died in Reno, Nevada on October 19, 1926.

Scope and Content

The Lorenzo D. Creel Collection consists of 8.5 cubic feet and is open without restrictions.  The Lorenzo D. Creel collection was donated by his granddaughter, Jane Creel.

The collection has been divided into two major subgroups and into series within the subgroups. The first subgroup contains Creel family items and includes correspondence, financial records, business papers, memorabilia, photographs, and books which belonged to Creel family members with the majority of the material originating from Lorenzo and his son Cecil. Three- dimensional items, which accompanied the collection, have been donated to the University of Nevada, Reno, school of Home Economics Costume Collection, the Nevada Historical Society and the Nevada State Museum. 

The second subgroup contains U. S. Indian Service records representing Lorenzo D. Creel's work with various Indian agencies and groups throughout the country. Included are correspondence, financial records, subject files, diaries, workbooks, maps and photographs. The material in the collection includes original, handwritten documents and also typewritten, copied, and printed items that covers a time period from about 1875 to 1945.  The photographs in this group, most of them taken by Lorenzo Creel, number about 4500.  They include prints, film, and glass plate negatives, in generally good condition, depicting Indian life and customs in areas around the United States. All photographs in the collection have been transferred to the photo archives, as collection 2710 and 2711.

This Collection is divided into the following subgroups and series:

Subgroup I. Creel Family
Series 1 Correspondence
Series 2 Financial records
Series 3 Family items
Series 4 Business Papers
Series 5 Cecil W. Creel items
Series 6 Books and pamphlets
Series 7 Family photographs

 

Subgroup II. U. S. Indian Service
Series 1 Correspondence
Series 2 Subject Files
Series 3 Financial records
Series 4 Diaries and workbooks
Series 5 Maps and drawings
Series 6 Photographs
 
 

Subgroup I. Creel Family

Material generated and collected by the Creel family is contained in this subgroup. Members if the immediate Creel family represented include Lorenzo D. Creel; wife, Estella Willis Creel; son, Cecil Willis Creel and daughter, June Creel. Additional Creel family members are represented in the family correspondence and include Lorenzo's brothers and sisters, Estella's family, Laura Stevens (Mrs. Cecil W. Creel), Marshall Stevens Creel (Cecil's son) and Oliver Perry Riker (June Creel's husband).

Creel family items generated from family home locations in Parkersburg, West Virginia; Angola, Indiana and Reno, Nevada. Additional material originated from Montana, Florida, Salt Lake City, and Washington, D. C., areas determined by the professional activities of Lorenzo and Cecil Creel. Correspondence between family and friends constitutes a major portion of this group. Also included are family financial records and papers, business records, collected items, memorabilia, family photographs, books, and pamphlets.

 

Box 1-4

Series 1 82-01/I/1 Correspondence

The Creel family correspondence covers the period from 1884-1945.  It includes the personal correspondence of Lorenzo D. Creel, Estella Creel, Cecil Creel, June Creel Riker, and other members of the Creel family.  Correspondence is arranged in chronological order followed by three envelopes of invitations and announcements and one envelope of greeting cards.

Box 1 Correspondence 1884-1911
Box 2 Correspondence 1912-1915
Box 3 Correspondence 1916-1945 and updated
Box 4 Invitations and announcements and one envelope of greeting cards

 

Box 4

Series 2 82-01/I/2 Financial Records

Creel family financial records make up this series.  Included are family accounts and receipts, 1875-1925; three account books, 1884, 1896, 1911; Washoe County Bank Statements, 1916-1918, 1926; bank book and check books, 1909-1917; cancelled checks, 1908-1922; check book stubs, 1911-1926. 5 folders, 5 envelopes.

 

Box 5

Series 3 82-01/I/3 Family Items

This series contains a small collection of Creel family papers and memorabilia.  Included are some family histories and biographies; family obituaries; documents reflecting Lorenzo Creel's education, employment and mining and land interests; family writings and notes; family memorabilia including calling cards, flower cards, and dance programs; June Creel's post card collection; and four maps stored in map drawer. 13 folders, 8 envelopes.

 

Series 4 82-01/I/4 Business papers

Lorenzo D. Creel's private business interests are reflected in this series of documents. Apart from his work in the U. S. Indian Service, Creel was involved in bee keeping and the honey industry from 1920-1924.  Apiaries were located at Wadsworth, Nevada and at Lamoille, Elko County, Nevada.  Four folders of material include receipts and accounts, also correspondence relating to bees and hone interfiled with accounts in chronological order. After retirement from the U. S. Indian Service, Lorenzo Creel bought and sold Navajo Indian rugs.  Two folders contain Creel's rug accounts, printed material and rug order books, 1924-1926.

 

Box 6

Series 5 82-01/I/5 Cecil W. Creel items

Cecil W. Creel, son of Lorenzo D. Creel, was born in Angola, Indiana in 1889.  He received his education at various schools around the country and attained the Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Nevada in 1911.  In 1921, after some years of experience in the field of agriculture, he became director of the Agricultural Extension Division and professor of Agricultural Extension in the College of Agriculture, University of Nevada, Reno.  In 1940, Cecil Creel moved to Washington, D. C., where he served as coordinator between the Association of Land Grant Colleges and the Roosevelt administration.  He also ran, unsuccessfully, for the U. S. Senate in 1942. Cecil Creel retired from the University of Nevada faculty in 1952, and died in Reno in 1968.

Cecil Creel's correspondence, financial papers and memorabilia are included throughout the Creel family series.  This series comprises a small collection of his school notebooks, college workbooks, entomological field notes, addresses and articles dating from 1903-1932.  No political campaign material is included.  Additional papers of Cecil W. Creel that relate to his affiliation with the University of Nevada can be found in the University of Nevada Reno Archives.  4 folders.

 

Box 6

Series 6 82-01/I/6 Books and pamphlets

This series contains several books and pamphlets owned by the Creel family and a small collection of newspaper clippings.  Included are three family Bibles and assorted books and pamphlets belonging to Lorenzo Creel, Estella Creel, and Cecil Creel.

 

Box 7

Series 7 82-01/I/7 Family Photographs (transferred to photo archives as 2711)

This series includes approximately 400 family photographs, ca. 1880-1926.  They are mostly portraits of the early Kodak type, professional and amateur.  Very few are identified.

 

Subgroup II. U. S. Indian Service

Lorenzo D. Creel began a career with the U. S. Indian Service in 1902.  He served as superintendent of the boarding school at the Crow Indian agency in Montana, and in 1907 he was transferred to the Nevada Agency as superintendent of the Indian Training School at Wadsworth, Nevada. In 1910, he accepted appointment as special agent for the Seminole Indians in Florida and from 1911 to 1916, he served as special agent for the scattered bands of Indians in Utah. In 1916, Lorenzo Creel returned to Nevada as a Special Supervisor for the Indian Service and Special Disbursing Agent for Nevada Indians.  He retired from the Indian Service in 1922, but remained in Reno, Nevada until his death in 1926.  The papers in this group reflect Lorenzo Creel's work with the Indian Service and his special interest in American Indians. Included are reports of conditions on various Indian reservations, observations on Indian lifestyle and customs, correspondence concerning the welfare of the people he represented and, possibly most valuable, approximately 4500 photographs, many taken by Creel himself, depicting various aspects of Indian life.

 

Box 8

Series 1 82-01/II/1 Correspondence

This series contains correspondence relating to Lorenzo Creel's association with the U. S. Indian Service from 1906-1926.  Included are letters concerning the Crow Indian Agency, Montana; the Paiute, Washo, and Shoshone Indians of Nevada; the Seminole Indians in Florida; scattered bands of Indians in Utah and Indians in California.  Correspondence is arranged in chronological order.

 

Series 2 82-01/II/2 Subject Files

This series includes subject files maintained by Lorenzo Creel relative to his work with the U. S. Indian Service.  Originally found in envelopes, the material has been kept intact, placed in folders and labeled according to the notation on the original envelope.  Photographs have been Xeroxed and relocated in the photograph series.  Subject files include Ash Meadows, Death Valley, 1917-1918; California Colonies, 1918; Crow reservations, Montana, 1904; Dressler Colony, 1922; Pyramid Lake Industries, 1`922; Pyramid Lake School, 1922; Relief of Homeless Indians, Nevada, Final Report 1917; Report of California Indians; Report on Fish matters; Pyramid Lake, 1922; Ruby Valley Shoshone, 1917, 1918; Seminole Indians, Florida; Summit Lake, Nevada, 1920; Washoe Pine Nut Lands Report, 1917, 1918.

Additional subject files have been created such as Indian narratives, Indian Printed Material, Personal Writings and Notes on Indian Matters.  Also included in this series are two handwritten letters and one copy, 1886, signed, Sarah Winnemucca, and typescript copies of these letters, also three certificates of appointment by the Secretary of the Interior for Lorenzo D. Creel, 1910, 1911, and 1916. Material is arranged by subject in alphabetical order.  18 folders.  Oversize materials are stored in the manuscript map case.

 

Box 9

Series 3 82-01/II/3 Financial records

This series contains financial records generated by the U. S. Indian Service, Department of Interior and by Lorenzo D. Creel as an employee from 1907 to 1923.  Included are receipts and accounts, vouchers for traveling and personal expenses, accounts current for disbursing officers, statements of disbursing officers' transactions, disbursing officers' checkbooks, payrolls, handwritten accounts and notes and correspondence relating to Indian Service financial matters.  Material is arranged in chronological order in folders.  Check books are in an envelope and large checkbook pages are stored separately on the shelf.  17 folders.  Oversize materials are stored in the manuscript map case.

 

Box 7

Series 4 82-01/II/4 Diaries and Work Books

Diaries and Indian Colony Work Books make up this series.  Included are diaries from 1909 through 1924 (1917 and 1918 missing), recording Lorenzo Creel's daily activities in the U. S. Indian Service.  Entries are sparse for some periods.  Also included are two Colony workbooks from the Reno- Sparks Indian Colony, and one from McDermitt, also a notebook inscribed, "Fallon Census" which lists individuals and provides information about people in Nevada Indian Communities.

Empty envelopes, with notations by L. D. Creel, are also stored in this box.

 

Series 5 82-01/II/5 Maps and Drawings

The maps and blueprints in this series relate to Creel's work with the U. S. Indian Service. Included are twelve blueprints for Indian cottages, 1912; five maps of Southern Florida, all with annotations by Creel, 1905, 1909, 1919; two hand drawn maps, one plate showing the southern end of Pyramid Lake and one labeled "Dressler Option"; a Nevada state map, 1908; a map of Nevada, Southern Pacific Railroad Co., 1912, annotated; a map of proposed irrigation ditch, Ash Meadows, Nevada, 1918; a blueprint map showing areas irrigated in 1920, Pyramid Lake project, Nevada. These oversize items are housed in the Manuscript Map Case. Additional generic maps are placed in the following map case drawers: "Nevada", "Ormsby County", "Washoe County nid" [n.d.?]; Nevada 1900-1939, M-1, Nevada and the West, Nye.

 

Series 6 82-01/II/6 Photographs (transferred to photo archives as 2710)

Approximately 4500 photographic prints and negatives, the majority taken by Lorenzo D. Creel, make up this series.  They are generally of the early Kodak type and span the years from 1906 to 1922.  Photographs in this series are numbered 2710/plus a number corresponding to the numbers and description of the photograph in the partial inventory of Creel photos prepared by the Nevada State Museum. They are boxed in numerical order and stored in photo archives.  Included are: