An Evening with Vanessa Jennings: Kiowa Cradleboards, Culture, and Tradition

Kiowa elder Vanessa Jennings is the last active Kiowa cradleboard maker on the Southern Plains. Join her as she discusses her work, reflects upon the importance of cradleboards to Kiowa culture and traditions, and highlights the cradleboard of Stevetta Mopope.
For more info see:
www.brown.edu/...
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Brown University

[@paulakeltner2940]

Very much enjoyed this and wish I could have attended. Steven Mopope was a friend of my father at the University of Oklahoma, he also was very close to Oscar Jacobson and Monroe Tsatoke at OU. Barbara Hail came to our apartment in NYC and saw the cradleboard I inherited from my parents. She was so informative and coincidentally, my parents knew her first husband's father-in-law, Dr. George Andrews.

[@ChooseForToday]

Blessed to have an original Ella Faye Horse cradleboard in our family. It's disappointing the picture of Stephen Mopope in his cradleboard on his mother's back is featured in the book Beadwork: A world Guide by Caroline Crabtree and Pam Stallbrass (2002), but listed as "Woman, possibly Blackfoot or Kiowa, with heavily beaded baby carrier" (pg 80). I wish it had been labeled properly.
Is there a place one could see a list of the different boards and which collections or museums they are in, for those that aren't still in their family's care? I wish some museums would list more details other than just "cradleboard, Kiowa, ca. (year)". It's interesting to know the family, who made it, etc., when available.