View of Fort Snelling - Edward K. Thomas (US), 1850

Although the upper reaches of the Mississippi River were sparsely settled in the 1850s, a surprising number of artists sought out the northern landscapes. Edward Thomas's View of Fort Snelling exemplifies frontier images in which Dakota tipis, houses of the families associated with the American Fur Company, and the military fort exist side by side. Such depictions served as accurate topographical representations and also as visual records of a landscape already in transition.