This man was an Assinoboine Indian from Montana. Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood in the mid-1970s had a large Native American population. I encountered this man several times during my four years of photographing in Uptown. He was always courteous, respectful and respectable. Like many before and after him, he migrated to Chicago to find work. But the difficulty of life in Uptown made him question his decision to move to the city.
The rumor on the street in Uptown during that era was that representatives of every tribe in America lived in Uptown. There were more than 20 social service agencies in Uptown that supported Indians at one time. The area contained the largest concentration of Indians in Chicago and, some claimed, the nation.
Harry S. Truman College can be seen behind him. It was still under construction on Wilson between the El and Racine when I took this shot. Note the missing windows. It looks much the same today, though everything around it has changed radically and, I am told, that many of Chicago’s Indians have dispersed from Uptown.
