James Mooney

James Mooney
Born	(1861-02-10)February 10, 1861 Richmond, Indiana, U.S.
Died	December 22, 1921(1921-12-22) (aged 60) Washington, D.C., U.S.
Resting place	Mount Olivet Cemetery Washington, D.C., U.S.
Occupation	Ethnographer
Spouse	Ione Lee Gaut ​ (m. 1897)​
Children	6, including Paul

James Mooney (February 10, 1861 – December 22, 1921) was an American ethnographer who lived for several years among the Cherokee. Known as "The Indian Man",^[1] he conducted major studies of Southeastern Indians, as well as of tribes on the Great Plains.^[2] He did ethnographic studies of the Ghost Dance, a spiritual movement among various Native American culture groups, after Sitting Bull's death in 1890. His works on the Cherokee include The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees (1891), and Myths of the Cherokee (1900). All were published by the US Bureau of American Ethnology, within the Smithsonian Institution.

Native American artifacts collected by Mooney are held in the collections of the Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution^[3] and the Department of Anthropology, Field Museum of Natural History.^[4] Papers and photographs from Mooney are in the collections of the National Anthropological Archives, Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution.^[5][6]