Mahongo at the Court of Charles X of France
by Mike Wimmer
Mohongo was a beautiful Osage woman who was among a group taken to Europe under false pretenses.
In 1827, David Dulauney, a French adventurer and confidence man, arrived at Mohongo's village at the Chouteau camp on the Neosho River in Indian Territory with his Indian interpreter. Assuming the role of an U.S. representative, Dulauney told the party that he wanted to take them to meet the President in Washington. Mohongo and seven members of her tribe, including her husband, traveled down the Mississippi to New Orleans and boarded a ship for New York.
The group of Osage were instead taken to Europe and landed at LaHavre, France. They were exploited by Dulauney and forced to perform native dances in a Wild West show that traveled through the continent. It is known they performed in Holland, Germany and France. The Osage dancers were very popular and were presented to and performed for the royal court of Charles X of France.
The Osage were abandoned on the streets of Paris either because the show lost popularity or, more likely, that Delaunay was recognized by past creditors and thrown in jail. Unable to communicate, they wandered homeless through the streets in tattered buckskins and refusing to beg for food. They came to the attention of Lafayette who paid their passage back to the United States.
Tragedy struck on the ship home when Mohongo, now pregnant, lost her husband and two of the other tribe members to small pox. After landing at Norfolk, Virginia, they again lived a hand-to-mouth existence until a sympathetic landlady contacted Colonel Thomas McKenney, who helped them. Three years after wandering Europe in a side show act, Mohongo finally met President Andrew Jackson and was given the Peace medal. Charles Bird King painted her portrait with her child, which hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Mahongo at the Court of Charles X of France by Mike Wimmer was dedicated on May 19, 2004 the commission was managed by the Oklahoma State Senate Historical Preservation Fund, Inc. The painting is located inside the Oklahoma State Senate Chamber lobby on the fourth floor of the Oklahoma State Capitol and can be viewed daily from 8:30-5:30.
The Artist
Born
and raised in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Mike Wimmer began his career as
an artist during the seventh grade. He earned his B.F.A. from the University
of Oklahoma, where he met Don Ivan Punchatz. Wimmer later moved to
Arlington, Texas to be Punchatz apprentice at Punchatz famous Sketch
Pad Studio. Wimmer learned valuable knowledge regarding the
business aspect of illustrating as well as various painting techniques
and the working methods of the local Dallas illustrators. After his two and a half year apprenticeship, he moved back to Norman, Oklahoma and
set up his own studio using all that he had learned in Texas. Since
then Wimmer has become very successful illustrating children’s
books such as “Flight: The Journey of Charles Lindbergh” by
Robert Burliegh which was the winner of
the Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children in 1990. He also illustrated “All the Places to Love” by Patricia MacLachlan which
was published in 1994 and won the Oklahoma Book Award
for Best Illustrated Children’s Book 1995. Wimmer’s latest
book, “Will Rogers” by Former Governor Frank Keating, was
published in 2002 and has won the 2003 Spur Award from the Western
Writers Association of America. Even though Wimmer has worked for some
of the largest corporations in the world including Disney and Procter
and Gamble, Wimmer finds the greatest artistic pleasure within his
creation of fine art.