[Press Photograph Picturing the Abandoned Campus of the Tomah Indian Industrial School]

[Tomah, Wi, 1950. Very good.. Black and white photograph, 5 x 9.5 inches on a slightly larger contact sheet. Minor wrinkling, creasing, and edge wear. Ink stamp and portion of a newspaper clipping on verso. A somber press photograph featuring a handful of abandoned buildings and the defunct water tower of the Tomah Indian Industrial School, which operated in west-central Wisconsin until 1935, when it was abandoned by the U.S. government. The news clipping on the verso indicates the Tomah Advancement Association is looking for a new tenant for the property, "which includes 15 to 20 buildings and a 277 acre farm..." The school was located along a railroad line that connected Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul. "Opened in 1893, the Tomah Indian Industrial School was intended to teach Indian children how to shed their cultural background and to become more like white, middle-class Americans. Funded primarily by the federal government, Indian boarding schools were established throughout the United States in an attempt to acculturate Indians to 'American' ways of thinking and living. The children's time was carefully monitored, with boys receiving instruction in agriculture or trade and girls in the domestic arts" - Wisconsin Historical Society.