Michael Lehr Antiques
Live Auction

Fall Photographic History Auction, 2025

Sat, Sep 6, 2025 01:00PM EDT
  2025-09-06 13:00:00 2025-09-06 13:00:00 America/New_York Michael Lehr Michael Lehr : Fall Photographic History Auction, 2025 https://auction.michaellehrantiques.com/auctions/michael-lehr-antiques/fall-photographic-history-auction-2025-20189
We are pleased to announce our next auction, featuring approximately 200 individual lots drawn from a diverse and compelling range of 19th- and early 20th-century photography. This sale focuses on vernacular images, photographs created not as formal studio portraits or elite commissions, but as direct, unscripted records of lived experience. These are objects made by and for everyday people, preserving moments of intimacy, labor, travel, performance, identity, and loss.
Michael Lehr Antiques info@michaellehrantiques.com
Lot 284

Cabinet Card of "Steps," a Nez Perce Survivor, by Bailey, Dix & Mead

Estimate: $400 - $600
Starting Bid
$200

Bid Increments

Price Bid Increment
$0 $10
$200 $20
$320 $30
$380 $20
$420 $30
$480 $20
$500 $50
$1,000 $100
$2,000 $200
$3,200 $300
$3,800 $200
$4,200 $300
$4,800 $200
$5,000 $500
$10,000 $1,000
$20,000 $2,000
$32,000 $3,000
$38,000 $2,000
$42,000 $3,000
$48,000 $2,000
$50,000 $5,000
$100,000 $10,000
$200,000 $20,000
$320,000 $30,000
$380,000 $20,000
$420,000 $30,000
$480,000 $20,000
$500,000 $50,000
Striking 1882 cabinet photograph by Bailey, Dix & Mead depicting "Steps," a Nez Perce man who survived extraordinary hardship after being separated from his band during General Nelson A. Miles’s campaign in the Nebraska Badlands in 1878. The portrait shows him kneeling with a solemn expression, wearing a heavy coat and resting his remaining hand on a studio prop chair. The amputation of both feet above the ankles and the loss of his right hand are evident, a result of frostbite endured during a blizzard over two decades earlier. The printed narrative on the reverse provides rare context, explaining his subsequent journey and alliance with Sitting Bull's Uncapapa Lakota band in Canada. Part of a larger ethnographic series produced by the photographers while based at Fort Randall in Dakota Territory, this card is identified as No. 3 in the set and was copyrighted in 1882. The image is a sobering and historically significant visual document reflecting the toll of forced displacement and survival during the Indian Wars.

Available payment options

PayPal

Spend $500 or more at our auction and all of your SHIPPING IS FREE, buyers to pay insurance if they want it.