Film poster: 'The Indian Raid', 1911. Film produced by Stafford & Company. Poster is in three parts.

The first Native American film director, James Young Deer settled in California after stints in Barnum and Bailey’s Circus and the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch Wild West Show. At a time when, in the words of cinema historian William K. Everson, “the Indian became accepted as a symbol of integrity, stoicism and reliability,” Young Deer quickly distinguished himself in a series of movies dealing with such topics as racism, miscegenation and assimilation. He also enjoyed a thriving second career as an actor, appearing in numerous productions throughout the 1920s (meanwhile, his wife, Lillian St. Cyr, known as Princess Red Wing, appeared in Cecil B. DeMille’s THE SQUAW MAN, the first feature film shot entirely in Hollywood). Young Deer’s career was over by 1924 after directing only three feature-length films and, while he is largely forgotten today, his films stand as a valuable early portrait of a culture which has been underrepresented on the screen.