Birch bark, sweet grass, quills (undyed (white), black, red, yellow, orange), cotton thread

The outer body of the box is a single piece of undecorated second-growth birchbark (a trademark of Maime's work, and another element influenced by her nephew, artist Carl Beam). The decorated lid inserts inside the body with a lip overhanging slightly. The lid's sweetgrass trim extends out several inches to form this lip, and the ring of birchbark that forms the fitted insert is sewn to its underside. The interior of the body is lined with the customary layer of birchbark, with the floor stiched on with quill in three places, and the sides tabbed (cut triangular) and folded at the bottom and stitched into the sweetgrass at the top.

Lid: a thunderbird in the four colours with spread wings on a solid white background. A ring of bare birchbark encircles the scene, then a ring of red and black quills and then the sweetgrass trim. Body: undecorated second-growth birch bark. On the bottom of the body is stitched with white quills: "1982, M.Migwans"

The Thunderbird is the symbol of the Anishinaabeg Nation. It appears here in the four colours of the medicine wheel (yellow, red, black, white).

Noted in quill stitching on the bottom of the box.

Maime Migwans, box, quill. Currently at the Ojibwe Cultural Foundation, A1.01.034. Item photographed and described as part of a GRASAC research trip; GRASAC item id 25277.

Dummy GRASAC records of collections made by Lakota Preston, April 2010, items labelled and info updated by Juanita Migwans, summer 2010. Photos and item spreadsheet created June 2011 by Adrianna Greci-Green (visiting to research quill boxes in the OCF collection), Crystal Migwans (OCF curatorial assistant) and Emanuela Rossi (visiting researcher), using information from Sophie Corbiere, Kate Roy, and 2003 appraisal sheets by P.Krueger. Records edited and filled out by Crystal Migwans, June 2011.