Jace Romick first saw Roland Reed’s photograph, “The Eagle,” more than 30 years ago, but the impact has been lasting. When the Steamboat Springs-based gallery owner – and photographer in his own right – had an opportunity to purchase a large collection of Roland Reed’s glass plate negatives and personal paraphernalia, he took it.

From the opening of The Roland Reed Gallery in Steamboat in 2021 to the publication of a book “Passion and Purpose: The Photographic Art Studies of Roland Reed” in 2025, Jace has always felt a kindred spirit with the pioneering photographer. “In the end,” he says, “I hope to get Roland Reed the notoriety and attention that he deserves.”

“Passion and Purpose,” where these images are found, is available for purchase at the Jace Romick Gallery.

Who was Roland Reed? A lesser-known contemporary of Edward Curtis, Roland Reed’s work remained largely unseen until nearly 50 years after his death. He began his work at the turn of the century, traveling west to document Native American tribes, thus cementing their legacy in history. Covering miles on horseback with unwieldy photography equipment, he captured images of many tribes, earning their trust along the way. “Capturing these pictures was an incredible challenge that most people today couldn’t even imagine,” Jace says.

It is thought that both Roland Reed, who took this photograph, and Lazy Boy, the subject of it, were looking to the future. The Blackfoot tribe experienced dramatic changes in their lifetime and understood the urgency to capture these images to keep at least the memory of the time alive for decades to come.

 

Since Jace acquired the collection in 2021, he has spent time retracing Roland Reed’s steps. In Glacier National Park in 2024, he stood at the spot where “The Eagle” was taken over a century earlier.

The Southwestern Native Americans are portrayed in pictures of the Navajos and Hopi who lived in the plateaus of Arizona and New Mexico. Roland Reed wrote in his journal, “I lived with them for weeks, got some stunning stuff and promised, when I had to leave them, to come back again someday. Those Southwestern Navajos in the up-country canyons and deserts live today just as they did 500 years ago, and it takes more patience and perseverance to photograph them than it does the shyest animal in the world."