KenyaThesis_JSAlderson

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The past in pictures: visualizing Kenya’s post-colonial
history in the Nairobi National Museum
Jennifer Alderson
University of Amsterdam
Thesis for Master Museum Studies
4 September 2008
Student no. 0436925
Thesis supervisors: Dr. Ellinoor Bergvelt and Drs. Paul Faber

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Table of contents
Introduction 1
Current research related to my topic 4
Chapter 1: The Nairobi National Museum in Kenya 10
1.1 Colonial beginnings: the Corydon Museum (1910-1963) 10
1.2 The newly christened National Museum of Kenya in Nairobi 11
1.3 1997 to 2007: New expositions relevant to post-colonial Kenya 12
Chapter 2: Which version of history will be presented? 17
2.1 Brief history of Kenya between 1880 and 1963 18
2.1.1 The history of occupation on the East African coast 18
2.1.2 The ‘Scramble for Africa’ and early British colonization
of Kenya 20
2.1.3 The Uganda Railway 22
2.1.4 Land rights 26
2.1.5 The Indian Question 27
2.1.6 World War I 28
2.1.7 The creation of ‘Kenya Colony’ and early signs of protest 29
2.1.8 Missionary-run versus independent schools 30
2.1.9 World War Two and the rise of Mau Mau 32
2.2 Which version of history is being presented in the new History
Gallery? 36
2.2.1 Re-defining the contents of the history exhibitions 36
2.2.2 Recent Developments 38
Chapter 3: Historical photos of Kenya in European photographic resources 41
3.1 History of Photography in Africa and Kenya 42
3.2 A comparison between the requested photos and those available 45
3.2.1 The History of Kenya gallery: Introduction 47
3.2.2 ‘Before 1895: Kenya before Kenya’ 47
3.2.3 ‘1895 - 1920 : Invasion and resistance’ 50
3.2.4 ‘1920 - 1963 Who owns Kenya?’ 54
3.2.5 ‘1963 - 2002 (/now) Independent Kenya’ 59
Conclusion 60

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List of Literary sources 62
List of Visual sources 67
Appendix I: List of objects to be acquired 71
Appendix II: Storyline of the History Exhibition 75
Appendix III: Potential Sources for Photographs 80
Summary 86

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Introduction
In all parts of the world, nations young and old are busy re-defining their shared national
history – one which reflects the contributions of all layers of contemporary society. In
many western lands this has resulted in the formation of new cultural-historical
institutions dedicated to displaying and promoting the nation’s official history. In other
parts of the world former colonial museums are being transformed into national ones,
relevant to those currently living within the country’s borders.
The Nairobi National Museum is in the midst of such a transformation. Originally
founded by British colonial settlers and naturalists, the institution is now tasked with
displaying and interpreting the official national history of Kenya for a broad public. In
2005 the museum staff began revamping all of the permanent expositions housed within
the expansive main building of this former colonial museum. The new displays have been
divided into three overlapping categories: nature, culture and history. The proposed
History of Kenya gallery will be dedicated to visually conveying a newly written, post-
colonial history of their nation and peoples, one which better reflects contemporary
Kenya.
The museum staff has not had an easy task. The contemporary history of Kenya is
in many ways still being redefined. The nation of Kenya is in effect a nineteenth-century
creation of the British Empire, colonized by the Queen in the 1880s. Only in December
1963 was the ‘Kenya Colony’ declared an independent nation. The museum staff are
essentially ‘de-colonizing’ the museum in order to make it more relevant to contemporary
Kenya’s many ethnic and religious communities. One of their challenges is finding
historical objects and photographs which illustrate this multicultural past and the
contributions of all its members.
My own involvement with this project began during my internship at the
Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam, as part of the University of Amsterdam Master Museum
Studies program. Between February and September 2007 I worked in the museum on a
variety of tasks. It is important to note that I moved to the Netherlands from Seattle
Washington just five years before and at no point in my life have I been to sub-Sahara
Africa. One of my internship-related tasks was to help search through European
photographic sources for photos or other images which could be used in the future

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History of Kenya gallery in Nairobi. My own exploration was limited to photographic
archives, illustrated books and photo banks available in Europe; a Kenyan researcher
would conduct a similar search through African sources at a later date.
The focus of this thesis is on the period of British colonial control in Kenya,
between 1880 and 1963. This was not my intention, but has more to do with the nature of
the photos I have come across during my research. The majority of images I have found
reproduced in books that were taken after 1963, are almost exclusively attributed to
African sources.
Due to the nature of the European archives and books I have found, my own
research was limited primarily to photographic materials created during the period of
British colonialism, 1880 to 1963. This assignment immediately raised a number of
questions: what kinds of photos would be available to visualize this newly written post-
colonial History of Kenya and where would I find them? What kinds of photographers
were active in Kenya throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and would their
reason for being in the region have an effect on the resulting photos? Would I find a
strong European perspective or bias reflected in these archives and books, or would I also
find images of prominent African and Indian members of society? And what could the
history of photography in Africa – in particular developments in photographic techniques
and conventions – tell me about the types of images of Kenya taken during the different
eras? And finally were there events or persons now important to the nation’s history,
which are not represented in these European sources?
Within the framework of this thesis I will discuss all of these questions; using the
photos I have found to illustrate my findings and conclusions. The main question driving
this thesis is two-fold: what kinds of photographs are available in European
photographic sources which could be used in the future ‘History of Kenya’ gallery, and
how do these images relate to the post-colonial version of history to be told in the new
exposition? This thesis and my conclusions are based on my own research into European
sources as well as literature relevant to the topics introduced above.
In chapter one I will go into more detail about the renovation of the permanent
exhibitions currently taking place in Nairobi. To better place this change within the
appropriate context – and better understand its national significance – the colonial origins

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and history of the Nairobi National Museum will also be discussed. I touch only briefly
on the renewal of the buildings and organizational structure also taking place in Nairobi
because these changes are less relevant to my thesis topic.
In chapter two I will examine the current construction of Kenyan history and
briefly discuss how it relates to – and differs from – other official versions of Kenya’s
past. Which events and persons are currently considered important in post-colonial
Kenya, as well as the decision process used to determine the contents of the History of
Kenya gallery, will also be explored. In this chapter, as in the rest of the thesis, my focus
is on the history of Kenya during British colonial occupation between 1880 and 1963.
In chapter three I will summarize the specific contents of each new display and
provide examples of the types of related photos found in publicly-accessible European
sources. Within this chapter a brief history of photography in Kenya will also be
presented, focusing on the types of Europeans actively taking pictures in the region.
In the conclusion I shall summarize the findings presented in this thesis and point
out future topics of research.
This thesis is merely a beginning, a preliminary and incomplete survey of the
available photographic evidence. Originally it was the intention that my research into
European archives would coincide with a similar research project conducted in the more
important African archives and photographic sources. These two projects would
ultimately complement each other, allowing the staff members of the Nairobi National
Museum to have quick access to a wide selection of photos before choosing certain
images for use in the new History of Kenya gallery. Researchers in Kenya had begun the
process of searching through locally available archives, even placing advertisements in
national newspapers asking for private photographs or other materials which could be
used in the new exhibitions. However work on other galleries within the museum has
taken priority, and this historical photographic research has been put on hold indefinitely.
My own initial findings were bundled into one book and sent to the Nairobi
National Museum in July 2007. A copy of this research is also available for viewing in
the Handboekerij of the Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam, under the title: ‘Photographs (and
potential sources for photos) which could be used in the History of Kenya Gallery,
National Museum of Kenya’ (July 2007).

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Current research related to my topic
This thesis is based on both my own exploration into the photographic archives
mentioned above, as well as current literature and published research related to my thesis
topic. The most important literary sources will be discussed in this section.
The information provided within this thesis about the origins and history of the
Nairobi National Museum was obtained through conversations with those involved in the
project at the Tropenmuseum and Nairobi National Museum, a few email exchanges, and
internet websites managed by the museum itself. I have listed the specific sources within
this thesis, where relevant.
Several books and magazine articles offer a reasonable amount of information
about the origins and history of photography in Africa. The majority have been written
within the last twenty years. Four books in particular provide insight into the historical
uses of photography in different regions of the African continent and during diverse time
periods. These are: two books by Christraud Geary, Images from Bamum: German
colonial photography from the court of King Njoya, Cameroon, West Africa, 1902-1915
and In and out of Focus: Images from Central Africa, 1885-1960, as well as The
Colonizing Camera: photographs in the making of Namibian History edited by Wolfram
Hartmann, Jeremy Silverter and Patricia Hayes, and Africa Then: Photographs 1840-
1918 by Nicolas Monti.
All use a selection of images taken from archives located around the world to
analysis both the processes behind image production in the African colonies; as well as
explain how photos were used by both colonial agents and the local African elite. Though
the photographs may have been created by different colonial agents, missionaries and
explorers, the similarities between visual representations taken in different time periods
and locations are abundant. However none of these books approach history from out an
African perspective, at best information about African photographers is regulated to one
chapter or short paragraph, often entitled ‘Africans and the camera’.
Monti’s contribution in particular provides interesting information and even a few
photos relevant to the new History of Kenya gallery. In his book Africa Then:
Photographs 1840-1918 he attempts to give a comprehensive overview of photography in
Africa between 1840 and 1918. Monti admits in the introduction that this is a difficult

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task considering the poor physical state of many European and African photographic
collections and archives. He begun by researching Italian archives before spreading out to
other European archives with strong links to colonial Africa, and finally including a few
African collections.
Though this book contains a wealth of information about specific photographic
practices and individuals active in both East Africa and colonial-era Kenya, Monti’s work
is limited by his ambition. Despite his stated intentions, he has not consulted every
photographic archive available which may contain photographs relevant to Africa’s
history, nor is it in all likelihood humanly possible to do so. As such, he has inherently
failed in his task of creating a comprehensive overview of photography in Africa.
However his work does provide lots of interesting details and general information about
the state of photography in certain parts of Africa, and does include an impressive
selection of photos. Though it is by no means complete, it does contain some information
relevant to Kenya that I was not able to find in other sources, such as a detailed list of
photographers – both Indian and European – working in East Africa between 1860 and
1920. This work does remain an important introductory source for researchers interested
in studying nineteenth- and early twentieth-century photographs of Africa.
One of the most important sources for this paper was an essay written by Dr.
David Killingray of the Department of Historical and Cultural Studies at Goldsmiths’
College in London, and Dr. Andrew Roberts of the Department of History at the School
for Oriental and African Study. In their article, ‘An Outline History of Photography in
Africa to ca. 1940’, they present a ‘modest sketch of the more important developments in
the practice and uses of photography in Africa.’1
This is considered to be the first
complete survey of the history of photography on the continent. They have limited their
research to the period 1880 to 1940 because, as they explain in their introduction, after
circa 1940 the photographic record becomes too fractured to properly summarize in a
short amount of space.2
Their essay shows quite clearly how advancements in the
photographic technique, as well as changes in the photographic conventions, affected the
resulting photographic record.
1
Killingray and Roberts 1989: 197.
2
Idem.

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Similar to the books listed above, the Killingray and Roberts’s article also
provides specific information about individual photographers working in the East African
region and a general overview of the more important colonial players at that time. This is
a fantastic source which contains a plethora of pertinent information relevant to this
thesis and the topics discussed with. It is by far the most comprehensive source that I
have found, with regards to the history of photography in Africa. I highly recommend it
as a primary source to any researcher exploring the uses of photography and image
production in Africa between 1860 and 1940, or those hoping to use photographs of
Africa as a historical source.
This article was first presented at the School for Oriental and African Study in
May 1988 as part of an international workshop held to consider the problems and
possibilities of using photographs as sources for African history. It was first printed in the
conference bundle, ‘Photographs as sources for African History’, edited by Andrew
Roberts, and was later re-printed in the History in Africa journal.
It is worth mentioning that the conference bundle ‘Photographs as sources for
African History’ includes a number of papers relevant to the reconstruction of the Nairobi
National Museum, the most interesting being the contribution made by Rosemary
MacDonald. Entitled ‘A Local Collection of Historical Photographs at Fort Jesus
Museum, Mombassa, Kenya’, MacDonald discusses the ‘accidental birth and subsequent
growth’ of the museum’s small collection of locally-relevant historical photographs, as
well as potential uses for such a collection in an African context.3
However, these articles
are not of importance for this thesis and will not be discussed in further detail.
There are numerous articles and books documenting the ways in which
missionaries used imagery as part of their religious propaganda in the early days of
African colonization. Perhaps the most concise is the essay ‘Images of Africa:
Missionary Photography in the Nineteenth Century: an Introduction’, by Dr. T. Jack
Thompson. This work is actually a summarization of two papers the author presented at
the Centre of African Studies at the University of Copenhagen in May 2003, as part of his
ongoing research into missionary photography and its impact on creating stereotypes of
Africa in Europe. Thompson argues that missionary photos have been used ‘uncritically’
3
MacDonald 1988: 149.

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for too long. As they become an increasingly important historical source, more research
must be done into the ways in which these photos purposefully manipulate reality, as well
as the relationship between the photographer, subject and setting.
Within his article he outlines the events leading up to the increased European
presence in Africa before describing the four most common types of religious propaganda
created by missionaries in Africa in the late nineteenth century: namely ‘anthropological’,
‘social Darwinist’, ‘transformative’, and ‘crusading’.4
He also explores the ways in which
missionaries and colonial agents used the resulting photographs to sway and influence
their public both at home and abroad.
Thompson shows the reader how missionary photos were used to create
stereotypes of Africans in Europe, often by manipulating the resulting image to
exaggerate the ‘exotic otherness of the African’ or the successes of the mission.5
Thompson also introduces the term ‘Anonymous African Syndrome’, a form of textual
manipulation in which “Africans are stripped of their identity – either by being presented
as mere types – ‘a Zulu’ woman – or by being given merely their ‘Christian’ names –
‘David’, ‘Mary’ or ‘Samuel’, without any reference to their African names – either
personal or family.”6
As Thompson points out, often only the European subjects of
photographs were identified in the captions and documentation accompanying most
colonial-era photographs.
This is an excellent article to read before beginning research into missionary
photography. Thompson introduces a number of significant theoretical topics every
researcher should consider when using them as historical sources in contemporary
settings. However, he offers few examples or illustrations of his arguments with regards
to a specific mission or even African country.
Several articles and books describe different methodologies photographic
researchers should follow when researching old photos, or when attempting to re-
interpret their social, political or cultural significance. One of the best and most
accessible is the article ‘Photographs as materials for African history, some
methodological considerations,’ written by Christraud Geary and reprinted in the
4
Thompson 2004: 13-15.
5
Ibidem.
6
Thompson 2004: 20.

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periodical History in Africa. In her article she names three issues that need to be
considered: ‘the question of photographic technology and its impact on the
photographer’s product, photographic conventions influencing the photographer, and the
archival bias in the establishment of the photographic collections.’7
According to Geary, the photographic record was shaped by the goals and
interests of the photographer’s particular profession and ‘when doing research a scholar
must be aware of the implications of the photographer shaping of the record.’8
In an ideal
situation photographic researchers should consider the creation process used by the
individual photographer, the role of the photographic subject, and that of the viewer or
audience.9
However Geary herself admits that ‘frequently in cross-cultural photography
little is known about the specific relationship between photographer and subject’.10
Despite the occasional contradictions in her logic, I do find this to be an
interesting article containing quite a bit of pertinent information. She sets down in black-
and-white a methodology often only hinted at in other books. She does however over-
analyze her own methodology to some degree, continually brings up inconsistencies
within her own arguments and logic. That said, I recommend it to beginning
photographic researchers, especially those analyzing cross-cultural photography for the
first time.
I have also found a number of books which examine the role of photography
within the context of the British Empire during the time of Kenya’s colonization. One of
the most relevant sources for my thesis is Picturing Empire: Photography and the
Visualization of the British Empire, written by British geographer James Ryan. This
book, more than any other, provided the cultural context of the majority of photos found
in European archives and relevant to Kenya’s national history. Despite that fact that his
research encompasses the entire British Empire, he has included quite a bit of information
about Kenya and the role of photography in East Africa. He explains how images were
disseminated throughout the Empire, as well as their various uses within the colonial
government, in particular to map out the colonial world. As Ryan explains, ‘imperialism
7
Geary 1986: 89.
8
Geary 1988: 12, 30.
9
Geary 1988: 10.
10
Geary 1988: 11-12. ‘Cross-cultural photography’ refers to a photo wherein the subject and photographer
have different cultural and/or ethnic backgrounds.

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played a central ideological role within British culture and society in the Victorian and
Edwardian eras […] It is only by considering photography within such a framework of
cultural processes that it is possible to gain an understanding of the significance of the
medium within British imperialism.’11
In his conclusion Ryan also raises concerns about
photography’s shift in status and the mutable meaning of all historical photos, stating that
more research is still needed into ‘anti-colonial’ imagery.
This is an excellent resource for any photographic researcher working with British
colonial photographs. Not only does he efficiently summarize the theoretical, cultural and
political background of the era, but he also includes several pertinent photographic
examples.
Books about the history of colonial and post-colonial Kenya are numerous and
widely available in the Netherlands, in both Dutch and English. However the historical
accounts written before 1963 differ significantly from those written after Kenyan
Independence. In chapter two of this thesis I discuss both the official history of
contemporary Kenya as well as the current controversies surrounding its interpretation in
a post-colonial society. Those books with a strong colonial perspective include: The
Permanent Way: the story of the Kenya and Uganda railway, being the official history of
the development of the Transport System in Kenya and Uganda, written by M.F. Hill in
1949, and Kenya from within: A short political history, written by W. McGregor Ross in
1927. Three important history books written in the 1980s and 1990s by Kenyan historians
and academics are: History of Kenya, written by W.R. Ochieng’, Decolonization and
Independence in Kenya, 1940-1993, edited by B.A. Ogot and W.R. Ochieng’, and the
textbook Our Nation, Kenya, written by F. Wegulo and C. Ondieki.
11
Ryan 1997: 13.

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Chapter 1: The Nairobi National Museum in Kenya
Before discussing the current renovation taking place in Nairobi it is important to delve
further into the histories of both the National Museums of Kenya organization and its
flagship, the Nairobi National Museum.
1.1 Colonial beginnings: the Corydon Museum (1910-1963)
The history of the Nairobi National Museum dates back to
1910, when the East Africa and Uganda Natural History
Society established a small museum in Nairobi to house their
collections of specimens.12
Its members consisted primarily of
colonial settlers and amateur naturalists. The original site was
soon deemed too small and a larger building was erected in
1922.13
In 1929 the colonial government set aside land on
Nairobi’s ‘Museum Hill’ for a new building. It was officially
opened on 22 September 1930 and named Coryndon Museum
in honor of Sir Robert Coryndon, governor of Kenya between
1922 and 1925, and a staunch supporter of the East Africa and
Uganda Natural History Society.14
(See image 1.) Both the
material collections and the society’s extensive library were
moved into the new building, located at the Nairobi National Museum’s current site. The
relationship between the East Africa and Uganda Natural History Society and the newly-
appointed museum trustees quickly soured; a year later all of the contents of the museum
were turned over to the colonial government, in exchange for fifteen annual payments to
the Society.15
12
National Museums of Kenya website: Brief History, 1 May 2008; National Museums of Kenya website:
About Us, 1 May 2008. The East Africa and Uganda Natural History Society is presently known as ‘Nature
Kenya’ or ‘The East Africa Natural History Society’.
13
National Museums of Kenya website: Introduction, 1 May 2008.
14
Ross 1927: 48, 80, 112; National Museums of Kenya website: Brief History, 1 May 2008; Ryan 1997:
104.
15
Information was found on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Museums_of_Kenya), and
attributed to: L. S. B. Leakey, By the Evidence: Memoirs, 1932-1951, (1972) Chapter 8. 1 May 2008.
1 Sir Robert Coryndon,
early colonial governor of
Kenya and member of the
East Africa and Uganda
Natural History Society.
Presumably taken between
1922 and 1925 while serving
as governor. No photo
credit listed.

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In 1941 both Dr. Louis Leakey and his wife Mary were appointed unpaid curators
of the Coryndon Museum.16
The Leakey’s were paleontologists; later to become famous
for their discovery of early human fossilized remains in the Olduvia Gorge in northern
Tanzania.17
Four years later Louis Leakey was named paid Curator and Director, a
position he would hold until 1961. One of his first actions was to open the museum up to
African and Asian visitors; prior to then the museum had been ‘for whites only’.18
The
museum buildings were enlarged and galleries were added in the 1950s.19
During his
reign, paleontology, archeology and natural history were the focal point of the museum
displays and its staff’s research.
1.2 The newly christened National Museum of Kenya in Nairobi
A year after Kenya's independence in December 1963, an Act of Parliament established
the National Museums of Kenya (NMK) as a national institution.20
The newly established
NMK was expected to ‘develop programmes that promote cultural dynamism in order to
build a sense of nationhood and belonging’.21
The Coryndon Museum was renamed ‘the
National Museum of Kenya in Nairobi’ and became the organization’s flagship, tasked
with exhibiting Kenya's national heritage to both international tourists and local
Kenyans.22
In 1969 the NMK opened other government-managed museums and historical
sites throughout Kenya, as well as initiated a number of research and development
programs, often in cooperation with the University of Nairobi and the Institute of African
Studies.23
That same year the Leakey Memorial building was added to the Nairobi
National Museum complex, creating more space for the already existing administration,
archeology and paleontology departments.
16
Information found on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Museums_of_Kenya), and
attributed to: L. S. B. Leakey, By the Evidence: Memoirs, 1932-1951, (1972) Chapter 8. 1 May 2008.
17
Miller 1994: 7.
18
Ibidem.
19
National Museums of Kenya website: Brief History, 1 May 2008.
20
National Museums of Kenya website: Introduction, 7 May 2008.
21
22
National Museums of Kenya website: Brief History, 1 May 2008; National Museums of Kenya website:
Introduction, 7 May 2008.
23
Ibidem.

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1.3 1997 to 2007: New expositions relevant to post-colonial Kenya
Though the museum buildings in Nairobi had been enlarged and several other cultural
institutions and sites of national heritage had been established after Kenya gained its
independence, the permanent exhibitions in the nation’s capital had not yet been changed
significantly since opening in 1930. To better serve the needs of contemporary Kenyans,
the NMK recognized that the permanent displays needed to be brought up to date and the
buildings themselves modernized. One of the main supporters of this project was then-
NMK museum director George Abunga.
The NMK secured the necessary financing in 1997, the majority of which came
from the European Union within the framework of the National Museums of Kenya
Support Programme (NMKSP). The ‘Museum in Change’ programme, as is popularly
known, ‘was geared towards making NMK an outward looking institution that responds
to visitors’ needs while providing quality services and products. It is the first time that the
European Union has supported a cultural organization in Africa on this scale.’24
To better facilitate this massive renovation, the European Union placed a tender
for an experienced European partner to work with them on this project. Two cultural
institutions working as a consortium, the Belgian firm Transtec and KIT Tropenmuseum
in Amsterdam, won the contract.25
Transtec was the NMK’s lead partner for the overall
project and internal re-organisation; the Tropenmuseum was responsible for the
refurbishing the museum displays, design and routing. Paul Voogt, head of Public
Presentations at KIT Tropenmuseum, began working on the project in 2002 and has been
to Kenya several times to provide advice and work on training missions associated with
the general re-design of the internal museum’s layout and general contents of the future
displays. The NMK’s official relationship with KIT Tropenmuseum lasted through
December 2007.
There are four key aspects to the ‘Museum in Change’ programme: an
Infrastructure Component, Legal Reform Component, Organizational Review
Component, and the Public Programmes Component.26
The Infrastructure Component
involved the expansion and improvement of the Nairobi Museum buildings and the
24
25
The information in this paragraph came from an e-mail conversation with Paul Voogt. 12 August 2008.
26

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construction of a new commercial centre. (See image 2.) Other key developments in this
component include the building of a new administration block (now named Heritage
House) and the improvement of NMK's physical planning.
To better facilitate the enforcement of laws concerning heritage management in
Kenya, the Legal Reform Component included the preparation of the ‘Museums and
Heritage Act’ which was passed by parliament in 2006. This bill aims to ‘ensure the
protection of Kenya's rich and diverse heritage by establishing a new legal framework for
Heritage Management that will domesticate some of the international conventions and
protocols on heritage for which Kenya has ratified.’27
The third, Organizational Component meant the review and development of an
appropriate organizational structure for the institution. The new structure has been
incorporated in the NMK's Strategic Plan 2005 - 2009.
The fourth and last component addresses the museum’s public, via educational
projects and the museum’s new permanent expositions. The aim of the Public
Programmes Component is ‘to streamline and
build capacity within the NMK public
programmes to achieve efficiency and
teamwork’.28
This involved revitalizing NMK's
public programmes so that they ultimately
better meet the needs of the museum’s visitors
– both Kenyans and international tourists. The
museum’s goal was to first establish and
improve its relationship with its local public ‘in
order to integrate knowledge gained from
museum collections and scientific research into
public exhibitions that will optimize the
museum’s educational and recreational
goal’.29
27
28
Ibidem
29
Ibidem.
27 According to the caption, this is ‘John
Ainsworth in a rickshaw in 1915.’ No further
information provided.2 The new entrance to the Nairobi National
Museum, completed in late 2007. Photo:
Chris Thouless of the NMK Support
Programme.

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A new corporate brand identity for NMK was also developed. The new identity
“is meant to position NMK as the destination choice in the heritage tourism sector
resulting in a vibrant, strong and progressive institution. It positions NMK as a
‘Custodian of heritage’ with the following brand values: ‘authentic, reliable, unifying,
caring and authoritative’.”30
The fourth Public Component is the most important in terms of this thesis and
thus deserves to be described in more detail. In 2002 the museum initiated the first of
several public programs designed to stimulate the active involvement of the local
communities in the museum’s activities and
expositions.31
Different outreach programs and projects were envisioned, including
training street youths as artists and involving indigenous people in the design and display
of artifacts to which they have a direct cultural allegiance. In particular information and
objects obtained from older local Kenyans were considered invaluable ‘because their
knowledge of the past can contribute to and perhaps influence contemporary social
interaction’.32
According to then-NMK director George Abunga, ‘the museum is a place
for shared experiences; it can serve as a platform for dialogue, and be a place wherein
differences can be expressed peacefully.33
Especially in light of the unexpected post-
election violence in Kenya at the end of 2007, is this public component and its
community-based programs of special importance.
The second phase of the Public component was the revitalization of the permanent
displays. According to Abunga this change was badly needed to make the museum and
its contents relevant to those living in post-colonial Kenya. In the keynote speech at the
conference Changing Audiences of Museums in Africa held in Arusha, Tanzania in April
2002, Abunga stated that “the contents of the National Museums of Kenya were the
works of the white settlers, sometimes the products of their hobbies as collectors of
natural history, and they were not meant at all for the benefit of Black Africans. To most
Africans, the museums still exuded the idea: ‘don’t touch me I am very monumental.’
[…] Now that Kenya is an independent African country, if still a member of the
30
Ibidem.
31
Hendry 2005: 28.
32
George Abunga, quoted in Hendry 2005: 44.
33
George Abunga, quoted in Hendry 2005: 28.

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Commonwealth, the national museum must adapt to serve the public that supports it. It
needs to seek a new audience by changing its visions and missions, by empowering the
local community to make it a place of heritage and memories, and by representing the
identities of the speakers of the forty-two languages groups that live in Nairobi, and of
the new independent nation.’34
In October 2005 the museum closed its doors to begin the renovation of the
museum’s facilities and expositions. The buildings themselves were to be expanded and
modernized and all of the museum displays were to be completely re-developed and re-
structured.35
It was expected that the museum would re-open in the summer of 2007.
After the renovation, the newly christened ‘Nairobi National Museum’ would again serve
as the national flagship museum for the country and NMK association.
According to the current NMK Director General Dr. Idle Omar Farah, the
relevance of all of the NMK cultural institutions in Kenyan contemporary society ‘is
through its wide range of research activities taking a lead role in recognizing, valuing and
protecting our heritage so as to reinforce and remind us of who we are as a people, where
we come from, and what it is that we value about our country.’36
The main objective of
the new Nairobi National Museum is to ‘showcase Kenya's cultural and natural heritage,
and history in an objective, holistic and intellectually stimulating manner.’37
The museum re-opened to the public on the 31st
of March 2008, nine months later
than scheduled.38
According to the museum’s new website, the official grand opening
will take place sometime later this year. The administrative and exposition buildings have
been completely refurbished and modernized as planned.
However not all of the museum’s objectives have been fulfilled as of yet. Though
the museum will house a total of thirteen galleries, only four permanent exhibitions are
now complete. The first is the centrally-placed ‘Hall of Kenya’ which showcases Kenya’s
national heritage and introduces the three main categories of displays to be presented
within the refurbished museum: nature, culture and history. The recently completed
‘Great Hall of Mammals’ and the ‘Cradle of Humankind’ feature evolutionary history
34
George Abunga, quoted in Hendry 2005: 28-29.
35
National Museums of Kenya website – About Us, 1 May 2008.
36
Ibidem.
37
Ibidem.
38
National Museums of Kenya website: Nairobi National Museum now open, 2 July 2008.

- 19 -
and early human fossils found in the region. (See image 3.) The ‘Cycles of Life’ gallery
represents ‘the life of most Kenyan communities in the form of milestones and phases’.39
According to the Nairobi National Museum website there are also diverse temporary
exhibitions on display covering the areas of art, nature, history and culture, however I
have been unable to find more information regarding their specific content.
Though the recent political crisis and funding issues have certainly caused
disruptions within the museum, work has continued on the rest of the new exhibitions and
overall museum design. For example,
the layout of the galleries has been
improved so that visitors are no longer
confronted with ‘dead-end routes’ but
can walk from one gallery to the next
without having to retrace their steps.40
The rest of the permanent expositions
will be completed in phases. At this
time it is uncertain when exactly the
other galleries, such as the History of
Kenya gallery, will be opened to the
public.
39
National Museums of Kenya website: Nairobi National Museum now open, 2 July 2008.
40
Ibidem.
3 The newly refurbished paleontology displays in the
Nairobi National Museum, pictured here, were one of
the first galleries to be re-designed as part of the
Museum in Change Programme. Photo: Chris
Thouless of the NMK Support Programme.

- 20 -
Chapter 2: Which version of history will be presented?
Within the first section of this chapter I will present a short summary of the more
important events in contemporary Kenyan history. In keeping with the rest of this thesis
and my own photographic research, I will focus on the era of British colonial occupation,
specifically the years 1880 through 1963. After 1963 the better and more complete
photographic and literary sources are to be found in Africa and Kenya itself. The facts
and interpretations used to compile this section purposefully come from a wide variety of
books and articles, written by both colonial and African authors. Because of my limited
knowledge of this country and period, I have been careful to compile this history based
on the facts and interpretations listed in the majority of my sources. This resulting version
is of course then my own interpretation of Kenya’s complex history, written in as neutral
manner as possible.
The history of East Africa is complicated by the fact that the British not only
controlled the camera recording life in the Kenya Colony, but also the written history of
the nation now known as Kenya, at least through the 1960s. Books written before Kenyan
independence by European settlers and colonial administrators often present a different
version of certain historical events than those written after 1963 by Kenyan historians,
making my task more difficult. That means that some of the persons and events now
considered pivotal to the nation’s contemporary history are not necessarily the same as
one-hundred years, or even fifty years ago. As will be made clear in this section, even in
modern-day Kenya there are still questions and conflicting viewpoints about how certain
moments in history or prominent figures should be presented to the public.
Though I am not enough of an expert in Kenyan and African history to
extensively discuss or analyze the various constructions and interpretations of Kenya’s
past, other authors are. A small body of literature illustrates how the post-colonial history
of Kenya is still in flux and open to re-interpretation, in particular The Combing of
History by David William Cohen, The Politics of the Independence of Kenya, by Keith
Kyle, Imperialism and Collaboration in Colonial Kenya, by B.E. Kipkorir, and Kenya:
The Quest for Prosperity, by Norman Miller and Roger Yeager.

- 21 -
2.1 Brief history of Kenya between 1880 and 1963
2.1.1 The history of occupation on the East African coast
The area now known as Kenya has a long and complex history. For thousands of years it
has been considered an important crossroads for an international trade route – via land
and sea. It has been colonized by, or played host to, a variety of foreign powers. As early
as 500BC Indonesian traders brought boats and navigation techniques, as well as bananas
and coconuts.41
Arab traders established ports along the coast in 500AD. Kiswahali is
still the major language in Kenya and East Africa, thanks to these early interactions with
Arabs and other traders.42
The first European power – the Portuguese – arrived in 1498,
led by explorer Vasco da Gama. The Portuguese
military built Fort Jesus in 1593 in present-day
Mombassa in an attempt to break the resident
Arabs’ monopoly on trade in the region.
In 1698 the imam of Oman, Saif bin
Sultan, captured Mombassa; by 1729 the
Portuguese had been driven out of East Africa.43
Trade and slavery characterized the region
between 1700 and 1880. Slaves were used by the
Arabs to man their armies, perform manual labor,
or work as house servants and harem eunuchs.
Europeans, especially the French, employed these
slaves in newly acquired colonial posts overall in
Africa. The slave trade to Europe was primarily
controlled by Gulf merchants who arranged orders
and supplied dhow transport. ‘Kenya-based Arabs
or Swahili middle-men organized the slave
hunting expeditions which tore apart indigenous
coastal societies and spread enormous suffering as
41
Derr 1999: 10.
42
Miller 1994: 8.
43
Miller 1994: 8-9.
4 This wood engraving of CMS
Missionary Johann Ludwig Krapf was
most likely copied from a photograph,
judging by the detail of his face. It is
reproduced in the front of the book,
Ludwig Krapf: Missionary & Explorer by
C. G. Richards (1958). It came from an
illustration originally printed in Krapf’s
autobiographical work, Travels,
Researches and Missionary Labours,
Trubner & Co., London, 1860.

- 22 -
far west as Eastern Congo’.44
Slavery was first challenged in 1807 by the British, who made it illegal for her
subjects before beginning a campaign to end the slave trade overall. By the late 1840s
most of the European Empires had abolished slavery at home and in their colonies.45
However measures were difficult to enforce and unpopular with African-based slave
traders. The continuation of human trafficking compelled first missionaries, and later
imperial powers, into action. The desire to stamp out slavery at its source – and save a
few souls while they were at it – drove many religious organizations to establish bases or
‘foreign missions’ in Eastern Africa in the early to mid-1800’s.46
The first mission base
opened in East Africa was established near Mombassa in 1844 by Johann Ludwig Krapf
of the Church Missionary Society (CMS).47
(See image 4 and pages 27 and 47 for more
information). Though his own missionary work was hindered by the slave trade, his
presence encouraged several other churches to follow suit. By the late 1880s most of the
larger British religious organizations had a mission based in present-day Kenya.
By the 1880’s the missionary movement was putting strong pressure on the
British government to commit itself to the anti-slavery campaign, and to protect the
numerous clergymen active in Africa.48
The British were by that time quite keen to
colonize East Africa, and did indeed begin actively supporting several missions’
activities. As an early colonial governor put it: ‘The opening of a new mission station
seemed to me to be generally as officious for the extension of European influences as the
opening of a Government station.’49
44
Miller 1994: 9.
45
Ochieng’ 1985: 77; Miller 1994: 9.
46
Thompson 2004: 1; Miller 1994: 13.
47
Anderson 1970: 10; CMS is based in Birmingham England and was founded in 1799 as part of the
Church of England.
48
Miller 1994: 11.
49
“Charles Eliot: The East African Protectorate – London 1905, p 241,” cited in Kipkorir 1980: 3.

- 23 -
2.1.2 The ‘Scramble for Africa’ and early British colonization of Kenya
The British were not the only ones interested in establishing colonies in Africa. After the
defeat of Napoleon, several European countries wanted to expand territorially and ‘Africa
was the only continent left’.50
To regulate the ‘scramble for Africa’ and help avoid major
territorial conflicts or squabbles, a series of conferences were organized in Berlin
between November 1884 and February 1885. During the conference different ‘spheres of
influence’ were determined and boundaries between the new colonies were mutually
agreed upon. The ‘Congo Basin Treaties’ were signed on 26 February 1885 in Berlin by
Great Britain, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Spain, France, Italy, Holland,
Portugal, Russia, Norway and Sweden. The United States of America, though represented
at the conference, did not ratify the treaty.51
Both the Germans and British had
been fighting for control over Eastern Africa,
but thanks to the Congo Basin Treaties the
area had been divided between them. (See
image 5.) The Germans controlled the
southern half, now known as Tanzania. The
British got the northern half, roughly the area
where modern-day Kenya, Zanzibar and parts
of Uganda are located. In 1888 the privately-
owned Imperial British East Africa Company
received the Royal charter to survey the land,
secure peace treaties and establish bases for
colonial work.52
The Bible and the flag
advanced together; the East African Scottish Mission, established in 1891, was first
sponsored by Sir William Mackinnon (1828-1893), chairman of the Imperial British East
Africa Company. Its missions were built next to company forts.53
(See image 6.)
50
Hill 1949: 3-4.
51
Hill 1949: 9.
52
Miller 1994: 11; Hill 1949: 9.
53
Peterson 2004: 39.
5 Map of East Africa in 1892.

- 24 -
Eight years later the British colonial government
assumed direct control over the area.54
A Foreign Office
Notice officially proclaimed the territory to be the ‘East
African Protectorate’ on August 31, 1896.55
Within a
year Britain had enough control over East Africa to
effectively abolish slavery there.56
The colonial
government continued to support missionaries’ efforts.
For example, when the Church of Scotland established
their first Kenyan mission at Tumutumu in 1901, the
district commissioner accompanied its clergymen with a
force of police.57
Between 1895 and 1914 the British colonial
government launched several military ‘expeditions’
against the local populace, for both control of the land and domination of the people.58
The imposition of colonial rule was stiffly resisted in many parts of the Protectorate,
provoking several
military reactions. The
British also tried to
sway leading
community leaders to
work with them. In this
way they tried to take
advantage of the
already existing social
structures through
which most Kenyan
communities were
54
Miller 1994: 11.
55
Ross 1927: 45.
56
Ochieng’ 1985: 78.
57
Peterson 2004: 39.
58
Ochieng’ 1984: 88.
7 According to the caption: ‘Maasai senior chief Lenana poses with
white officials who moved his tribe off traditional Maasai grazing land.’
In 1904 Lenana signed a treaty with the British colonial government,
resulting in the First Maasai Move on 10 and 15 August of that year.
This photo is attributed to Camerapix.
6 Sir William Mackinnon, founder
of the Imperial British East Africa
Company, which administered
British East Africa between 1888
and 1896. This image is held by the
BBC Hulton Picture Library.

- 25 -
ruled, mainly by kings, chiefs or a council of elders.59
Those leaders who resisted were
met with brutal violence, their peoples often exterminated and their land and cattle
confiscated. These included chiefs Mekatelili, Waiyaki, and Samoei, now considered
Kenyan heroes.
The few local leaders who worked with the British to control and even relocate
their peoples were often spared part of their lands and livestock, more importantly their
communities were left in relative peace.60
Two examples of early ‘colonial collaborators’
– as they are now known – are senior chiefs Lenana of the Maasai and Waiyaki of the
Kikuyu. (See image 7.) They helped create safe passage for the British through
Maasailand in the late 1890s, an area that had posed serious danger to colonial
caravans.61
Between 1895 and 1915 collaboration between colonial officers and local
chiefs was quite common. This sort of relationship served as the model for the ‘indirect
rule’ approach to local administration: colonial officers managed chiefs, and the
collaborating chiefs managed their people. 62
2.1.3 The Uganda Railway
One of the first major undertakings of the
new colonial government was to begin
construction of the Uganda Railway. (See
images 8, 10 and 24.) It was seen to be
of vital importance to both the new
colony and the British Empire for a
number of reasons. Its construction was
directly related to the notion of ‘colonial
progress’. In an age where ‘progress’
equaled ‘civilization’ the Uganda
Railway was meant to be a tool in the stride against slavery by creating an alternative
economic source and market and establishing the first transportation system in the area.
From out a military standpoint, the railway made it easier for the British to counter any
59
Derr 1999: 11.
60
Ochieng’ 1984: 89.
61
Miller 1994: 13.
62
Miller 1994: 13, 15.
8 According to the caption, this is the ‘First train to
leave Mombassa for Voi, April 1898.’ Photo: David
Keith Jones/Images of Africa Photobank.

- 26 -
foreign invasion against the precious Nile headwaters in Uganda.63
Apparently the British
were quite concerned that the French, German and/or Italian forces would attempt to
block the headwaters of the Nile thereby disseminating British-Egypt, one of the jewels
of the British Empire.
Work on the rail line began in Mombassa in May 1896. It was completed in 1903;
the end destination was Kisumu, on the eastern shore of Lake Victoria in Uganda.64
It
stretched a total of 959 kilometers and was used primarily to carry goods from Uganda to
the Kenyan coast for further transport. Its total construction cost the British taxpayers
5,500,000 pounds, but it was expected that it would quickly begin paying for itself.
The influence of the railway was enormous, though not necessarily in the way that
63
Elkins 2005: 2.
64
Hill 1949: 150.
9 This photo shows Nairobi in 1899, established first as a work camp because of its close access to
the fertile farming lands later known as the ‘White Highlands’. This photo was accompanied by an
extremely long yet revealing citation and caption in the book The Permanent Way, the official
history of the building of the Uganda Railway: “‘Nyrobi has, with great judgment, been selected as
the site for principal workshops. It is about 5,500 feet above the level of the sea, which ensures a
comparatively salubrious climate: there is ample space of level ground for all requirements, and
excellent sites for the quarters of officers and subordinates on higher ground above the station site.
There is a fairly good supply of water, but reservoirs and tanks will have to be constructed.’ So
wrote Sir Guildford Molesworth, Consulting Engineer for Railways to the Government of India, in
1899. A few years later Nairobi looked like this – a city had been born. Railway officers and houses
are on the left, station and locomotive sheds in the centre background and workshops on the right.”
No photo credit or exact date was listed.

- 27 -
it was intended to be. The railway was under-utilized as a transportation network and
ultimately declared an economic failure, which caused quite a controversy in Great
Britain.65
However it did change the physical and cultural landscape forever, impacting
the placement of cities, the right to land ownership, and the ethnic composition of
present-day Kenya. Even the location of the capital city was determined by its
construction, as it was originally established as a railway work camp.66
(See image 9.)
When workers reached modern-day Nairobi on 30 May 1899 it was nothing more than a
large flat area at the entrance of the fertile highlands, which later became the center of
European settler’s farming communities.67
The railway and these work camps ran
through several different indigenous communities’ territories, simultaneously dividing
their peoples and making white settlement possible. As a direct result of the railway’s
construction many indigenous peoples were forced onto reserves, located far from their
traditional lands.
Its construction also changed the ethnic landscape of Kenya in another way. More
than 30,000 indentured laborers were imported from India to help build the ‘lunatic line’;
65
Ochieng’ 1984: 102.
66
Hill 1949: 185.
67
Kyle 1999: 6.
10 According to the caption, this is a 'plate-laying gang shifting camp'. Between 1896 and 1903
thousands of Indian migrant laborers were imported to help construct the Uganda Railway. It is
unclear when this photo was taken or where. No photo credits are listed.

- 28 -
approximately one-third of these workers remained behind and established themselves in
the East African Protectorate.68
(See images 10 and 24.) Africans were seen by the
colonial government as ‘unfit for service because they refused to recognize any one
person as authority over them.’69
The construction of the Uganda Railway provides a chance to examine how one
historical event can be presented from out a multitude of perspectives, depending on the
era in which the literary work was written as well as the cultural background of the
author. As seen in the book The Permanent Way, written by British historian Hill in 1949,
according to prevailing colonial thought, ‘the railway is intertwined with the history of
British East Africa, without it there would have been no social or economic or political
progress.’70
In the words of Sir Edward Grigg, Governor of East Africa between 1925
and 1930 and First High Commissioner of Transport for Kenya and Uganda: ‘the railway
is the beginning of all history in Kenya. Without it there would be no history of Kenya.
This country was really nothing but a corridor. It has been neglected even by the
missionaries who passed through its inhospitable highlands to the richer and more
civilized lands around the lake [Lake Victoria in Uganda]. It was extraordinarily free
from outside influences and, perhaps for that reason, the tribes seem to have been static
for years. Kenya was not conquered by force of arms. It was conquered by one of the
greatest forces of modern civilization; it was conquered by a railway… The railway
brought settlers and our Government in its tracks, and it was the railway which created
Kenya as a Colony of the Crown.’71
According to W.R. Ochieng’, distinguished Kenyan historian and professor at
Kenyatta University College in Nairobi, “colonialism – and specifically such
‘improvements’ as the railway – destabilized the economic and social foundations of the
indigenous pre-capitalist societies”.72
In contemporary post-colonial thought, these
technological inventions – once the pride of the British Empire – ‘can be seen as physical
reminders of the divisive nature of the colonial authorities.’73
These and other economic
68
Miller 1994: 12.
69
Hill 1949: 251.
70
Hill 1949: v.
71
Hill 1949: 243-244.
72
Ochieng’ 1985: 87.
73
Ogot and Ochieng’ 1995: 13.

- 29 -
reforms introduced by the British were – despite colonial assurances to the contrary –
established to exploit, offering ‘no reliable foundation for a better future’.74
2.1.4 Land rights
Land ownership in the East African Protectorate came under Colonial control in 1899.75
A year later the British began moving Africans away from land their communities had
inhabited for centuries and onto ‘reserves’, established in places that the British
themselves did not consider fertile enough for settler plantations.76
In 1902 the remaining
land was parceled and European farmers were given 999-year leases.77
At that time there
were only 480 Europeans in all of Kenya, including twenty farming families. To attract
new settlers the colonial government spearheaded a publicity campaign, offering
inexpensive leases to Europeans interested in investing in ‘unoccupied’ lands. Between
1903 and 1906 a total of 1,800 Europeans immigrated to Kenya.
European settlement was concentrated in the fertile highlands above Nairobi,
which became known as the ‘White Highlands’.78
This land was then used to cultivate
large-scale export crops such as coffee and tea, for which indigenous Kenyans were often
hired to work. By 1914 there were 5,400 Europeans living in the East African
Protectorate, 3,000 of which were settlers.79
A year later the colonial government issued
the East African (Land) Ordinance, which allowed Africans to live only on land not
occupied by Europeans, but denied them titles of ownership in the reserves. The
ordinance also made the sale or transfer of land to non-Europeans illegal, effectively
blocking Indian or Arab citizens from owning land.
74
Ibidem.
75
Miller 1994: 15.
76
Miller 1994: 21; Ochieng’ 1984: 98.
77
Miller 1994: 15.
78
Derr 1999: 44.
79
Miller 1994: 14-15.

- 30 -
2.1.5 The Indian Question
The significant Indian population in Kenya was also discriminated against by the colonial
government. After working on the Uganda Railway for three years, Indian coolies could
choose to be repatriated to India or stay on in East Africa. At the completion of the
railway, between six and seven thousand Indians remained in present-day Kenya, as
compared to only about one-hundred European settlers at that time.80
They were mainly
regulated to work as shopkeepers and office workers and, just as Africans, were not
allowed to own significant tracts of land.81
Prominent Indian leaders such as A.M. Jeevanjee
called for equal rights for Indian citizens as early as 1903.
(See image 11.) The government conceded partially to their
demands in 1909, allowing one Indian representative to sit on
the Legislative Council of the East African Protectorate.82
Jeevanjee accepted the nomination, but soon concluded that
‘the presence of one solitary Indian member, in a council
otherwise European and largely hostile, served no useful
purpose’.83
In 1921 V.V. Phadke became the first Indian
member to be appointed to – and remain on – the council.84
The ‘Indian Question’ arose again in 1915 when
Indian Kenyans demanded the right to own land, the abolishment of segregation laws in
urban areas, and equal citizenship – in short the same rights enjoyed by other British
citizens.85
The issue remained unresolved until 1923, when the colonial government
officially proclaimed in July of that year that Indians could never be allowed to obtain
these rights so long as the Kenyan Africans could not, because ‘Kenya is an African
territory, and His Majesty’s government thinks it is necessary definitely to record their
considered opinion that the interests of the African native be paramount.’86
Of course the
80
Ross 1927: 300.
81
Ochieng’ 1985: 114.
82
Ross 1927: 297, 315.
83
Ross 1927: 315.
84
Ross 1927: 329.
85
Ochieng’ 1985: 114; Kyle 1999: 15.
86
Ross 1927: 377, quotation comes from a White Paper written in 1922 but issued by the colonial
government in July 1923.
11 Early Indian leader A.M.
Jeevanjee. It is unclear when
or where this photo was
taken, or by whom.

- 31 -
colonial government was unwilling to give these rights to indigenous Kenyans. At that
time there were approximately 9,700 Europeans, 23,000 Indians, 10,100 Arabs and more
than 2,300,000 Africans living in the Protectorate.87
2.1.6 World War I
During World War I (1914-1918) many European settlers and Kenyan Africans were
conscripted into British service, leaving the extensive settler-farms behind in order to
help the war effort. An outbreak of rinderpest in 1916, followed by a severe drought and
famine two years later, necessitated a new wave of European immigration. In 1919 a
‘soldier-settler scheme’ was put into place by the colonial government.88
All Europeans
who had served in World War I would receive free tracts of farming land if they
established themselves in Kenya. A total of 1,310 new farming tracts were given away.
This land scheme was however not available to African or Indian soldiers who
had served in the British Army. In fact, most of the 10,000 African soldiers and 195,000
African laborers who served never even received payment for their service, as was
promised to them upon joining.89
Instead the majority were forced to return to the
increasingly overcrowded ‘native reserves’. Unable to remain self-sufficient, many
Kenyans were obligated to participate in the cash economy. To further ‘encourage’
Africans to work as laborers on the newly established European settler-scheme farms,
different taxes were enforced, such as the poll and hut tax.90
Ironically the ‘hut tax’ was
imposed on African migrant workers who choose to set up a temporary tent or hut on the
settler’s property while they worked the white man’s land.91
A registration system was
also put into place – known as kipande – which required Africans to wear a metal
container around their neck with their registration papers and employment records
inside.92
87
Kyle 1999: 5.
88
Miller 1994: 17.
89
Ochieng’ 1985 112.
90
Ogot and Ochieng’ 1995: xv; Kyle 1999: 17.
91
Miller 1994: 18.
92
Kyle 1999: 17.

- 32 -
2.1.7 The creation of ‘Kenya Colony’ and early signs of African protest
On 23 June 1920 the British government formally annexed a large portion of the East
Africa Protectorate and declared it to be the ‘Kenya Colony’. At the same time, the
portion of the East Africa Protectorate now known as Zanzibar was renamed the ‘Kenya
Protectorate’.93
The colonies were named after the British region’s highest mountain.
Many believe German explorer and early missionary Johann Ludwig Krapf gave Mt.
Kenya its current name in the mid-nineteenth century. (See also pages 19, 27 and 47 as
well as image 4.) Others attribute its name to the Maasai word eroknya, which means
‘snow’ and refers to the white peak of the mountain.94
Months after its establishment, the first of many major protests by Africans
against the new colony and settler-dominated economy was organized in the coffee-
growing district of Kiambu.95
This
action, like the other protests that
soon followed, was ignored by the
local authorities. The repeated
failure of peaceful protests and
letters of grievances lead to the
formation of more militant anti-
British groups. The largest and
perhaps best organized was the
Young Kikuyu Association,
founded in 1921 and lead by Harry
Thuku, then a government
telephone operator.96
When Thuku
and his organization began
attracting national attention and
similar associations began forming
in other districts, the colonial
93
Ross 1927: 86.
94
Derr 1999: 11.
95
Miller 1994: 20.
96
Miller 1994: 20; Ross 1927: 230.
12 Jomo (Johnstone) Kenyatta, pictured here with his first
wife Grace Wahu and their children. It is unclear when
this photo was taken or in which studio. Photo property of
Wayland Picture Library.

- 33 -
police arrested Thuku and jailed him on charges of seditious activities. This set off first
political riot in the Kenya Colony. Thousands of Africans gathered outside the Nairobi
central police station where Thuku was being held. Most stayed throughout the night and
when they failed to disperse the next morning the police opened fire, killing at least
twenty-five.97
Thuku was exiled to the Somalian coast for nine years.98
In 1925 the Young Kikuyu Association was renamed the Kikuyu Central
Association (KCA).99
Three years later Jomo Kenyatta – perhaps the most important
Kenyan political figure in colonial and immediate post-colonial history – became general
secretary of the organization. (See image 12, 17 and 30.) In 1929 the KCA sent him to
London to present their petitions and letters of grievances concerning the right of
Africans to self-representation in the Kenyan colonial government, directly to the head
Colonial Office in London. Two years later he was sent to London again, this time to
bring grievances concerning land alienation and work permits directly to the British
Parliament.100
He stayed in England until 1946, studying economics at the London
School of Economics and working as a lobbyist for Kenyan and Pan-African concerns.
2.1.8 Missionary-run versus independent schools
Between 1920 and 1940, Europeans were the landowners; Africans the servants, laborers
and petty traders; and Indian-Asians the artisans, clerks and merchants.101
These roles
were reinforced by the publicly funded education available in the Kenya Colony.
European missionaries, who had founded the first schools in the late nineteenth century,
remained responsible for national education until after World War II.102
In general these
public schools produced low-paid clerks and white-collar workers for the local colonial
bureaucracy and large European firms established in Africa.103
Almost as soon as they were set up in Kenya, European-type schools were seen as
one of the keys to economic and political progress by colonists and Africans alike.
Colonists wanted to train better skilled workers and instilled respect for European law
97
Ochieng’ 1985: 114.
98
Miller 1994: 21; Or 11 years according to Ochieng’ 1984: 114.
99
Miller 1994: 21.
100
Miller 1994: 21.
101
Miller 1994: 18.
102
Derr 1999: 25.
103
Monti 1987: 91.

- 34 -
and order. Africans hoped – through formal education and especially by learning the
English language – to gain an increasing share of the positions of wealth and authority
being created around them.104
Though these mission-run schools were at first
wholeheartedly welcomed by Africans, in reality ‘only a tiny few learned the English
language with which British settlers and administrators debated colonial policy. The vast
majority of Africans were herded into the Swahili world of indirect rule.’105
Independent African schools were established in the late 1920s and 1930s as a
reaction to the colonial/missionary school system. One of the largest organizations, the
Kikuyu Independent Schools Association (KISA), was officially founded in August
1934.106
(See image 13.) The group was originally part of the Church of Scotland
Mission Station at Kikuyu but
broke off in 1929.107
Independents
studied in English, were baptized
and took English names. They
practiced the rituals of British
colonialism and governmental
bureaucracy ‘in the hopes of
obligating British rulers to treat
them not as voiceless subjects, but
as active and worthy participants in
the colony’.108
The colonial government
responded to the Independent
school movement by releasing
various reports which restricted the
education available to Africans
even further. In 1949 the Beecher
104
Anderson 1970: 5.
105
Peterson 2004: 122.
106
Anderson 1970: 119.
107
Ibidem.
108
Peterson 2004: 139-140, 144, 148.
13 According to the caption: “In a photograph printed at
the front of the association’s constitution, the Kikuyu
Independent Schools Association’s Managing Committee
sits behind a table piled with books. The [original] caption
further emphasizes the KISA men’s skill with
bureaucratic procedure. It reads: ‘Sitting (from left):
Messrs. Jefitha Ngig, District Chairman, Embu;
Johnanna Kunyiha, President, KISA; Hezekiah Gachui,
Vice-President KISA; Jimmy Willie Wambugu, District
Chairman, South Nyeri. Standing (from left): Messrs.
Samuel Mukua, District Chairman, Kiambu; Javenson
Kinyanjui, Provincial treasurer; Peter Kibaka, District
Chairman, Fort Hall; E.M. Wambico, General Secretary,
KISA.’ (From Kikuyu Independent Schools Association:
Report and Constitution. Nairobi: KISA, 1938).”

- 35 -
Report was released, severely limiting the number of Africans that were officially
allowed to learn English. In many ways the Beecher Report and others like it condemned
African children ‘to perpetual servitude within the colonial system’.109
2.1.9 World War Two and the rise of Mau Mau
The period 1945 to 1952 witnessed what Kenyan historian W.R. Ochieng’ described as ‘a
divided but articulate African nationalistic effort’.110
Perhaps the most important factor
was the return of the African ex-servicemen who had fought for the British during World
War II. These men had found acceptance abroad and refused to be treated as second-class
citizens any longer. When recognition at home did not come, ‘the returned soldiers
started a campaign to liberate the masses of their fears of the white man’.111
Mau Mau
General Bildad Kaggia later said that ‘people needed to be told
that Africans were equal to whites […] and, given education
and opportunity, were capable of doing everything that the
mzungu [white man] could do.’112
More and more African-led political parties were being
formed in the late 1940s and 1950s. On 1 June 1947 Jomo
Kenyatta was elected the President of the Kenyan African
Union (KAU) party.113
Kenyatta preached gradualism, but
radical elements in the KAU were ‘tired of waiting and
distrusted colonial promises of change’.114
Some joined an
underground movement, which by 1951 was binding select
members by oath against the British. In January 1952, a Central
Committee of twelve – made up mostly of KAU politicians –
was organized to control the clandestine activities of this anti-
colonial group and organize oathing on a large-scale. This
committee formally started what would become known as
109
Peterson 2004: 194.
110
Ochieng’ cited in Kyle 1999: 129.
111
Ochieng’ 1985: 129.
112
Ochieng’ 1985: 130.
113
Ibidem.
114
Ochieng’ 1985: 132.
14 Mau Mau Field
Marshall and
contemporary Kenyan
hero, Dedan Kimathi. He
was one of the leaders of
the movement; his capture
and execution in October
1956 ended Mau Mau
resistance in Kenya. No
information about the
place, date or
photographer was included
with this photograph.

- 36 -
15 ‘Mau Mau army
training camp’. No other
information was
provided.
‘Mau Mau’.115
Mau Mau is often portrayed as simply an uprising of landless Kenyans against the
colonial government and white-settler society. In reality many factors – including land
alienation, the continued denial of political rights, unemployment and rural poverty –
contributed to its creation.116
On 7 October 1952 senior native Chief and prominent
British supporter Kungu Waruhiu of Githunguri – the colonial government’s ‘tower of
strength’ – was assassinated by Mau Mau rebels.117
The government responded by
declaring a State of Emergency and calling in British troops to suppress the
insurrection.118
Because Waruhiu had told another colonial chief that Kenyatta was the
leader of the Mau Mau shortly before his death, Jomo Kenyatta was also arrested.
Ironically the skills learnt in the British Army were to
prove a major asset to Mau Mau. Many of the group’s more
important figures, such as Stanley Matheng’e, Waruhiu Itote,
Dedan Kimathi and Paul Mahehu, were ex-servicemen who had
fought for the British during World War II.119
(See image 14.)
They in turn trained new Mau Mau recruits. Between 1952 and
1956, this self-trained army launched increasingly militarized
attacks against European settlers and other colonial institutions,
with the aim of
ridding the country
of British imperialistic influences. (See
image 15.) The British government –
determined to do everything within its
powers to save one of the Empire’s last
remaining colonies – responded with
unprecedented force in the form of ‘search
and subdue’ missions. Concentration camps
115
Ibidem.
116
Miller 1994: 24.
117
Kipkorir 1980: 86.
118
Kipkorir 1980: 84; Miller 1994: 25.
119
Ochieng’ 1985: 136-137.
16 ‘Mau Mau suspects congregated around the
gallows at Thompson’s Falls Camp before their
final departure to the Pipeline (a larger
network of concentration camps dotted around
the Kenya Colony).’ Popperfoto/Retrofile.com.

- 37 -
were set up around Kenya to house those captured, as well as those suspected of
collaborating with Mau Mau rebels. (See image 16.)
In October 1956, the last Mau Mau resistance came to an end with the capture and
execution of Mau Mau Field Marshall Dedan Kimathi. (See image 14.) In those four
years an estimated thirty to one-hundred British, twenty-five Indians and 1,920 African
Loyalists were slain. This in comparison to an estimated 11,500 to 13,000 Mau Mau
killed and another 2,585 captured.120
In addition, more than 100,000 Kikuyu were
forcibly relocated or placed into detention camps. However the State of Emergency was
not lifted until January 1960, the same year a Colonial
White Paper released by the Public Relations Office
in London officially recognized the root cause of the uprising as the loss of African land
to Europeans.121
Just what Mau Mau precisely was or accomplished is still very much open to
debate in both Kenya and abroad. According to most British historians, Mau Mau was a
violent rebellion, though a select few refer to it as a ‘militant nationalist movement’.122
In
post-colonial Kenya Mau Mau rebels are now regarded ‘as revolutionary freedom
fighters and architects of the Kenyan nation.’123
On 18 February 2007 H.E. Mwai Kibaki,
then-President of the republic of Kenya, unveiled a statue of the ‘former Freedom fighter
and Kenya Hero’ Dedan Kimathi, stating that he ‘was an inspiration to many world
leaders including former South African President Nelson Mandela’.124
Two other Mau
Mau leaders were honored by way of memorial halls in 2006. The Paul Ngei Mausoleum
and the Bildad Kaggia Mausoleum were opened on 11 August and 13 October 2006
respectively, by the Kenyan Minister for National Heritage Suleiman Shakombo.125
He
stated that these memorial halls showed that ‘his ministry was seeking ways to identify
120
Miller 1994: 25; Derr 1999: 58-59.
121
Miller 1994: 26.
122
Derr 1999: 58-59.
123
Cohen 1994: 61. In the 1980s and 1990s, several of the surviving Mau Mau generals began challenge
professional historians for the responsibility for writing the official history of the Mau Mau. These include
Field Marshall Mbaria Kaniu and politician Waruru Kanja (see Cohen 1994: 61). However I was unable to
find any literature written by these men in neither Dutch libraries, nor references to such a publication on
the internet.
124
National Museums of Kenya website: Dedan Kimathi Statue Unveiled, 1 March 2008.
125
National Museums of Kenya website: Paul Ngei Mausoleum Unveiled, 1 March 2008; National
Museums of Kenya website: Bildad Kaggia Mausoleum Unveiled, 1 March 2008.

- 38 -
such heroes and heroines for their unique and selfless service to the nation.’126
He also
said that ‘the Government would liaise with politicians from Central Kenya to come up
with a place to build a mausoleum for [all] Mau Mau freedom fighters’. As of yet there
appears to be no concrete plans for a central Mau Mau Memorial Hall.
Although the British succeeded in crushing the Mau Mau movement, it
nevertheless marked a watershed moment in Kenyan history, triggering major policy
changes concerning African land rights and representation in government, which
ultimately led to the Kenya’s independence.127
The Lyttleton Constitution of 1954 gave
Africans direct representation for the first time. During the Lancaster House meetings of
1960 and 1962 a final constitutional agreement was drafted and eventually accepted by
both British and Kenyan representatives.128
Kenya was ultimately declared a free and independent nation on 12 December
1963. Jomo Kenyatta was the first elected President of the newly created African state.
Because the British colonial government had prohibited nationally-based political parties
during their reign, one of the biggest stumbling blocks in the immediate post-colonial
years was creating national unity amongst the various ethnic communities spread across
the country.129
Kenyatta, a Kikuyu, preached harambee or ‘unity’, making national
cohesion and the re-
establishment of brotherly bonds
one of the most important goals
of his early years as President of
Kenya.130
For this reason he
purposefully included influential
people from other ethnic groups
in his government, such as
Oginga Odinga from the Luo
tribe as Vice President. In
126
National Museums of Kenya website: Bildad Kaggia Mausoleum Unveiled, 1 March 2008.
127
Ochieng’ 1985: 136-139; Miller 1994: 26.
128
Ochieng’ 1985: 140; Miller 1994: 32.
129
See Sayer 1998, Loh 1996, Friedmann 1975, and Ochieng’ 1985 for more information.
130
Loh 1996: 41.
17 Jomo Kenyatta with a group of white settlers in 1963. He
had just assured them that they were welcome to stay and
farm in independent Kenya. Photo attributed to Epoque
Ltd., no further information is available.

- 39 -
addition, he made conciliatory gestures towards the European settler community. One of
these key post-colonial moments includes Jomo Kenyatta’s address to white farmers in
Nakuru in 1963. (See image 17.) While promising them they would still be welcome in
post-colonial Kenya, he stated: ‘If I have done a mistake to you in the past, it is for you to
forgive me. If you have done a mistake to me, it is for me to forgive you. The Africans
cannot say the Europeans have done all the wrong and the Europeans cannot say the
Africans have done all the wrong.’131
Jomo Kenyatta would serve his country as President until 1978, when he died in
his sleep. He was succeeded by his Vice President, Daniel Moi.132
For detailed
information about Kenyan history after 1963, I highly recommend the book History of
Kenya (1985) by Professor W.R. Ochieng’, which also served as an important source for
this thesis.
2.2 Which version of history is being presented in the new History Gallery?
2.2.1 Re-defining the contents of the history exhibitions
The process leading up to the creation of a new History of Kenya exhibition has been
complex to say the least. As seen above, the national history is still very much in flux and
it is not always clear how an event should be interpreted in this post-colonial age. Even
within the NMK staff there was dissent around how certain events should be presented.
In this section I will describe the concrete steps taken by the NMK and support staff
when revamping the new History of Kenya gallery. Which events were considered most
relevant to contemporary Kenyan society, how this multifaceted history would be
presented, and what sorts of objects would be displayed, all had to be discussed. To
facilitate these talks, a series of conferences and workshops were organized in 2005 and
2006 to work out the general design and content of the future displays. In addition to
several members of the NMK staff, external consultants were also involved with both the
project and conferences.133
131
Friedmann 1975: 72.
132
Sayer 1998: 22.
133
The information with this section comes from a combination of personal and/or converstations with
several individuals involved with this project, namely: KIT Tropenmuseum Africa curator Paul Faber and
head of Public Presentations department Paul Voogt, as well as Lydia Kitungulu, Head of the Exhibition
Department of the Nairobi National Museum, and Assistant director Kiprop Lagat.

- 40 -
In June 2005 a project management workshop was held in Kenya. During this first
workshop a ‘vision’ for all of the new expositions was set down on paper. Paul Voogt,
head of Public Presentations department at the KIT Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam, had
been the project leader of the museum renovation since 2002 and was also involved in
this workshop. As a result of these talks, the collections and galleries were split into three
groups: culture, nature and history. Each of these categories was assigned to a different
group of NMK museum staff members. The team dedicated to the History of Kenya
gallery included Lydia Kitungulu, Head of the Exhibition Department, Mischi Wambiji,
an Exhibition Developer, and Simon Gatheru, the Principal Curator.
On 12 and 13 January 2006 the various NMK exhibition teams and external
advisors met in Nairobi for a two-day workshop, designed to help stimulate work on the
new displays. Drs. Paul Faber was the main external consultant for the History gallery,
involved with both its design and contents. Paul Faber is the Africa Curator at the
Tropenmuseum and has been involved with this renovation project since 2002. Though
his primary contact with the museum staff in Nairobi has been via email, he has also been
to Kenya several times to meet with the History team and various NMK staff. Two
museum advisors working for the Nairobi-based NMK support programme – Gonda
Geets and Chris Thouless – were also active participants in these discussions.
During these sessions a draft-plan and preliminary storyline for the history
exhibitions were developed by the project team. At the end of the conference, the initial
themes and topics to be handled in the History expositions had been agreed upon by those
involved. The results were written up by Paul Faber. Because there was no dedicated
History Curator working for the NMK at that time, the History Team’s version of the
past, as well as the chosen themes, still needed to be verified and further developed by
local experts and historians.
During this workshop a number of potential stumbling blocks and internal
problems were also signaled by the NMK staff. The proposed opening of the museum
was then only seventeen months away, but the staff had not had enough time to complete
even one of the seven proposed galleries. A lack of an experienced and/or trained staff, as
well as financing, was primarily to blame. Though the museum had secured a substantial
subsidy from the European Union, the majority of money had been set aside for other

- 41 -
aspects of the renovation; the monies available for the re-design of all of the exhibitions
was – in comparison – quite limited. There was also little funding available to hire in
local experts or historians. And perhaps most importantly for the History Team, the need
for a history curator dedicated to this project was becoming acute. Without one, it was
suggested that the History Gallery be put on hold. Unfortunately there was little the
external experts or support staff could do other than to make a note of these problems.134
In March 2006 the rough exposition design was spread across the building;
galleries were assigned locations within the newly renovated building and key objects
were ‘placed’ inside. The first version of the history gallery layout was also created.
In July 2006 a conference was organized for the History team in Liverpool and
London, England. By that time a team of five Kenyan historians, including Kenneth S.
Ombongi of the University of Nairobi, had written a very raw, basic exposition text.
During these sessions in England, the history team used this conceptual text to create a
storyline, which was set on paper by Paul Faber. In August 2006 James Nzlinga was
hired as the History curator for the Nairobi National Museum. Paul Faber was for the last
in Kenya in November 2006.
2.2.2 Recent Developments
The History Team’s storyline has been since further researched and revised. The latest
document, the ‘Storyline of the History Exhibition’, provides a brief post-colonial
account of Kenyan history, split into a chronologically-ordered list of important national
events and persons. (See Appendix II.) The new History of Kenya gallery has been
divided into six major sections: ‘Introduction: What is History’, ‘Before 1895: Kenya
Before Kenya’, ‘1895 – 1920: Invasion and resistance’, ‘1920- 1963 Who owns Kenya?’,
‘1963 – 2002 (/now) Independent Kenya’, and ‘Closing element: contemporary wall’.
Each of the four main time periods consists of a number of related themes. In Chapter
three I go into more detail about each of these sub-sections. Between each section, a
‘bridging element’ will be used to help connect these different periods in history.
134
Information in this paragraph comes from two documents. First, an internal KIT Tropenmuseum
document: Report Kenya Mission Report written by Paul Faber on 9 February 2006, which briefly
summarizes the main objectives, output and conclusions made during the 2-day workshop held 12 and 13
January 2008 in Nairobi. Second, an email written by Hassan Aero and sent to Paul Faber and John Mack
on 23 January 2008.

- 42 -
Based on this preliminary storyline, a detailed list of objects which could be used
in the displays was created by the NMK staff and History team. This ‘List of objects to be
acquired’ – written up in outline form – provides specific information about the objects
and photographs the History team hopes to exhibit within the new gallery. (See Appendix
I.) For each major theme or event, a number of photos and/or objects have been signaled
as key elements of the new displays.
Initial research into the NMK collections and National Archives revealed a
serious shortage of material objects available for use in the new, post-colonial History of
Kenya gallery. Because of this, the museum hopes to find a large number of photographs
which could be used to visualize historical events from out multiple perspectives. Photos
are also seen as evocative objects, able to convey a large amount of contextual
information to a wide audience.
One of the more critical issues to be tackled by the History team, as determined
during the various workshops, was research into the museum’s own collections and the
national archives. Only once they knew what they did or did not have in-house, could
they begin searching for and acquiring new objects for use in the exposition. This is also
one of the reasons that I was asked to work on this project, assisting in the collection
research by looking for photos which could be used in the History of Kenya gallery.
Though it was hoped that the new gallery would be opened in June 2007, this has
proved to be impossible; the museum staff is unsure at this time when it will be
completed. At this point the relationship with KIT Tropenmuseum has ended, though it is
still possible that they will be contracted in the future to help finish the gallery.
It is interesting to note that, as a result of an autonomous initiative from the
Kenyan Indian community, the ‘Indian perspective’ on Kenya’s colonial history will be
presented in a separate hall entitled ‘Asian African Heritage’. At the moment the
intention is that the exposition space will be created as a separate building, with a hall
connecting it to the new museum. The construction of the exposition space and hall will
be primarily funded by the local Asian African population. These displays will most
likely be similar to a successful temporary exposition erected in the museum in the 1990s
that was dedicated to conveying the history of Indian and Asian citizens in modern-day
Kenya. The exposition, also called the ‘Asian African Heritage’ exposition, was created

- 43 -
out of a mixture of photographs and objects. Many of the images were lent from private
individuals, the national Museums of Kenya Ethnography department, and media houses.
Some were returned to their owners after the temporary exposition closed, while other
photos were donated to the National Museum archives and Ethnography departments.135
135
Email correspondence between Lydia Kitungulu, myself and the Assistant director of the Nairobi
National Museum, Kiprop Lagat. Sent Friday, November 23, 2007.

- 44 -
Chapter 3: Historical photos of Kenya in European photographic
sources
The ‘List of objects to be acquired’ and ‘Storyline of the History Exhibition’ also formed
the starting point of my own research into potentially useful photographic materials. (See
Appendix I and II respectively.) As part of my internship at the Tropenmuseum, I was
asked to search through different European photographic archives and locally available
books for images which could be used in the new History of Kenya gallery. As was noted
by the History gallery project team in 2006, further research into potential images would
also help the museum staff visualize the new exposition. It was seen as useful to the
project to have someone such as myself perform a preliminary search into available
photographic materials, specifically into colonial and imperial archives located in Great
Britain and Europe in general.
In this section I will discuss the results of my photographic research, providing
both commentary on the sorts of images available as well as supplying examples of
photographs found. I have divided the images up according to the categories used in both
the ‘Storyline of the History Exhibition’ and the ‘List of objects to be acquired’
documents. My research was limited to a select number of European archives and
cultural-historical books about Kenyan history available in Dutch public libraries. A
complete list of my photographic sources can be found in Appendix III. Because I was
not able to travel to England and look through the plethora of institutional and museum
sources available, my archival research is limited to Dutch institutions and relevant
British archives accessible via internet.
It was also important to find images which Kenyan researchers could easily trace
and order copies of, provided the photos were deemed worthy of being exhibited in the
new displays sometime in the near future. For this reason I downloaded, scanned or
photocopied the most relevant and interesting images and bundled them together with any
source information I had found. The resulting book, the aforementioned ‘Photographs
(and potential sources for photos) which could be used in the History of Kenya Gallery,
National Museum of Kenya’ (July 2007), was then sent to the Nairobi National Museum
for future use. Of course before a final selection can be made, similar research must be
completed in Kenya.

- 45 -
During the course of my research, I found one-hundred and fifty images which
could be used in the new gallery, a selection of which have been included in this thesis.
Within the European archives, books and photo banks I have consulted, I was not able to
find a visual representation of every event or person included in the NMK history team’s
lists. This is especially so for events taking place before 1920; what is ‘missing’ will also
be discussed in this chapter. In other cases, the only photos I could find of an event or
person are out of focus, probably too damaged to include in any future expositions, or
simply not that interesting visually. Most European archives hold a smaller body of
photographs relating to events in Kenya after 1963. That is not to say that photos of
independent Kenya do not exist, on the contrary there are a plethora of images available.
However the majority were taken by African photographers for Kenyan or East African
newspapers, such as the Daily Nation. Why precisely such a large number of high-quality
photographs became available after 1963, and how African photographers dominated the
scene so quickly, is a question to be answered in another research project. Suffice to say;
within this section my focus remains on my findings of European archival sources and
images taken between 1880 and 1963.
3.1 History of Photography in Africa and Kenya
Before discussing the types of photos found, it is important to take a brief look at the
history of photography in Kenya. The origin of photography is usually dated to 1839,
when different techniques for producing the first photographic images were announced in
France and England. Within a few months of its invention, photography reached Africa;
some of the earliest surviving photos are of Egyptian monuments.136
These early cameras
were quite heavy and hard to handle. To operate one required a substantial amount of
knowledge about both the camera equipment and the chemicals used to develop the glass
plate negatives, from which only one print was created.137
Between 1870 and 1900, photographic technology improved dramatically;
cameras were increasingly easier to operate and could even capture small degrees of
136
Thompson 2004: 2.
137
Thompson 2004: 2; Roberts 1989: 199.

- 46 -
motion.138
Advancements in chemicals and the negative process also made it possible to
create photographic negatives from which multiple prints could be made.
By the mid-1870’s it was increasingly common for missionaries and colonial
explorers to carry cameras into the heart of Africa.139
Britain and France had colonized
much of the known world by the late 1880s; photographers from both countries actively
documented their colonies. ‘The camera became a tool in the appropriation of the world
by making it manageable and classifiable through imagery, so to speak.’140
Photographs –
then considered to be an accurate depiction of
reality – were used to collect facts and
information on all kinds of things, peoples and
customs.141
Some photos, ‘especially those of
natural wonders were for public consumption.
Others were destined for the archives and the
attentions of scholars and specialists of the
time.’142
Of course the nature of the resulting
photographic record was greatly influenced by
the particular interests of the individual
photographers’ active in Kenya. Missionaries,
for example, often photographed for
propagandistic and didactic reasons. They
printed their photos of African converts and
newly-built mission schools onto postcards
and in missionary magazines in order to raise
moral and financial support from those at
home.143
Colonial administrators and military
men would document their scientific
138
Geary, in Killingray 1988: 31.
139
Thompson 2004: 11.
140
141
Badger 2007: 24; Geary, in Killingray 1988: 37.
142
Badger 2007: 24.
143
Thompson 2004: 11-13.
18 This photo of ‘camera hunter’ Arthur
Radclyffe Dugmore shows him photographing
a charging rhinoceros. The animal was shot
by one of his companions before it could kill
him. This image was originally included in
Dugmore’s book Camera Adventures in the
African Wilds (1910) and accompanied by the
caption: ‘The Author and his camera’. It is
now held in the archive of the Royal
Geographical Society, London.

- 47 -
explorations and military successes, then send their images to the Colonial Office in
London or scientific institutions such as the Royal Geographic Society and Royal
Anthropological Society.144
(See image 18.) Anthropologists created ‘racial types’,
which served the contemporary research interests in human evolution, and took part in
‘inventory-taking’, photographing objects which could not be collected or removed.145
They often sold or sent their photos to various ethnographic and colonial museums.
Commercial photography studios created portraits on demand for the European and
African elite, but also produced postcards catering to the tourist and safari markets.146
Colonial imagery served scholarly and educational needs, but much of it also
reinforced and perpetuated age-old stereotypes of Africans.147
‘Photography was used in
Africa to define and propagate the popular image of the white man as conqueror and
civilizer, presenting him as explorer, soldier, hunter, missionary, or master of the
machines produced by victorious Western technology.’148
The African interior, in
contrast, was usually portrayed as a place of disease, death and barbarism.149
“Colonial
photographs of Africa – like all photographs – […] depict aspects of a constructed reality
that incorporates the perceptions, politics and tastes of the photographer, the
photographic subject, and the intended audience. Historical photographs of Africa taken
by Westerners inevitably portray the encounter between Western and ‘exotic’ cultures
and reveal conventions of picture-taking in another time.”150
One of the archetypal colonial figures of the Victorian era was the colonial hunter,
frequently pictured with a gun posed beside his recently killed prey.151
(See image 19.)
The big game hunt in Africa, very popular in the early days of the Kenya Colony, was
part of the theatre of imperial ideology; “hunting large mammals enacted the domination
of Europe and America over their empires, reiterating the feudalistic conceit that men of
leisure were warriors, and objectified Africa as ‘nature’.”152
These types of photos had
144
Ryan 1997: 22-27.
145
Geary, in Killingray 1988: 34-35.
146
See Behrend 1999.
147
148
Monti 1987: 131.
149
Ryan 1997: 30.
150
Schildkrout 1985: 70.
151
Ryan 1997: 99.
152
Hartmann 1998: 153.

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