These life-sized wooden figures, popular from 1840–1890, stood at tobacco shop doorways. Some were attached or chained to the store front; others, such as this figure, were placed on wooden platforms that could be wheeled inside and out. The Native American figure alluded to the fact that the these cultures introduced Europeans to tobacco during the 1600s. This wooden sculpture, originally carved in Montana from a solid block of white pine, is a representation of the Sioux chief, Skookum. It graced the entrance of the C. H. Manley Tobacco Company in Tacoma for over 65 years. Then in the 1950s, it was relocated to the Sterling Tobacco Company on East Pine Street in Seattle.

The appropriation of Native culture in order to market products or events was one common example of discrimination and marginalization faced by Native peoples in the United States.