by Phillip G. Goff, GGFA Director of Genetic Genealogy
A November 2, 2021 GGFA Facebook post featured a studio portrait of a Native American woman and child ca. 1880-1900 from the Bud Lake and Randy Brewer Crow Indian Photograph Collection, Montana Historical Society. The photographer was “O.S. Goff, Fort Custer, Mont.” Googling his name produces a large number of the late 19th century photographs of the Old West, including the first solo portrait of Sitting Bull and the last known photograph of George Armstrong Custer before the Battle of Little Bighorn. Who was O.S. Goff?
Phillip Goff is the co-author, along with Roy L. Lockhart, of The Four Goff Brothers of Western Virginia. Since 2004, he has run the Goff/Gough Surname DNA Study, which today has about 400 participants.