Filmmaker Beth Harrington’s serendipitous encounter with the photographs of Frank Matsura at the Washington State History Museum in 2002 ignited a nearly two-decade quest to understand the artist’s unique vision. Among a collection featuring his contemporaries, Matsura’s work, described by Harrington as possessing a “completely different character,” immediately captivated her. His black-and-white images, imbued with a palpable charisma and a profound connection to his subjects, offer a vibrant window into the diverse communities of Okanogan County, Washington, between 1903 and 1913. As a Japanese immigrant, Matsura not only documented the lives of white settlers and Indigenous peoples of the Colville Reservation but often posed playfully alongside them, a testament to the deep rapport he cultivated.

Matsura’s life, tragically cut short by tuberculosis at the age of 39, remains largely undocumented beyond the thousands of images he left behind. Yet, over a century later, the communities he so vividly portrayed continue to remember him with warmth and affection. Harrington, who moved to the Pacific Northwest from Boston in the early 2000s, finally brought Matsura’s enigmatic legacy to the screen in her 2025 feature-length documentary, Our Mr. Matsura. The title itself reflects the intimate, almost personal, way Matsura is perceived; as Harrington explains, "Everyone thinks they have a little window into who he is. And there’s a collective sense of who he is because of those little impressions."

The film’s resonance was powerfully demonstrated last September when approximately 300 people gathered at the restored Omak Theater for a screening. Douglas Woodrow, a lifelong resident of Okanogan, shared how Matsura’s photographs were a familiar sight in his childhood, frequently featured in the local newspaper. As a young boy in the late 1950s, Woodrow would bike to the very locations depicted in these historical images, marveling at the changes over time and imagining the grandeur of the now-vanished Bureau Hotel, a once-elegant landmark in the developing town.

Woodrow’s reconnection with Matsura’s work intensified when, as a volunteer for the Okanogan County Historical Society, he discovered a "literal shoebox" filled with unprocessed photographs. These images, when sequenced, revealed the 1910 construction of the Conconully Dam, an early project by the Bureau of Reclamation. This discovery fueled Woodrow’s passion, leading him to present the dam’s construction to community groups, marking his first foray into preserving Matsura’s legacy. His dedication extended to a journey to Tokyo, Matsura’s birthplace, accompanied by Japanese photographer Tetsuo Kurihara, whom he had met during Kurihara’s research trip to Okanogan. Back home, Woodrow has been instrumental in establishing an interpretive site near Matsura’s former studio and spearheading a walking tour featuring mural-sized reproductions of his photographs.

Woodrow observes that Matsura possessed an "extraordinary" social mobility, a rare feat for immigrants of his era, particularly one of Japanese descent in early 20th-century America. Matsura’s ability to photograph "everyone in town," transcending social strata, allowed him to be "included in just about everything that happened in town." His lens captured tribal members, burgeoning white businessmen, miners, and saloon patrons alike, creating an unparalleled visual archive of a dynamic frontier society.

Randy Lewis, a Wenatchi (P’Squosa) elder and member of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, is among the many descendants of Matsura’s subjects featured in Our Mr. Matsura. Lewis has actively participated in community screenings of the film, including a memorable "barn screening" in Winthrop, Washington, followed by a traditional salmon bake. His family’s story, as depicted in Matsura’s work, highlights the enduring connection between the past and the present.

The film prominently features a photograph of Lewis’s great-uncle, Sam George, with his family in a buckboard wagon, which Lewis humorously likens to "the F-250 of the time." This photograph hung in George’s home during his final years, serving as a poignant reminder of his heritage. Lewis recounts how his great-uncle would gaze at the picture, using it as a mental anchor to recall the names and birthdays of everyone in the wagon, keeping his memories vibrant even as he approached his 108th birthday.

Sam George’s life spanned a period of immense transformation in the region. Born in 1860, his birth predated the establishment of the Colville Indian Reservation in 1872. During his long life, he witnessed its contraction, the era of land allotment, and the influx of prospectors and homesteaders. His family, like many Indigenous families, continued traditional seasonal fishing practices, maintaining a vital platform at Celilo Falls until its inundation by The Dalles Dam in 1957, which submerged one of the continent’s most productive fishing grounds. Matsura’s arrival coincided with this cultural flux, capturing a period when both Native and settler cultures were evolving. As Lewis notes, Matsura documented "life going on," rather than focusing solely on the tragic narratives often associated with Indigenous history.

Our Mr. Matsura is as much a portrait of Okanogan County as it is of the photographer himself. Harrington skillfully portrays the isolated and rugged beauty of the landscape, a setting that has remained remarkably similar to the region Matsura first encountered. Jean Berney, a seasoned rancher and farmer residing near Conconully, describes her home as "off the beaten track for a lot of people." Berney, an enrolled member of the Colville Confederated Tribes, married into a non-Native cattle-ranching family and developed her own successful herd, earning national recognition as a conservation-minded rancher and dedicated supporter of the 4-H program.

Her land, incidentally, was once the site of The Conconully Naturpathy Institute, colloquially known as Casselmann’s Sanitarium, established in 1906 by German immigrant Dr. Casselmann to treat tuberculosis patients. The dry climate of the region is believed by many to have drawn Matsura to Okanogan, and some speculate he may have been a patient at the sanitarium. Berney often contemplates Matsura’s experiences traversing this stark terrain: "Did he ever talk to Dr. Casselmann about his condition? How long was he sick? We wonder about Frank and everything that happened a long time ago, and we can’t ask."

Harrington’s documentary joins a growing body of work dedicated to understanding Matsura, including the tireless efforts of volunteers at the Okanogan County Historical Society and the scholarly contributions of Michael Holloman, a tenured art professor at Washington State University. Holloman, an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation, co-curated a significant exhibition of Matsura’s work at Spokane’s Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture in 2023 and published the book, Frank S. Matsura: Iconoclast Photographer of the American West, in 2025. Holloman emphasizes the enduring relevance of Matsura’s approach, stating, "We need people to be like Frank right now, to engage multiple communities and be able to find life, vibrancy, in a world that is in transformation and change."

The intended wide release of Our Mr. Matsura on PBS’s The American Experience was unfortunately curtailed by federal funding cuts to the long-running series. Despite this setback, Harrington remains optimistic that the film will find its audience through film festivals, streaming platforms, and continued special screenings, much like the impactful event in Omak. She acknowledges that the path forward will be more challenging, reflecting on the inherent value of such stories: "There’s a lot of worthy things that we can’t put a dollar value to. These stories… we’re poorer for them when we don’t have them."

The filmmaker was deeply moved by the gratitude expressed in Omak, with attendees thanking her for "mirroring" the trust Matsura had cultivated with his subjects over a century prior. Harrington, however, was quick to share the compliment, asserting that the film’s narrative extends beyond Matsura’s charisma and his remarkable photographic output. "It’s about the way people uphold his memory and still talk about him 112 years after his death," she concluded, underscoring the profound and lasting impact of an immigrant photographer on a frontier community.