Adolph Francis Alphonse Bandelier, 1840-1914, ethnologist, born in Bern. Arrived in the US in 1848 and went with his father to the Swiss-founded town of Highland, Illinois. He returned to Switzerland in 1855 and studied geology in Bern, but then went back to Highland to work in his father's bank. From 1877 he participated in numerous geological and ethnographical expeditions in the southern US, Central and South America, where he studied the culture of the Pueblo Indians. He also wrote about the history of Mexico, Peru and Bolivia. He died in Seville, where he had been sent by the Carnegie Institute in Washington to study descriptions of Indian tribes held in the Spanish archives. The Bandelier National Monument in New Mexico, an important archaeological site, was named for him.

Albert Samuel Gatschet, 1832-1907, linguist and ethnologist, born in Beatenberg, Canton Bern. Immigrated to the US in 1868 and settled in New York. He pioneered the study of native American languages. His work as ethnologist of the US geological survey enabled him to make extensive trips to gather information about different native American peoples. His important work on the Klamath Indians of Southwestern Oregon, first published in 1890, was last reprinted as recently as 1990.