George Caleb Bingham - New Franklin, MO - Missouri Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

County of memorial: Howard County
Location of memorial: MO-5 & Katy Trail, S. limits of New Franklin
Artist: Harry Weber
Dedicated: 31 August 2013
Granite Etchings artist: Kevin Hale
Engineer: Crockett Engineering
Contractor: Bill Sullivan Excavations

Memorial Text:

George Caleb Bingham
March 20, 1811 to July 7, 1879 George Caleb Bingham was born March 20, 1811, in Augusta County, Virginia, to Henry and Mary Amend Bingham. Henry moved the family to Franklin in 1819. There they farmed, processed tobacco and ran a hotel. Bingham's interest in painting started when he helped hotel guest and famed artist Chester Harding paint Daniel Boone's portrait. Henry died of malaria in 1821. Mary sold the hotel and opened a girls' school on the family farm. The school's art teacher, Mattie Wood, gave Bingham art lessons. At 16 he apprenticed as a cabinetmaker, studied religion and law, and painted portraits. He was earning a living as an artist by 1836, when he married Sarah Elizabeth Hutchison. They had four children. Bingham painted portraits of President George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and John Quincy Adams, and famous Missourians James S. Rollins, Frederick Moss Prewitt, and Joseph Kinney. He painted hundreds of portraits over a span of 50 years. In 1845, Bingham began painting scenes of everyday American life such as "The Jolly Flatboatman," landscapes such as "The Old Horse," and political themes such as "The County Election." Bingham's wife and a son died tragically in 1848. He married Eliza Thomas, and they had a son. Bingham's public service included state legislature in 1848, state treasurer and captain in the U.S. Volunteer Corps during the Civil War, and Adjutant General in 1875. After second wife Eliza died in 1876, Bingham married longtime family friend Martha Livingston Lykins. Bingham's artistic genius led to him becoming the first art professor at the University of Missouri in 1877 and, later, earned him recognition at the most famous illustrator of American frontier life. He is buried in Kansas City's Union Cemetery.

Web link: [Web Link] History of Mark: "George Caleb Bingham (March 20, 1811 – July 7, 1879) was an American artist whose paintings of American life in the frontier lands along the Missouri River exemplify the Luminist style. Left to languish in obscurity, Bingham's work was rediscovered in the 1930s. By the time of his bicentennial in 2011, he was considered one of the greatest American painters of the 19th century. That year the George Caleb Bingham Catalogue Raisonné Supplement Of Paintings & Drawings—directed and edited by Bingham scholar Fred R. Kline—announced the authentication of ten recently discovered paintings by Bingham. As of June 2015, a total of twenty-three (23) newly discovered paintings by Bingham have been authenticated and are listed with the GCBCRS" ~ Wikipedia Additional point: Not Listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   05/08/2021 freezer54 visited it