The Selected Papers of Charles Willson Peale and His Family
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Volume 5: The Autobiography of Charles Willson Peale
Charles Willson Peale; Edited by Lillian Miller, Sidney Hart, David C. Ward, Lauren E. Brown, Sara C. Hale, and Leslie K. Reinhardt
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Format: ClothPrice: $115.00
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This autobiography, written by Peale when he was in his eighties, spans American history from the 1740s to the 1820s, an era in which Peale was a primary actor in many of the young nation’s significant cultural and political events.
Peale begins by describing his difficult early years as an apprentice to a saddlemaker, and he then tells how he became an artist, one who eventually painted more than one thousand portraits of the generation that won American independence and established the Republic. He writes of his service in the Philadelphia militia during the American Revolution and of his fighting at the Battle of Princeton. He explains his involvement in Philadelphia’s radical republican politics and the difficulties this caused his family. He discusses his involvement in the founding of such cultural institutions as the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and his museum of natural history and art, the latter an institution he hoped would be his legacy. He recounts his experiences as a farmer and agrarian reformer and as an inventor (of fireplaces, a vapor bath, and the first American bridge design). Finally he includes a great deal of material on his wives and children, providing a matchless account of an American family in the early Republic.
Peale begins by describing his difficult early years as an apprentice to a saddlemaker, and he then tells how he became an artist, one who eventually painted more than one thousand portraits of the generation that won American independence and established the Republic. He writes of his service in the Philadelphia militia during the American Revolution and of his fighting at the Battle of Princeton. He explains his involvement in Philadelphia’s radical republican politics and the difficulties this caused his family. He discusses his involvement in the founding of such cultural institutions as the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and his museum of natural history and art, the latter an institution he hoped would be his legacy. He recounts his experiences as a farmer and agrarian reformer and as an inventor (of fireplaces, a vapor bath, and the first American bridge design). Finally he includes a great deal of material on his wives and children, providing a matchless account of an American family in the early Republic.
Published for the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
Sidney Hart is editor and David C. Ward is senior associate editor of the Peale Family Papers, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution. The late Lillian B. Miller was editor of the Papers.
ISBN: 9780300075472
Publication Date: February 9, 2000
Publishing Partner: Published for the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
Publication Date: February 9, 2000
Publishing Partner: Published for the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
560 pages, 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
83 b/w + 13 color illus.
83 b/w + 13 color illus.
