Charles S. Graham

Yosemite Valley
c. 1877
Oil on Canvas Board
7 ½ x 12

Charles Graham (1852–1911)

Charles Graham was an American painter and illustrator whose work was featured in
nearly every issue of Harper’s Weekly published from 1880 to 1893. During this period he was one of the most well-known artists in the United States. Born in Rock Island, Illinois he worked as a topographer for the Northern Pacific Railroad in Idaho and Montana before being hired as a scenic artist for a theater in Chicago during the mid-1870s. The quality of his work led to engagements at multiple theaters in New York City. Around 1877, he joined Harper & Brothers and became an illustrator for Harper’s Weekly, touring and illustrating the American West. He toured the Southern United States in 1886, illustrating a series of articles for Harper’s on the New South. In 1892, he became a freelancer, though he continued to contribute to Harper’s, along with The Century Magazine, Collier’s and the New York Herald. He was bestowed with the honor of being “the official artist” of the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, underscoring his position as one of the nation’s most widely recognized artists. He continued thereafter to work on a freelance basis based in New York City, where he died
in 1911.

You may also like

Richard Kidwell Miller Robert Emmet Owen Hazel R. Owens William H. Partridge  Howard Ashman Patterson N. L. Percy