Description: This photograph is a black-and-white image of a colorful mural titled "Pioneers Crossing the Ohio River," painted in 1941 by artist Michael Loew (1907-1985). The mural depicts a group of pioneers, a covered wagon, and an ox crowded together on a raft. Behind them is a body of water with hills in the background. From the rear, several men are using long poles to propel the raft forward, while in the front a young man is pulling on a rope with all of his strength to move the raft forward. Several women, one of whom is holding an infant, are grouped in the center next to the wagon, ox, a plow, and yoke. The mural, painted in oil on canvas, is located in the former post office building in Amherst, Ohio. It measures 4-1/8 feet high by 14 feet long. The mural was funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture, one of the department’s three visual arts programs instituted during the Great Depression. Established in 1934, the Section of Painting and Sculpture commissioned artists to create paintings and sculpture that would decorate new federal buildings. The commissions were awarded competitively. Unlike other cultural programs of the New Deal, the Section’s primary goal was to procure art for public buildings, not to provide work relief. Born in New York City, artist Michael Loew was an abstract expressionist whose early works were representational, including the murals he painted for the Treasury Department’s Section of Painting and Sculpture. He studied at the Art Students League from 1926-1929 and worked as a stained-glass artist. He studied art in Paris from 1929-1930. In 1939 he had painted murals for the New York World’s Fair with his close friend and fellow artist, Willem de Kooning. By this time his style was shifting toward abstract expressionism. After serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Loew studied at the Hans Hofmann School of Fine Art from 1947-1949 and at the Atelier Fernand Leger from 1949-1950. Between 1956 and 1966, he taught painting at the Portland (Oregon) Art Museum, University of California at Berkeley, and at the School of Visual Arts in New York. In 1988 photographer Connie Girard took color and black-and-white images of this mural for an article in "Timeline" magazine (June/July 1989). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04494
Subjects: Mural paintings (visual works); Post office buildings--Ohio; United States. Works Progress Administration; United States. Department of the Treasury. Section of Painting and Sculpture; Loew, Michael, 1907-1985; Great Depression and the New Deal
Places: Amherst (Ohio); Lorain County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photograph is a black-and-white image of a colorful mural titled "Mail—The Connecting Link’," painted in 1938 by artist Sally F. Haley (1908-2007). The mural depicts the significant role that mail (and the postal service) plays in the life of individuals and of the entire nation. Three human figures (a mail carrier, a woman, and a little girl) occupy the center of the image, forming a triangular space that divides the background between urban and rural settings. The mail carrier is delivering a letter to the woman as the little girl watches. Bags of mail travel to distant locations via trains (rural areas and small towns) and boats (large urban areas). On the left side the mural, a railroad signal bears the number “1938,” the year that Haley painted the mural. The mural, painted in oil on canvas, is located in the McConnelsville, Ohio, post office. It measures 5 feet high by 17 feet wide. The mural was funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture, one of the department’s three visual arts programs instituted during the Great Depression. Established in 1934, the Section of Painting and Sculpture commissioned artists to create paintings and sculpture that would decorate new federal buildings. The commissions were awarded competitively. Unlike other cultural programs of the New Deal, the Section’s primary goal was to procure art for public buildings, not to provide work relief. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Sally Haley was the daughter of Elizabeth Akers Haley and John P. Haley, a portrait photographer. John Haley was a friend of photographers Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Steichen. Two of Sally’s brothers also became artists. In 1931, Sally Haley graduated from Yale University with a bachelor of fine arts degree. She taught art in a Bridgeport high school for two years, studied art in Germany for a few months, and then returned to the U.S. to paint full time. In 1935 she married artist Michele Russo, and the couple lived in Connecticut until 1947, when they moved to Portland, Oregon. Haley was very active in the Portland art scene, and her paintings were widely praised. She died in 2007 at age 99. In 1988 photographer Connie Girard took color and black-and-white images of this mural for an article in "Timeline" magazine (June/July 1989). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04495
Subjects: Mural paintings (visual works); Post office buildings--Ohio; United States. Department of the Treasury. Section of Painting and Sculpture; Great Depression and the New Deal; McConnelsville (Ohio)
Places: McConnelsville (Ohio); Morgan County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photograph is a black-and-white image of a colorful mural titled "Drift toward Industrialism,” painted in 1937 by artist Karl Anderson (1874-1956). The mural, also known as “Exodus to the Cities,” is located in the former post office building in Bedford, Ohio. The building now houses the offices of Doty & Miller Architects, 600 Broadway Avenue. As seen in the photograph, the mural surrounds an office door. The mural portrays the widespread migration of workers, families, and young people from small towns and rural areas to large industrial cities during the late 19th century. In the lower left corner, a bearded farmer stands behind a horse-drawn plow and raises his right arm in farewell to the stream of people headed toward a cityscape visible in the background. A young girl clutches her mother’s arm and looks back at the place she is leaving and to which she’ll probably never return. An older mother embraces her daughter while an elderly man dressed in a Civil War uniform sits morosely on the sidelines. Karl Anderson was born Carl James Anderson in Morning Sun, Ohio. His parents, Irwin M. and Emma Anderson, and their family of seven children lived in various communities in the state but eventually settled in Clyde (Sandusky County). Karl’s younger brother Sherwood, the noted American author, based his famous short-story collection "Winesburg, Ohio" on his memories of life in Clyde. Karl Anderson became a noted painter, illustrator, and engraver. The mural was funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture, one of the department’s three visual arts programs instituted during the Great Depression. Established in 1934, the Section of Painting and Sculpture commissioned artists to create paintings and sculpture that would decorate new federal buildings. The commissions were awarded competitively. Unlike other cultural programs of the New Deal, the Section’s primary goal was to procure art for public buildings, not to provide work relief. The post office in West Haven, Connecticut, features the second of two murals that Karl Anderson created for the program. Anderson died in 1956 in Westport, Connecticut, where he had lived since 1912. Nicknamed “the Dean of Westport Painters,” he was part of the thriving arts community there. In 1988 photographer Connie Girard took color and black-and-white images of this mural for an article in "Timeline" magazine (June/July 1989). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04496
Subjects: Anderson, Karl, 1874-1956; Mural paintings (visual works); Post office buildings--Ohio; United States. Department of the Treasury. Section of Painting and Sculpture; Great Depression and the New Deal; Cuyahoga County (Ohio)
Places: Bedford (Ohio); Cuyahoga County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photograph is a black-and-white image of a colorful mural titled "New London Facts,” completed in 1941 by artist Lloyd R. Ney (1893-1965). The oil-on-canvas mural, which measures 5 feet high by 14 feet wide, is located in the New London, Ohio, post office. The mural was funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture (the "Section"), one of the department’s three visual arts programs instituted during the Great Depression. Established in 1934, the Section commissioned artists to create paintings and sculpture that would decorate new federal buildings. The commissions were awarded competitively. Unlike other cultural programs of the New Deal, the Section’s primary goal was to procure art for public buildings, not to provide work relief. Ney went to New London to learn as much as possible about the town, its history, and residents. Although Ney favored Modernism, he decided to forego a purely nonobjective design in favor of one that incorporated recognizable places, people, and objects as well as abstractions. A boldly outlined center triangle divides the mural into three sections. The individual sections and the overall mural functions as a montage of images. The triangle’s design, which includes an eye, is reminiscent of the Great Seal of the United State. Painter and sculptor Lloyd Raymond (“Bill”) Ney) was born in Friedensburg, Pennsylvania, the only child of Sadie Maidenford and William Ney. As a young child he showed a passion for art but had no formal training until he left high school in 1913 to study in Philadelphia and later in Europe at the end of World War I. While studying abroad, he became acquainted with influential Modernist painters, and his style became progressively more abstract throughout the rest of his life. He left Paris in 1925 and moved to New Hope, Pennsylvania, where he joined a thriving community of modernist artists. In 1939, Ney was awarded a commission from the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture (the “Section”) to paint a mural for the New London, Ohio, post office. When upper-level Section officials saw Ney’s preliminary sketches for the mural, they were upset by what they termed his “abstract” style and quickly rejected his design. Ney fought hard for his concept and enlisted the help of the New London community, whose outpouring of support convinced the Section to approve Ney’s design in 1940. The mural was completed and installed in the New London post office in 1941. Lloyd Ney died in New Hope, Pennsylvania, in 1965. In 1988 photographer Connie Girard took color and black-and-white images of this mural for an article in "Timeline" magazine (June/July 1989). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04497
Subjects: Ney, Lloyd Raymond, 1893-1965; New London (Ohio); Mural paintings (visual works); Post office buildings--Ohio; United States. Department of the Treasury. Section of Painting and Sculpture; Great Depression and the New Deal
Places: New London (Ohio); Huron County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photograph is a black-and-white image of a colorful mural titled "Romance of Steel, Old,” created in 1938 by artist Glenn Moore Shaw (1891-1981). The oil-on-canvas mural, which measures 7 feet high by 16-1/8 fee feet wide, is located in the Warren, Ohio, post office. This painting is paired with a second mural, “Romance of Steel, Modern,” which hangs directly below the first. Together the murals convey both the progression of steel manufacturing technology and the hard physical labor that produced the valuable alloy. Shaw depicts a group of eight steelworkers engaged in various tasks: grasping red-hot metal with long-handled tongs, using shovels to keep the furnace burning at the right temperature, and controlling the furnace door. The mural was funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Section of Painting and Sculpture (the “Section”), one of the department’s three visual arts programs instituted during the Great Depression. Established in 1934, the Section commissioned artists to create paintings and sculpture that would decorate new federal buildings. The commissions were awarded competitively. Unlike other cultural programs of the New Deal, the Section’s primary goal was to procure art for public buildings, not to provide work relief. Glenn Moore Shaw was born in Olmstead Falls, Ohio. After graduating high school he attended the Cleveland School of Art (now the Cleveland Institute of Art). He married fellow art student Elsa Vick in 1917 and joined the faculty of his alma mater in 1922. He was head of the school’s mural department from 1937 to 1957, when he retired. During his career he painted more than 60 murals. He and Mrs. Shaw moved to Arizona in 1968. He died in Sun City in 1981. In 1988 photographer Connie Girard took color and black-and-white images of this mural for an article in "Timeline" magazine (June/July 1989). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04498
Subjects: Mural paintings (visual works); Post office buildings--Ohio; United States. Department of the Treasury. Section of Painting and Sculpture; Great Depression and the New Deal; Warren (Ohio)
Places: Warren (Ohio); Trumbull County (Ohio)