Name |
Charles Malcolm Fraser |
Suffix |
^ |
Birth |
19 Apr 1868 |
Montreal, Quebec, Canada [1] |
- He used the name Malcolm Fraser as an adult.
|
Gender |
Male |
Baptism |
2 Sep 1868 |
Montreal (Montreal East Methodist Church), Quebec, Canada [1] |
Immigration |
1878 |
the United States [2, 3] |
- [1900 census indicates 1886, which wouold be inconsistent with his attending New York City grammer school and graduating in 1884.]
|
Education |
Jun 1884 |
New York, New York, NY [1] |
at Grammer School 35, graduating |
- He then entered the College of the City of New York which he attended for two years. Thereafter, he enrolled at the Art Students League. He studied under Carroll Beckwith and with Gotham Art Students under Walter Shirlaw. In 1888 he sailed for Paris to complete his education at the Sorbonne, and with study at the Académie Julien under Boulanger, Lefèbvre and Benjamin Constant, and at the Beaux Arts with Leon Jerome.
|
Occupation |
Aft 1886 [1] |
artist and illustrator |
He first came to public attention as an artist when at the age of eighteen he exhibited with the Black and White Club at the Salmagundi Club galleries in New York. The following year he exhibited at the Society of American Artists’ exhibition. He had thus begun his career with substantial work when he set out for Paris to continue his art studies. Following are some of the milestones in the course of his subsequent distinguished career as artist and illustrator. In 1892 he painted two six-foot windows for St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in the Rue Notre Dame in Paris. In 1895 he graduated from the Sorbonne in Paris, and in the same year was awarded the title of Professor of Fine Arts by the City of Paris. Also in that year, he was sent by the London "Times" to Egypt to make drawings for an archeological expedition to that country. He also made drawings for the Boulak Museum in Cairo, and was associated with Sir Flinders Petri. Also in 1895, Mr. Fraser received a degree from the famed University of Heidelberg in Germany. Although just past his twenty-sixth birthday, he had the honor, on his return to England, of make drawings at the home of Alfred Lord Tennyson, with the poet and his place of residence as subjects. He was associated with many of the famous personages of his period: Whistler, Monet, Corot, Sargent, the Innesses (father and son), Charcot, Petri, Rodin; Sir Henry Irving, Ellen Terry, Sarah Bernhardt and G. B. Shaw; Helen Keller and Ignace Jan Paderewski. Portraits executed by Mr. Fraser at this time included two of Queen Wilhelmina of Holland and others of the Barons Rothschild, a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, and other prominent figures. He also executed murals for many private homes. In 1897, after returning to this country, Mr. Fraser became a member of the Salmagundi Club in New York, and began his career as an illustrator which during succeeding years made his name well known among readers of such magazines as the Ladies’ Home Journal, Leslie’s, St. Nicholas, Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Century and other foremost periodicals of the time. He illustrated a number of fiction works in both the short-story and novel forms. Among these were "Black Beauty," F. Hopkinson Smith’s "Caleb West," and Winston Churchill’s "Richard Carvel," as well as the stories of Bret Harte. In 1908 he exhibited a series of seventeen symbolic paintings at Clausen’s Galleries in New York; and between 1910 and 1914 made a complete series of biblical illustrations for Sunday schools for the Providence Lithograph Company of Providence, Rhode Island. In 1917 he exhibited sixteen symbolic paintings at the Boss Art Gallery in New York, and the same year donated three large paintings, with poster rights, to the National Red Cross in Washington, D.C.
|
Census |
1900 |
New York, New York, NY [3] |
Residence |
1900 |
New York, New York, NY [3] |
210-14 West 4th St. (Greenwich Village) |
Elected |
6 Jul 1907 |
Brookhaven, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY [4] |
as the first elected president of the Brookhaven Improvement Association |
- This was the first election of officers for what was to become the modern Brookhaven Village Association. The first meetings of the BVA occurred a year earlier in 1906.
|
Military |
1917 |
WWI [1, 5, 6] |
- He volunteered for service and joined the French regiment known as the "Blue Devils." He later served as captain on the front lines, as zone commander with the American Red Cross, American Expeditionary Forces. He received the Congressional Medal, the Jerusalem Cross, Cross of Malta and Verdun Medal.
|
Census |
1920 |
Brookhaven, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY [7] |
- Also living in the household in 1920 was a boarder, William M. Hodges, age 73.
|
Occupation |
Aft 1919 [1] |
artist, illustrator, and teacher |
He resumed his career in America as painter, teacher and lecturer on art. At various times he was identified with the advertising departments of the Vacuum Oil Company, the Standard Oil Company, and the staffs of the magazines noted above. He produced work for the Providence Lithograph Company. In his earlier career, he had also contracted with Bellevue Hospital to execute a series of surgical drawings. Malcolm Fraser was voted an honorary member of the International Mark Twain Society for his contribution to American Art; and he was also an honorary member of the Orlando Art Association. He has been included in "Who’s Who in America" since 1901. Two of his distinctive contributions to the world of art in recent years were his donation of a large memorial altar piece to St. Luke’s Episcopal Cathedral in Orlando in 1945; and his donation of fifty-six symbolic paintings to the City of Ormond Beach, Florida, in 1946. The Miami "News" of November 30, 1947 states that "This $200,000 Art Gallery is the first war memorial to be completed in Florida." This series of paintings, the central theme of which is: "Spirit is life’s only significant reality," was presented by the artist as a war memorial to those who served in World Wars I and II. The citizens of Ormond erected a building to house this gift, and it was known as the Ormond War Memorial Art Gallery. Himself a veteran, Mr. Fraser had been wounded five times at the front from explosions, trench knife, shrapnel and gas. As evidence of his own extensive military record, he was awarded the following decorations: The Verdun Medal, Legion of Honor, Croix de Guerre, Cross of Malta, Jerusalem Cross, Silver Star of Belgium, The Cross of Joan of Arc, and the ribbon of the French Hospital Service with three stars. He was a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Alsace Lorraine Society. He provided the painted alter window for the St. James Episcopal Church in Brookhaven Hamlet. He also provided two other windows which no longer exist. Among his many students was the "magic realism" artist George Claire Tooker (see), whom he taught while a child.
|
Census |
1930 |
Brookhaven, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY [8] |
Misc |
demonstrated great interest and amazing skill in a variety of crafts and outdoor sports. [1, 9] |
- He was a member of the Bellport Yacht Club and served as a judge. He also frequented the golf course then owned by the yacht club.
|
Possessions |
1930 [5] |
a home valued at $10,000 |
Religion |
Episcopalian [1] |
Death |
12 Jun 1949 |
Brookhaven, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY [1, 10] |
His Obituary appeared in the New York Times 13 Jun 1949:
MALCOLM FRASER, AN ILLUSTRATOR, 80
Canadian-Born Artist, Donor of 56 Paintings to Ormond, Fla., as War Memorial, Dies
BROOKHAVEN, L.I., June 12 -- Malcolm Fraser, Canadian-born illustrator and artist, whose drawings appeared in leading American magazines at the turn of the century, died this afternoon in his home here after a brief illness. He was 80 years old.
Mr. Fraser first achieved prominence as an illustrator for The Century Magazine, St. Nicholas Magazine and the Ladies Home Journal. He did the black and white drawings for "Richard Carvel," "Caleb West" and several of the Bret Harte stories.
He considered his outstanding art work the series of fifty-six symbolic paintings that he donated as a war memorial to the City of Ormond, Fla., where he had a winter home. People of the city erected a special art gallery for the paintings and opened it in 1946 as the Ormond War Memorial Art Gallery.
Mr. Fraser also had a distinguished war career. In the early days of the first World War he served with the Blue Devils in the French Army. Later he was captain in the American Red Cross with the A.E.F. He received the United States Life-Saving Medal, and decorations from the French and Belgian governments.
Born in Montreal on April 19, 1869, he was the son of the late William Lewis and Sarah Hannah Fraser. Mr. Fraser studied at the Art Students League in New York, the Sorbonne and Académie Julian in Paris and received a degree from Heidelberg University.
Among his better-known works are mural decorations, symbolic portraits and an altar piece of "Madonna and Child," which is in St. Luke's Cathedral in Ormond. His portrait of the Right Rev. John D. Wing, Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Southern Florida, is in the same church.
Mr. Fraser was a member of the Veterans of foreign Wars, the Salmagundi Club and the Suffolk County chapter of the American Red Cross.
His first wife, the former Katharine Church, whom he married in 1897, died in 1930. In 1933 he married Mary Austin Aldrich, the sculptor, who survives. He leaves also a daughter, Mrs. Phyllis Fraser Champlain, of his first marriage; four grandchildren, and a great-grandson, who bears his name.
|
Person ID |
I5781 |
Brookhaven & South Haven Hamlets |
Last Modified |
28 Nov 2008 |