Frank Schoonover - part 2

Frank Earle Schoonover (1877-1972) was enamoured with Howard Pyle’s magazine work from the time he was a young boy in Trenton, New Jersey. After youthful endeavours copying Pyle’s illustrations, Schoonover joined his class at Drexel Institute in 1896. The young artist’s promising talent was duly noted by his teacher and he was offered scholarships to Pyle’s summer school in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. Schoonover was well known for his illustrations of outdoor adventure stories, especially of the Canadian and American West. He maintained a studio in Wilmington throughout his career and, with Stanley Arthurs, was a founder in 1912 of the Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts, the predecessor of the Delaware Art Museum. The Frank E. Schoonover Manuscript Collection contains photographs, correspondence, clippings, organisational records, diaries, and day books that document the work he executed. Delaware Art Museum

For a more in-depth biography, and for earlier works by Schoonover, see part 1 also. 

This is part 2 of 7-part series on the works of Frank Schoonover.

1903 The Blood Lilies by W.A. Fraser, published by Charles Scribner’s Sons:

They struggled and panted...in the swirling storm
oil on canvas en grisaille 55.9 x 35.5 cm

To Descoigne, lying in his shack, came Felix Benoit
oil on canvas, en grisaille 55.9 x 35.5 cm

Her wail was like that of a she-wolf
oil on canvas 55.9 x 35.5 cm

The Indian and the Scot gave lead to the hounds.
oil in canvas, en grisaille 55.9 x 36.1 cm

 (Caption not found)
oil on board, en grisaille 56.5 x 36 cm
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1904 Skin hanging from Rack
oil crayon on illustration board 26.6 x 17.7 cm
Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge, MA

1904 The Deliverance

A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields

published by Doubleday Page & Co., New York:

1904 ‘Read yourself – this once,’ he pleaded, ‘and let me listen.’
oil on illustration board 60.9 x 40.6 cm

In a massive Elizabethan chair of blackened oak a stately old lady was sitting straight and stiff
oil on canvas 55.9 x 35.5 cm

…waited for the oxen to reach the summit of the hill
oil on canvas 45.7 x 30.4 cm

…stood, bareheaded, gazing over the broad field.
oil on canvas (size not given)

The Inheritance
ink on illustration board 17.7 x 19 cm

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1905 "Hopalong Takes Command"
The Fight at Buckskin, by Clarence Edward Mulford
Outing Magazine, December 1905
50.8 x 76.2 cm

1905 “The Edge of the Wilderness.”
Scribner’s Magazine, April 1905
A bit of domestic life
oil crayon on paper 29.2 x 40.6 cm

1905 “The Edge of the Wilderness.”
Scribner’s Magazine. April 1905
oil crayon on paper 43.8 x 28.5 cm

1905 “The Woman and the Poet.”
Scribner’s Magazine, September 1905
The tragic hills looked down, watchful, impassive
oil on canvas en grisaille 71.1 x 43.1 cm

1905 Breakfast Cocoa, Walter Backer & Co.
oil on canvas 61 x 53.3 cm

1905 Only Jules Verbeaux
oil on canvas 72.3 x 48.2 cm

1905 Scribner’s Magazine. Poster for the July 1903 issue
" Came rushing with a huge noise through the wood."
oil on canvas en grisaille 60.9 x 45.7 cm

1905-12 Man exiting shelter, four men gathered around him
Half-tone plate engraved by H. Davidson
Century magazine

1906 "Skinny dragged him over to a crack and settled down for another try"
Bar-20 Yarns, The Outing Magazine
oil on canvas 76.2 x 50.8 cm

1906 After the Fight
oil on canvas 76.8 x 51.4 cm

1906 Got here on time
oil on canvas 91.4 x 61 cm

1906 The Bridge Across the Night by Katherine Holland
Scribner’s Magazine May 1906
oil 76.2 x 50.8 cm

1906 Two Trout
pastel on paper 20.3 x 27.9 cm

1906 Wa Gush
oil 91.4 x 121.9 cm

c1906 "Hasse Spears a Mullet"
gouache on board 20.3 x 13.3 cm
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Chadds Ford PA

1906 The Outing Magazine (April-September):

"After the break-up of the ice on the Porcupine he paddled down that stream to where if effected its junction with the Yukon."

"Hopalong blew another smoke ring. He was waiting for the gun to waver."

"In the full glare of the afternoon light, crouching in the entrance to the cave, the cubs saw the lynx mother."

"They can come and get me now."

One of Three by Lawrence Mott
"He got Lawsen on his powerful back with the cut leg stuck forward through the crook of his arm, and he started."

The Law of the Range
"Skinny dragged him over to a crack and settled down for another try."

1906 White Fang novel by Jack London:

1906 "White Fang's free nature flashed forth again, and he sank his teeth into the moccasined foot"
oil on canvas 89.9 x 49.8 cm
Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge MA

Preparatory sketch for the above illustration
ink on paper  9.5 x 7 cm

1906 Frontispiece "Circle of Fire"
 "They can come and get me now'"
oil on canvas 91.4 x 60.9 cm
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1907 Scribner's for February
poster
The New York Public Library Digital Collections

1907 Don Ramon in Bed - from The Eve of St. John by Thomas A. Janvier
Harpers Magazine July 1907

1907 "She took the oars and rowed me slowly around the shore"
Illustration for "Some Remarks on Gulls by Henry van Dyke"
Scribner’s Magazine, August 1907
oil on canvas 88.9 x 60.9 cm

1908 The Courage of Captain Plum by James Oliver Curwood:

Front cover wrap-around 

2. Frontispiece
 " I am going to take you from the island!"

Frontispiece artwork
charcoal and watercolour wash on off-white illustration board
Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields

Neil forced the dugout through the water.

His fingers twined about the purplish throat.

Marion

1910 The Mystery of Rowing:

An Incident of the Atalanta-Yale Race of 1890

Near the Finish

A Model in Schoonover’s studio

Frank Schoonover - part 1

Frank Schoonover in Howard Pyle's studio

As a student at Howard Pyle’s school in the Brandywine area, Frank Earle Schoonover became a devoted adherent to his teacher’s tough belief that an artist should “live what he paints”. In 1896, he entered Pyle’s classes at Drexel, choosing to study illustration rather than the ministry, which his parents had most coveted for him. After his second year of study, Pyle accepted him into his Chadds Ford Summer School on scholarship and by 1899 he was illustrating books such as A Jersey Boy of the Revolution and In the Hands of the Red Coats. By 1903, he was illustrating outdoor adventure stories; In the Open by Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews was the first of a long list of such commissions.

In 1903, with more inspiration from Pyle, Schoonover travelled to the Hudson Bay area to experience that environment for use in his illustration works. Schoonover’s journeys to Canada and Alaska are more remarkable when one realises that on one trip in 1903 the artist travelled some 1,200 miles entirely by snowshoe, canoe and dog sled. Over the years, a great number of his illustrations were based on those daring excursions, enabling him to accurately portray the living conditions of recently settled American frontiers.

He illustrated more than 200 classic books, and with classmate Gayle Hoskins he organized the Wilmington Sketch Club in 1925 and formed his own art school in 1942, teaching until he was 91 years of age in 1968.

His earliest commissions came through Howard Pyle and at least once he shared a commission with fellow student, Philip R. Goodwin.

Over many years of studying together, Schoonover and Pyle became close friends and ultimately, their studios in Wilmington were near each other, Schoonover also helped Pyle with major commissions and teaching. He befriended another fellow student, Stanley Arthurs, and in 1906 they both traveled to Jamaica with Pyle. That same year he rented a studio in Wilmington with his neighbours being more of Pyle’s students: N.C. Wyeth, Henry Jarvis Peck, and Harvey Dunn

“Schoonover Red” became a signature element in most of Frank’s paintings. He was enamoured with the colour red and in each of his illustrations he tried, wherever possible, to put in a dash of cadmium red, varnished more heavily than elsewhere to heighten its intensity. It became a characteristic symbol of his paintings.

Frank helped to organise what is now the Delaware Museum of Art and was chairman of the fundraising committee charged with acquiring works by Howard Pyle. In his later years he restored paintings including some by Pyle and turned to easel paintings of Brandywine and Delaware landscapes. He also gave art lessons, established a small art school, designed stained glass windows, and dabbled in science fiction art (illustrating Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars). He was known locally as the “Dean of Delaware Artists”.

This is part 1 of 7-part series on the works of Frank Schoonover:

1885 "Outing"

1899 "Drummer Boy"
oil on canvas 91.4 x 30 cm
Brandywine Museum, Chadds Ford, PA
Margaret I. Handy Memorial Fund

1899 A Jersey Boy in Revolution by Everett T. Tomlinson 

published by Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Company:

1899 "He was still alive"
oil on illustration board en grisaille 30.4 x 17.7 cm

1899 "Nearer and nearer they approached"
oil on academy board en grisaille33 x 19.6 cm

1899 "Sinking of the Yawl Boat"
oil on illustration board en grisaille 33 x 20.3 cm
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1900 The Chase
oil en grisaille on board 34.3 x 22 cm

1902 The Lane That Had No Turning

published by Doubleday Page & Co.

Bustard House
charcoal and wash on paper 7.6 x 15.2 cm

Chapter heading "Woman Sewing"
graphite on paper 15.2 x 15.2 cm

Chapter heading "The Lane that had No Turning"
charcoal and wash on paper 12.7 x 15.2 cm

Drink to Madelinette
oil on canvas en grisaille(size not given)

Bustard Coach
graphite and gouache on paper 13.3 x 17.7 cm

Chapter heading "Fournel and Seigneur"
graphite on paper 30.4 x 22.8 cm

Chapter heading "In Fournels house"
graphite on paper 30.4 x 22.8 cm

Chapter heading "The One Who Saw"
graphite on paper 22.8 x 30.4 cm

Chapter heading “Good evening Monsieur”
graphite on paper 30.4 x 22.8 cm

Chapter heading "Iya longtemps que je t’aime
Jamais je ne t’oublierai"
graphite on paper (size not given)

Lajeunesse
 graphite on paper 12 x 12 cm

Looked at the dead thing
oil on boarden grisaille 45.7 x 30.4 cm

On Guard!
oil on canvas en grisaille  (size not given)

Seigneur
graphite on paper 10.8 x  13.3 cm

She threw herself on her Bed
graphite and wash on paper 19 x 23.5 cm

Tailpiece: Finding the Will
graphite on paper (size not given)

Tailpiece: Tardif
graphite on paper  (size not given)

The duel between Havel and Tardif
oil on board en grisaille (size not given)

The Manor House of Seigneur of Pontiac
graphite on paper 9.5 x 17.1 cm

The National Fete was over
oil on academy board, en grisaille 45.7 x 30.4 cm

What will she do with it? 
oil on Academy board en grissaile 45.7 x 21.6 cm

1903 Children of the Coal Shadow

published in McClure's Magazine, February 1903 issue:

1903 Breaker Boys Meeting
charcoal on paper 45 x 36.2 cm

1903 Scranton - cornet player
charcoal on paper 20.3 x 10.1 cm

1903 Door boy in gangway
charcoal on paper (size not given)

Notice prohibiting coal picking
graphite & charcoal on paper 30.4 x 16.5cm

The Forelady “Leads an isolated life of conscious rectitude for about $5.00 a week”
charcoal on board 53.3 x 17.7 cm

1903 “The Waifs of the Street.” 

McClure’s Magazine, May 1903:

“Hastily bolted meals, with often double a man’s portion of coffee, cigars, and cigarettes.”
charcoal & gouache on paper 26 x 14.2 cm

“He is sixteen, and stunted bodily, mentally, and morally to the lowest degree.”
charcoal on paper (size not given)

"Lemonade Bill’, who claims to sell two thousand waffles a day, and is an authority on the street diet
(medium not given) 32.3 x 30.4 cm

"Playing Craps"
(medium not given) 21.6 x 33 cm

“Smoking is almost universal.”
charcoal & gouache on paper (size not given)

“The work is almost wholly dependent on the crowds in the street”
graphite & gouache on paper 29.2 x 29.2 cm

“They lie in tangled heaps…over gratings, down steps, and under benches.”
graphite 21.6 x 30.4 cm

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1903 The Cholera Ship
Frank Leslie’s Popular Monthly, June 1903
"With this ring of death round us."
oil on canvas 60.9 x 40.6 cm

1903 The Peru Pauper Case.
 Everybody’s Monthly Magazine, September 1903
"She sank down by the fence in a heap"
 oil on canvas (size not given)

1903 The Boatman
charcoal on paper 30 x 24.1 cm

1903 The Blood Lilies. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons
“O Great Chief! be not angry–“
oil on board, en grisaille (size not given)

1903 Scribner’s Magazine, July 1903
The man came toward him and bent to look at him
oil on canvas (size not given)

1903 Louise Chamberlain. “At the High Water.”
Scribner’s Magazine, September 1903
Clutching hands rose through the stir oil on canvas 71.1 x 43.1 cm

1903 Louise Chamberlain. “At the High Water.”
Scribner’s Magazine, September 1903 
All the world was water except the strong arm around her
oil on canvas 71.1 x 43.1 cm

1903 “The Woman and the Poet.” by Alice Prescott Smith
Scribner’s Magazine, September 1905
Rhyming his gentle melancholy into verses.
(Medium not given) 71.1 x 71.1 cm