Leila Usher

Leila Usher (August 26, 1859 – August 13, 1955[1][2]) was an American sculptor.

Leila Usher
Leila Usher with her bas-relief of Susan B. Anthony in 1922
Born
Leila Woodman Usher

(1859-08-26)August 26, 1859
Onalaska, Wisconsin
DiedAugust 13, 1955(1955-08-13) (aged 95)
New York City, New York
OccupationSculptor

Biography
Bas-relief portrait of paleontologist Nathaniel Shaler, c. 1909

Leila Woodman Usher was born in Onalaska, Wisconsin on August 26, 1859, to parents Isaac Lane Usher and Susannah Coffin Woodman.[2][3][4] She was a pupil of English sculptor H. H. Kitson in Boston, American George Brewster in Cambridge, and Irish-American Augustus Saint-Gaudens in New York, and also studied abroad in Paris and Rome.[2][5][6]

Her best-known work is a 1902 bust of educator Booker T. Washington commissioned by the Tuskegee Institute.[1] She produced bas-relief portraits of many other prominent figures such as social reformer Susan B. Anthony, scholar Francis James Child, minister Elijah Kellogg, and geologist John Wesley Powell.[2][5][7][8]

Usher received the Bronze Medal at the 1895 Atlanta Exposition,[6][9] and her work was also awarded at the 1915 Panama–Pacific International Exposition.[10] Usher's sculptures are held in the collections of institutions such as Bowdoin College, Bryn Mawr College, Hampton University, Johns Hopkins University, and Radcliffe College.[2][5][8][11]

She died at St. Luke's Hospital in New York on August 13, 1955, aged 95.[1][2]

References
  1. "The Week's Census". Jet. Vol. 8 no. 15. Johnson Publishing Company. August 18, 1955. p. 17. ISSN 0021-5996. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
  2. "Leila Usher, Sculptress, 95". New York Herald Tribune. OCLC 785729899. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via OCLC.
  3. "Francis James Child". Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian American Art Museum. Retrieved July 31, 2017.
  4. Usher, Edward Preston (1895). "Genealogy". A memorial sketch of Roland Greene Usher, 1823–1895. p. 126. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via archive.org.
  5. Putnam, Frank (1903). "Note and Comment". National Magazine. Vol. 19. p. 100. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
  6. "Directory of Sculptors". American Art Annual. MacMillan. 4: 92. 1903. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
  7. "Miss Leila Usher, Sculptress, with bas-relief of Susan B. Anthony". Library of Congress. Retrieved July 31, 2017.
  8. "Bronze Work". Granite, Marble and Bronze. A. M. Hunt. 24 (12): 35. December 1914. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
  9. Albert, Helen Horton (October 2, 1941). "We Women". Asbury Park Press. Asbury Park, New Jersey. p. 15. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via newespapers.com.
  10. Harlan, Louis R.; Smock, Raymond W., eds. (1977). Booker T. Washington Papers Volume 6: 1901–2. University of Illinois Press. p. 463. ISBN 9780252006500. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
  11. Harper, Ida Husted (1908). "International Suffrage". The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony. 3. Hollenbeck Press. p. 1253. Retrieved July 31, 2017 – via Google Books.
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