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Robert Vonnoh (American, 1858-1933) EDWARD DALE TOLAND AT THE HELM, painted circa 1926 signed lower left: "Vonnoh" Oil on canvas 42 1/2 x 32 1/2 in. Provenance: Ex collection Phillips, Son and Neale, New York, New York, auction sale, January 27, 1983, American Paintings and Western Art lot 106 illus. To Walter Knestrick, Nashville, Tennessee, until 2009 Exhibitions: The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 1927, The one-Hundred and Twenty-Second Annual Exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, no.46 illus. Other Notes: Robert Vonnoh was one of the most influential American painters working during the last two decades of the nineteenth century. He was twenty-two years old when he traveled to France for the first time. Vonnoh was able to study the works of Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, and Alfred Sisley at the Parisian galleries. After extensive studies in Paris, Vonnoh moved to the rural community of Grez, where he lived for five years. While at Grez, the painter befriended Roderic O'Conor who was the greatest living Irish artist of his day, as well an influential teacher; it was under O'Conor's tutelage that Vonnoh perfected his style. In 1891, he returned to Boston where he had his first solo exhibition. The show was a critical as well as popular success because it was one of the first times that an American had exhibited Impressionist paintings. Later that year Vonnoh moved to Philadelphia to teach at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. During his tenure at the Academy he was an immensely popular instructor; among his students were Robert Henri, William Glackens, and Maxfield Parrish. It was also at this time the artist cemented his reputation as a portrait painter. He taught portraiture, and he completed more than 500 commissioned portraits during his career. For the rest of the decade, Vonnoh divided his time between teaching and painting, especially portraits, although he painted landscapes as well. Vonnoh's works are in the collections of many public institutions including The Art Institute of Chicago, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and The Butler Institute. Edward Dale Toland, St. Paul's Class of 1904, was born in Philadelphia, December 11, 1886; he died in Concord, New Hampshire, January 3, 1964. Total spent fifty of his seventy-seven years at, or very near, St. Paul's School: four years as a boy in the rectorship of Dr. Joseph Coit; twenty-seven as a master; nineteen in retirement at Ash Brook Farm. After graduation from Princeton in 1908, Toland worked for a gas company in Philadelphia, in Kentucky as a manager of several small concerns, and then for a period as a junior partner in an investment-banking house. In 1914, Toland volunteered and served as a private in the French Army. He was "brancardier infirmier" (stretcher-bearer and orderly), first at a base hospital in Paris and later in a field hospital on the Somme. Toland kept a daily journal, and what he witnessed in those early days of the war was published in 1916 as The Aftermath of Battle: With the Red Cross in France. He was thirty years old when he returned to St. Paul's to teach French in 1916. However, the United States entered the World War in April 1917; Toland left St. Paul's at the end of his first term to join the U.S. Army and returned to France in command of Company M, 64th Infantry, 7th Division. Before shipping out to France, he married Esther Roberts Howell in Philadelphia. Toland returned to St. Paul's with Mrs. Toland in September, 1919, where he taught French until 1929. He then joined the History Department and was appointed department chairman in 1930, a position he held until he retired from teaching in 1945. Toland was keenly interested to the end of his days in local politics and civic affairs. He was a member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives from 1924 to 1926, state chairman from 1931 through 1933 of the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment, a member of the Committee of 22 to Revise the Liquor Laws, and state Commander of the American Veterans Association. In 1934, he campaigned unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination to Congress. He never ceased writing letters to editors of newspapers. When he died, the editor of "Concord 100 Years Ago" in the Monitor devoted his whole column to him. "Ned", he wrote, "had the true historian's zeal for the facts, and, when 'they had been ascertained to his satisfaction, he made known 'his findings 'by correspondence, telephone, and letters to the editor. Only a few days 'before 'his death, he wrote us that he was looking forward to seeing a certain item in print. . . he was careful not to offend anyone he felt was sincere in his convictions. But, if he thought a person was misleading the public, he was quick to do battle." Ned Toland was a great sportsman. He was an indefatigable hunter and a very fine shot. To the end of his days, he retained a keen interest in various other sports, especially yachting and tennis.