John Emil Berninger (December 13, 1896 – July 16, 1981) was an American landscape painter and Pennsylvania impressionist.

[1] Berninger studied under Orlando Gray Wales and Arlington Nelson Lindenmuth, and was a student of Baum's first class in Allentown during the summer of 1926.

In 1934, he was one of four Baum students along with Joseph Gehringer, Walter Mattern and Melville Stark who accepted into the Circulating Picture Club of the Philadelphia Art Alliance.

[3] Mabel Berninger assisted her husband in his role as curator at the museum, and also served as secretary for the Kline-Baum School's Circulating Picture Club, a "lending library" for art.

For forty years, Berninger painted with Karl Buesgen, a local impressionist landscape artist, music teacher and church organist.