Beginning in 1877, he studied at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris for three years,[3] returning to the United States and marrying Elizabeth Carroll in Philadelphia in 1882.

[3] The Alarm, commissioned by Martin Ryerson for Lincoln Park in Chicago, was intended to commemorate local Ottawa tribes, as part of a monument which originally included four bas-relief panels entitled The Peace Pipe, The Corn Dance, Forestry and The Hunt on its base (these original panels were stolen in the 1960s and replaced with sand-blasted reproductions).

Artistic advisor Augustus Saint-Gaudens delegated the "career-enhancing commissions for monumental sculptures that promoted the exposition's overarching theme of national identity," to a select group of sculptors it was felt would portray young America in its most promising light.

[8] The success of Boyle's work in this venue cemented his reputation as a sculptor for American ideals, leading to commissions in Washington in the newly built Library of Congress building (figures of Sir Francis Bacon and Plato, bronze, 1894–1896) in Washington, D.C.[4] Boyle's statue of Benjamin Franklin for the Philadelphia Post office followed (1896–1899), followed by an invitation to participate in the Pan-American Exposition of 1901.

[9] Behests by his wife to the PAFA in his memory included Tired out a bronze statue of a Native American subject completed in 1887.