William Preston Phelps

His father recognized the financial benefits of talents, as he too painted houses as extra income, and sent William on to the thriving mill city of Lowell, Massachusetts to work for the sign painter Jeduthan Kittredge at the age of 14.

Phelps' talents began to shift away from signage, as people were so impressed by the intricacies and beauty of his work, patrons started to hire him for canvas paintings.

[1] To focus his talent, he began to take the train into Boston for evening art classes, then he would paint landscape scenes that he sold out of the window of his shop.

Leaving his wife Anna and their two children behind, the 28-year-old set sail in 1875 for the Royal Academy of Art in Munich to study painting for two years before heading back to the States.

[1] After settling his family, Phelps once again headed for Europe in 1881 for a whirlwind trip, this time to the Scottish Highlands, then with his friend William Merritt Chase on a working tour of Italy, Venice, and Capri, then back to Germany before returning to Lowell via New York.

After a devastating sail back across the Atlantic, that took the lives of three crewmen and broke the main mast in a hurricane, William again set up his studio shop in Lowell.

Even in winter, Phelps continued to paint outdoors by building an elaborate shelter studio, that could be transported by a horse-drawn sled, and had its own oil burning stove for heat.

Ina and Robert settled down the road in Keene, where they raised their five children, including the famous inventor, architect, and artist Roger Hayward.

[4] In 1901, tragedy struck, when his son Edward, now 27, an artist and lecturer himself, was traveling in Waco, Texas, and rescued a child from the tracks of an oncoming train.