Influenced by Winold Reiss

"After an elementary education which was followed by several courses at William Jewell College, Liberty, Missouri," wrote E.H. Deines in 1946, "the starting point of a nurtured longing was realized. (Geary) was about 20 years old when he received training at the small art school in Kansas City, MO. It was not a very great distance from his home town of Carrollton...."
In his eleven page biography, FRED GEARY, MISSOURI WOOD ENGRAVER, Deines sought to remember a fellow artist, whom he admired and no doubt held conversations with. As to the accuracy of his record, it did point me to locations and dates when I first began this research, but some dates have been proven inaccurate,







For example, Deines named instructors that Geary may have had when the "fundamentals of art" were given to him.











These include "the teachings of Charles A. Wilimovsky, a Chicago-born painter, etcher and woodcutter - (Robert) Merell Gage, well-known sculptor and teacher of anatomy - and Norman Tolson in the commercial branches." (Fred Geary, Missouri Wood Engraver by E.H. Deines, 1946, unpublished, page one, courtesy of Ms. Jane Metz and the Carrollton Public Library, Carrollton, MO, accessed January 10, 2010-----YMCA postcard, above, courtesy of the Missouri Valley, Special Collections, Kansas City Public Library, Kansas City, MO)

However, after checking with school records, none of these instructors were available between 1914-1918. Nancy Warren, Archives Clerk with the Kansas City Art Institute, relayed: "You asked for the dates when Charles Wilimovsky and Norman Tolson taught at KCAI. Wilimovsky was at KCAI from 1920 through 1922 as was Merell Gage. Norman Tolson taught illustration and poster work here from 1920 through 1926. These dates don't seem to coincide with Geary's stint at KCAI as a student."(Email, Wednesday, April 21st, 2010, Nancy Warren,Archives Clerk, Jannes Library, Kansas City Arts Institute.) Ernest Deines had been a pupil at the Kansas City Art Institute. Perhaps, these were the instructors he had known when he attended.



"Interest in a variety of subjects was augmented later on by a brief period away from Kansas City...."(Deines, p.2)When Geary took figure drawing at the Art Students League in New York City (photo below),
Deines presumed the art instructor was George Bridgeman, when in fact, it had been John Sloan. Editor Stephanie Cassidy clarified that when she wrote: "I found one record for Fred Geary, who listed his city address as the President Hotel, West 48th Street and his home address as Kansas City, MO. He enrolled in April 1928 in John Sloan's life class." (Email, Thursday, March 25th, 2010, Stephanie Cassidy, Editor Art Students League of New York, 215 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019. Area Of Design, www.areaofdesign.com, accessed Saturday, May 22nd, 2010)The later date of 1928 made more sense in light of Deines following remarks:
"In New York Geary sought out an admired mentor, Winold Reiss, whose realistic (and colorful) drawings of the Blackfeet Indians on their Montana reservation, aroused in him a strong enthusiasm."
(Fred Geary, Missouri Wood Engraver by E.H. Deines, 1946, unpublished, page two, courtesy of Ms. Jane Metz and the Carrollton Public Library, Carrollton, MO. Book Rags, www.bookrags.com, accessed Monday, May 10th, 2010)
 
Records show that in 1928 Reiss showed fifty-one works from the Louis Hill Collection of his Blackfeet portraits in a solo exhibition, at the Belmaison Galleries in John Wanamaker's Gallery of Decorative Arts, in New York City. It was quite likely Geary visited Reiss' studio on 108 West 16th Street and may have seen the exhibit as well. (Winold Reiss, http://www.winoldreiss.org/works/portraits.htm#10-20,  and http://www.winoldreiss.org/life/chronology.htm, and http://www.winoldreiss.org/works/exhibitions.htm, accessed Jan 18, 2014)Deines: "Coming in contact with Reiss was a useful experience, utilized afterwards many times in the course of (Geary's) regular work..."

(Fred Geary, Missouri Wood Engraver by E.H. Deines, 1946, unpublished, page two, courtesy of Ms. Jane Metz and the Carrollton Public Library, Carrollton, MO)

pen in hand - fred geary

According to public records at the city library, Fred Geary was born in Clarence, Missouri on May 19, 1894. His parents were James F. and Sophia Stuetz Geary. He and his family moved to the city of Carrollton, in Carroll County, around 1895 when he was 18 months old. His father transferred to the area as a Santa Fe railroad agent.

In 1914, the year the Panama Canal opened for boat traffic, Geary graduated from Carrollton High School. The east entrance of the three story red brick building, circa 1912, is shown (above). The west entrance is shown below that.




(photos courtesy of the Carrollton Public Library, Carrollton)

Records at the University of Missouri at Columbia indicate that the following students graduated May 21st at Carrollton's 43rd Commencement program: Francis W. Audsley

Harold M. Austin

Charles E. Benjamin
Merrill B. Burruss
Floyd W. Casebolt
Melvin E. Crispin
Aurelia Cruzen
Fred F. Fisher
Edgar G. Fleming
Fred Geary
Oscar Hanaway
Aileen Harper 
Alpha A. Herren

Mary E. Liller
Bessie L. Lungren
Wilda A. Martin 
Oakland Maupin

Edward L. Minnis
Elizabeth A. McQueen
Fay Minnis
Thomas S. Mobley
Ray F. Parkins
Ione Rhoades
Clyde Spotts
Arthur Sturges
Mayme Thomas
Pete Trotter, Jr.
Jack V. Woodson
Jewell Wood

(Mary Beth Brown, Manuscript Specialist with the Western Historical Manuscript Collection, at the University of Missouri, in Columbia, MO, told me in a email Monday, March 22nd, 2010, from the Fred Geary Papers, 1903-1917 (C3515)

Fred Geary attended William Jewell College with Pete Trotter, where they both were members of the Sigma Nu Fraternity.
Tanna Campbell, Director of Alumni Services for that school, confirmed that "....Geary attended Jewell from 1914-1918." (Email, Monday, April 19th, 2010)
The Sigma Nu Fraternity General Catalog, 1918
in 1915, listed Pete Trotter as a student living at 204 North Main Street in Carrollton, MO. While Fred Geary was listed as an artist at the Fine Arts Institute, 1020 McGee Street in Kansas City, residing at South Main Street in Carrollton, MO.

The American Art Annual of 1911
has the Fine Arts Institute listed:
"Y.M.C.A. Building, 1020 McGee
Street, Kansas City, MO
Charles W. Moore, President
Howard E. Huselton, Secretary
J.C. Ford, Vice-President. 201
Junction Building. J.F.Downing,
Treasurer."

"The Fine Arts Institute was
incorporated in 1907 under the
laws of Missouri for the purpose
of securing to Kansas City a fine
arts museum, to collect, preserve
and exhibit objects of art; conduct
schools for instruction in drawing,
painting, modeling, sculpture,
illustrations, decorative designing,
architecture and the arts and crafts,
and by other appropriate means to
further the cause of Art..." (YMCA
photo, courtesy of the Missouri
Valley, Special Collections, Kansas
City Public Library, Kansas City, MO)




A cub reporter by the name of Ernest
Hemingway borrowed this location to
write a piece for the Kansas City Star
called "Mix War, Art, and Dancing."
It began "...Inside in the Fine Arts Institute
on the sixth floor of the Y.M.C.A. Building,
1020 McGee Street, a merry crowd of soldiers
from Camp Funston and Fort Leavenworth
fox trotted and one-stepped with girls from
the Fine Arts School while a sober faced young
man pounded out the latest jazz music as he
watched the moving figures...." You can read
it in its entirety HERE.

During his first year in college Geary drew pen and ink illustrations for the "1915 Carrollton High School Nautilus" yearbook.
Double click on images to view enlarged picture. Sophomores, page 31.



September entry, page 67
" New faces--quite a few. That, however, is not the rub. New faces mean new experiences--but the old ones. Why, Mr. Dietrich and Miss Hess were the first to greet us, Howard Standley and Arbuta Clark were next, even Paul Rea was there (next to Mr. Dietrich)."







The artist and his college buddy Pete stopped by their old stomping ground (high school) in a Monday, March 29th entry, page 73: "Messengers Geary and Trotter visited their former place of knowledge today."























Literary, page 55.

Organizations, page 37.



















Text below his header graphics identifies names of Superintendent George Dietrich, faculty members: Professor Eugene Briggs, Mrs. Mary Gentry Briggs, and Miss Inna Northcutt.


























And upper classmen: Glen Minis, Paul Rea, Arbuta Clark, and Howard Standley. The rival Brookfield football team is cited.

May entry, page 75: "The Nautilus staff, who were to be seen for the last two or three months going on among us with long-
drawn, tired, and worried faces, are beginning to brighten up in spirit as well as their countenance, as they see the finish of their many months of worry and labor drawing to a close."

(1915 Nautilus yearbook images courtesy of
Ms. Margaret Gentry and the Carrollton Public Library, Carrollton, MO)

Heading caption:
"Cram-
ming for exams," page 71