Quetzalcoatl is a piece of art created by an unknown artist during 16th century Mesoamerica. Quetzalcoatl is defined as the feathered serpent and snake. It represents the Aztec’s Morning Star God. In the Aztec culture animals were sacrificed in honor of the Quetzalcoatl who was believed to look down upon human sacrifices. It was believed that the Quetzalcoatl was sent into exile by his opposite Tezcatlipoca. Their hope was that Quetzalcoatl would return, as talked about in ancient stories.

Portrait of George Washington by Rembrandt Peale was more commonly known as his “Portal Painting.” It was created in the year 1823, forty three years after he painted the original. As the story goes, Washington was hesitant to sit for the young Peale. After being approached by Rembrandt’s father, Charles Wilson Peale with whom Washington had a long association, he agreed to sit for the portrait. Rembrandt was able to capture the strength of character and the “sheer physical presence of Washington.” Upon completion of the portrait, Rembrandt went back to his studio where he made at least ten copies of the original portrait. He never felt satisfied with his first painting and for years tried to create a portrait from the original that would be the standard for future portraits of the first president. Unfortunately for Peale it never became the standard by which all other portraits were judged. This honor went to Gilbert Stuart. Ironically, Washington sat for both artists at the same time.

Seenontya, an Iowa Medicine Man was painted by George Catlin. Catlin, born in Pennsylvania, was a lawyer by trade. But, his first love was studying the American West. Growing up he listened to stories told by his mother about the west and in particular about Native Americans. He became very concerned that expansion to the west would become a death knoll for the American Indian. As a result, he made at least five separate trips out West to record the lives of the American Indian in both the written word and in his paintings. When he came back east he set up a gallery devoted to the Native American. He traveled with his gallery all over the capitols of Europe and the Eastern States. Unable to get the funding to keep the gallery alive, and having used all of his own money, he eventually went bankrupt. He died in 1872 in Jersey City. Today, thanks to a wealthy industrialist who bought his entire collection and paid off his debts before he died, his work has a permanent home at the Smithsonian.

The Alamo: The Texas War of Independence was the Texans’ attempt to gain their freedom from Mexico. On February 23, 1836 in San Antonio, Mexican General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna and his army planned a surprise attack on Texas’ Alamo Mission. The defenders in the mission were a group of volunteers from Texas led by James Bowie, William Travis and Davy Crockett. Though incredibly outnumbered, (the numbers vary as being anywhere from 1,600 to 6,000 Mexican soldiers) Jim Bowie and his men were able to hold on for thirteen days. In the end, all were killed. The killings, however, encouraged many other Texans to join the Texas army in order to fight against Mexico. In “Remembering the Alamo,” the people of Texas were inspired and willing to do anything to defeat the Mexicans. In the Battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836 the Texans finally defeated the Mexicans gaining their ultimate goal of independence. This painting is unaccredited, as there have been many artists over the years that have been inspired to paint the Mission. People today still “Remember the Alamo.”

Robert Fulton’s Clermont, is a Chromolithograph by an unknown artist from the early 19th Century. Fulton was born on November 14, 1765 in Little Britain, Pennsylvania. He had many talents and careers. He was apprenticed to a jeweler, then studied drawing and painting under American Artist, Benjamin West but eventually pursued his true passions: science, engineering and invention. Among his many talents, he designed canal boats and experimented with submarine development. Finally, he returned to the study and designing of steamboats in which he had had an interest since his early childhood. Out of this came the Clermont the first commercially successful steamboat which ushered in a whole new era of transportation.

The Peacemakers, was painted by George P.A. Healy in1868. Healy was a self-taught artist who opened a studio in his hometown of Boston. A world traveler, Healy completed most of his portraits in Europe. In March, 1865, General Ulysses S. Grant met with President Abraham Lincoln, General William Tecumseh Sherman and Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter. (The four men met in order to decide whether or not to seek peace or continue the horrors of the Civil War a year longer.)Although not present at the meeting, Healy had previously completed portraits of the four men and had obtained information about the meeting from General Sherman. Behind the head of Lincoln in the Peacemakers, Healy placed a rainbow image symbolizing peace and hope. The painting currently hangs in the White House.

The West the Railroad Made

In 1863, two companies, the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific started the race to be the first transcontinental railway in the United States under a charter granted by the Pacific Railway Act of 1862. The objective was to connect the Pacific and Atlantic coasts for the first time. Begun during the Civil War, it took six years to build and was constructed almost entirely by hand. Thousands of workers participated. They were Chinese, Irish, German, freed slaves and soldiers from both the North and South. The railroad was finished in May of 1869. It revolutionized commerce making the transportation of goods and services cheaper and faster.

Croquet Scene, oil on canvas painting by Winslow Homer, was completed in 1866. Homer was an acute observer of everyday life recording what he saw in his paintings. This particular scene depicts the upper class playing croquet, a favorite pastime during the Gilded Age. Prior to his illustrious painting career, Homer worked as an illustrator recording scenes of the Civil War. This is probably where he honed his keen observational and technical abilities. Croquet Scene is one of five paintings that Homer created on the subject. This painting is currently hanging in The Art Institute of Chicago.

Buildings, Lancaster is one of a series of architectural paintings Charles Demuth created in his home town beginning in 1927. Demuth was known as the creator of the style of art called “Precisionism.” His paintings are a cross between cubism and futurism; all of the buildings identifiable by the viewer. Born in Lancaster Pennsylvania, he traveled to numerous places, New York, Provincetown, Paris and Bermuda. But he always went back to his home town to finish them. He died two years after finishing the last painting in 1935 at the age of 51.

Baseball at Night was created by Morris Cantor. Morris Kantor was born in Minsk, Russia in 1896. Around 1906 he arrived in the United States. He spent most of life in West Nyack, New York enjoying a prolific and long career as an artist. Probably his best known work is Baseball at Night. It records an historic moment: the beginning of baseball games played at night.

The Greatest Mother in The World was painted by Alonzo Earl Foringer. Foringer was born in Kaylor, Pennsylvania. He received most of his artistic training in Pennsylvania and New York City, eventually settling down in Saddle River New Jersey. He was known for his mural paintings, including eleven he created for Yonkers City Hall. The Greatest Mother in the World was a poster Foringer created to help promote the recruitment of nurses during World War I. The poster depicts a nurse cradling an undersized, injured soldier on a stretcher, the way a mother would cradle her child. The recruitment posters were highly successful as 16 million Americans joined the Red Cross during the war.

(Title Unknown) African American artist Romare Bearden created a series of paintings that portrayed images associated with jazz music. Even though he grew up in North Carolina, many of his collages, oil and water paintings reflect his time spent in Harlem during the 1930s. This piece was part of his jazz series, and shows a band playing jazz in a music venue. Bearden’s work is part of public collections in museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art and the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

The Model T Ford was originally known as the “Tin Lizzie.” The manufacturing of the Model T ushered in a new way of life for the average American. It changed the way they traveled and the way they worked. While the assembly-line existed prior to Henry Ford, he made changes that revolutionized manufacturing on a gigantic scale. Between 1908 and 1927, the Ford Motor Company built over 15 million Model Ts. It was built not only in Detroit, Michigan, but in Manchester, England and in Europe and sold for $300.00. It was reliable, inexpensive to maintain and long lasting. The “Tin Lizzie” became a symbol of American Folklore.

Teaching An Old Dog New Tricks, the cover of Life Magazine for February, 1926 shows a young female flapper dancing the Charleston with an older man. It was the beginning of a new era. It was now the 1920s, the first World War was over, and the Jazz Age had begun. Prosperity swarmed the nation; people were doing better than ever before. Times and culture were changing; leisure was now a part of everyone’s lives. This lithograph by John Held Jr. shows the Roaring Twenties at this time of change. It shows the transition of women from Victorian-styled ‘Gibson Girls,’ to independent, rebellious flappers. The older man represents the ‘old dog,’ being taught new tricks by the flapper. He represents the older times, as the woman represents the newer, modern times of the decade.

The Passion of Sacco & Vanzetti was created by Ben Shahn, a Lithuanian born American artist. Called “Social Realism” this was an art form in the 1920s that portrayed scenes of social and political protest; art created specifically to send a message. Shan himself held strong socialist views and his art often portrayed incidences of social injustice. One such example is his painting of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, one of twenty three that he painted of these two men from 1931-1932. Two Italian-born anarchists; Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted of murder despite evidence of innocence. They were subsequently executed. Many people throughout the world doubted their guilt. But at the time the United States was in the middle of a ‘Red Scare.” Many feared a Communist Revolution, which led to a distrust of foreigners. Being an immigrant himself, Shan was drawn to the case producing not only the paintings but a mural and several serigraphs.

This Migration Photograph was taken by Dorothea Lange, a well-known photographer during the Great Depression era. Dorothea was born in 1895 in Hoboken, New Jersey and married Paul Schuster Taylor, a professor of economics at the University of California Berkley in 1935. For five years the couple documented rural poverty and the exploitation of sharecropper and migrant workers. Most of these people were fleeing the Dust Bowl, or had fled the Great Plains and moved to California. Lange brought these issues to the public eye by distributing photos free to newspapers countrywide in turn making her pictures iconic to the era.

America Will Always Fight For Liberty is a World War II era propaganda poster created by Bernard Perlin and shows throughout time and history Americans have fought for liberty and freedom. It depicts American soldiers fighting for liberty from the American Revolution in 1778 to World War II in 1943. The posters were designed to help foster patriotism in the American people. It also encouraged Americans on the home front to contribute to the war effort by growing victory gardens, buying liberty bonds and rationing goods. Perlin later became an artist and writer for Life and Fortune magazines. The highlight of his career was having the honor of being aboard the USS Missouri when the Japanese formally surrendered in 1945.

Oh to Liberty was painted in1867 by German immigrant Theodore Kaufman. While still in Germany, he fought in revolutions against the German monarchy. Eventually he immigrated to the United States. Once here, he joined the anti-slavery cause, and was known to have painted several paintings on themes relating to awareness of social issues in America. Oh to Liberty shows slaves fleeing to freedom during the Civil War era. Kaufman was inspired to paint this scene after personally witnessing events during the time period. The original painting is currently on display in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

The Problem We All Live With, is an oil painting created in early 1964 by Norman Rockwell. Rockwell lived during a time when segregation was still occurring in the southern United States. Rockwell sympathized with the problems African Americans were experiencing. The plight of Ruby Bridges inspired him to paint The Problem We All Live With. Ruby Bridges was a six-year old African American girl who had the courage to attend an all-white public school in New Orleans, Louisiana. The young girl had received many threats and as a consequence she had to be escorted to school by four deputy U.S. Marshals. The Problem We All Live With is a unique reminder to society that all races haven’t always been treated equally in America.