Finding Aid
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Charles A. Cumming Papers Access and Restrictions: This collection is open for research. Digital Surrogates: Except where indicated, this document describes but does not reproduce the actual text, images and objects which make up this collection. Materials are available only in the Special Collections Department. Copyright: Please read The University of Iowa Libraries' statement on Property Rights, Copyright Law, and Permissions to Use Unpublished Materials. Use of Collections: The University of Iowa Libraries supports access to the materials, published and unpublished, in its collections. Nonetheless, access to some items may be restricted by their fragile condition or by contractual agreement with donors, and it may not be possible at all times to provide appropriate machinery for reading, viewing or accessing non-paper-based materials. Please read our Use of Manuscripts Statement. Acquisition and Processing Information: These materials were transferred from the State Historical Society of Iowa in August 1979 and purchased from Charles Apfelbaum, a rare books and manuscripts dealer, in September 1993. Guide created in July 2008. |
Charles A. Cumming, 1925 |
Scope and Contents
The Charles A. Cumming papers include photographs of his paintings and those by his wife, Alice. Also included are newspaper clippings and correspondence relating to his career, and a 1915 diary of Alice McKee Cumming. Series I contains family records, biographical and personal correspondence of Charles A. and Alice McKee Cumming.
Biographical Note
Charles Atherton Cumming was born on March 31, 1858, in Rochester, Illinois. His mother was Eliza Ellen (Atherton) Cumming. Charles was six years old when his father, George Paxton Cumming, died in action during the Civil War. Charles studied at Reading College Academy in Abingdon, Illinois, followed by Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa. He was enrolled at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1878 to 1879.
In 1880, Cumming established the Art Department at Cornell College and taught there until 1895. During his time at Cornell, he made several leaves of absence to study art in France. He resigned from Cornell in 1895 in order to direct the Des Moines Academy of Art, which was struggling in its fifth year. He was invited to take this position by the Des Moines Women's Club and the Iowa Society of Fine Arts. Just one year under his guidance increased enrollment to 40 students. In honor of his service, the Des Moines Academy of Art was renamed the Cumming School of Art in 1900. By 1906, Cumming stated that "only two other schools west of the Mississippi River are doing more real academic work and sending out more trained students than my school." The school's peak enrollment was in the 1948-1949 school year.
In 1908, the State Board of Education asked Cumming to establish and direct the Department of Graphic and Plastic Arts at the State University of Iowa. Reluctant to abandon the school he had developed, he managed to divide his work week between Des Moines and Iowa City until he retired from S.U.I. in 1927 due to poor health. At S.U.I., Cumming was considered innovative for including studio art classes in the curriculum, in addition to lectures. Cumming also founded the Iowa Art Guild in 1914.
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His best-known paintings were portraits in the Impressionist style. His subjects were well-known Iowans and large murals of Iowa scenes. One of his murals, "The Departure of the Indians from Fort Des Moines," is in the Polk County Courthouse. Twenty-four of Cumming's paintings reside with the State Historical Society of Iowa. Cumming witnessed new Modern painting styles emerge in Paris while he studied there. A pamphlet Cumming wrote in 1928, "Democracy and the White Man's Art,"
was outspoken against modern abstract styles of painting, which eclipsed the popularity of Impressionism during the 1910s.
Cumming married Nellie Millet Young in 1894. Cumming's second marriage was to Alice McKee of Stuart, Iowa, on August 26, 1926. Following their marriage, Alice and Charles lived in California for one year, on leave of absence from the State University of Iowa. The couple returned to Iowa in 1930. Cumming met Alice during her enrollment in the Cumming School of Art in 1915. Before their marriage, Alice served as a secretary at the Cumming School of Art, and as an art instructor at S.U.I. Following the death of Charles A. Cumming on February 16, 1932, Alice directed the school. Mrs. Cumming closed the school upon her retirement to Arizona in 1954. She died on March 16, 1965.
[D. Anderson; 07/2008]
Related Materials
Folder, "Cumming, Charles Atherton," Faculty and Staff Vertical Files collection (RG 01.15.03)
Records of the School of Art and Art History (RG 06.07)
Ferguson, Bess.Charles Atherton Cumming, Iowa's Pioneer Artist-Educator. Des Moines: Iowa Art Guild, 1972
Ferguson, Bess. "Charles Atherton Cumming: Pioneer Artist and Educator." The Iowan 30, no. 3 (spring 1982): 28-33, 50-52
Firestone, Evan R. "Incursions of Modern Art in the Regionalist Heartland." Palimpsest72 (fall 1991): 148-160. Includes Charles A. Cumming, Lester D. Longman, Grant Wood, and the University of Iowa.
Rasmussen, Chris. "Agricultural Lag: The Iowa State Fair Art Salon, 1854-1941." American Studies 36, no. 1 (spring 1995): 5-29. Includes Charles A. Cumming and Grant Wood.
Box Contents List
Series I: Personal
Box 1
Cumming genealogy
Cumming
biographical information
Cumming divorce, 1924-1926
Family photograph and property estate sale of Eliza Ellen Johnston of Missouri, 1892-1904
From Cumming (Paris), early 1880s
Mr. and Mrs. Cumming dinner engagement with family of Alson Secor, 1912
Correspondence: from Charles A. Cumming
---. Joseph C. Atherton, 1902-1904
---. Pastor Jenkins of Portland, Maine, ca. 1894
---. Mrs. J. Kidder, July 13, 1887
---. Mrs. Henry Ford, 1921-1927
Correspondence: to Charles A. Cumming
---. Albright, Ella
---. Burton, Alice S., 1893
---. Chauvin, Jules, 1891
---. Cumming, Miles I., 1902-1904
---. Darr, Eva C., 1903-1904
---. Goodnall, Laura M., 1924
---. Grubb, Sophia, 1891
---. Haddock, Ella, August 19, 1894
---. Ingham, Fannie A.V., January 4, 1907
---. Jannaseh, Myrtle Cumming, July 11, 1932
---. Leonard, Hattie J. (Mrs. R.M. Wright), 1893-1894
---. Oliver, Katharine, 1891-1909
---. Penn, Jessica, 1904
---. Robinson, A.E., 1892
---. Robison, Grace, 1902-1903
---. Stephenson, Annie G., 1890
---. Stickney, Edwin C., 1902-1903
---. Stickney, Maude W., 1903-1904
---. Warner, Alice Gould, 1890
---. Young, Nellie, n.d.; 1902
---. 1891
---. 1892
Correspondence to: Alice McKee Cumming
---. Florence Kruindenier, n.d.
---. Harold Miles, condolences, March 3, 1932
Box 2
Alice McKee Cumming
---. Vita and photographs
---. Diary, 1915
---. Membership cards in the Society for Sanity in Art, 1941-1942
Alice McKee Cumming family correspondence
---. Harold E. McKee, brother
---. Robert
E. McKee, nephew
---. Catherine (Mrs. Robert E. McKee)
---. James
Michael McKee, great-nephew, includes photographs
---. Weideman, Jennie
---. Eleanor and Vic
Series II: Professional
Box 3
Professional correspondence and administrative records
---. Cornell College
---. Des Moines Art Academy (Cumming School of Art)
------. 1897-1934
------. Announcements, 1880s-1945
---. State University of Iowa
------. 1908-1925
------. 1920-1924
------. Catherine Macartney, 1912-1926
------. S.U.I. leave and Cumming's personal creed, 1924
Iowa Capitol Commission
---. Report and appropriations, 1906-1909
---. Correspondence, 1905-1914
---. Artist copyright, 1907
Iowa Art Guild, 1921-1958
Speaking engagements and biographical requests
Notes by Harriet Macy on Des Moines Art Academy and successful students
Cumming urged Des Moines School Board for professional art instruction, 1913
Cumming School of Art, views on various art movements, 1914 and n.d.
Cumming School of Art brochure with Alice Cumming's accomplishments noted, 1946-1947
Box 4
Correspondence about commission of paintings, 1898-1926
---. S.U.I. College of Law portraits, 1905-1926
---. Portrait of Judge Deemer, 1919-1925
---. Copper plate of "The Departure of the Indians from Fort Des Moines"
Box 5
Correspondence, Cumming School of Art
---. 1909
---. 1911-1925
Writings
---.
"A Defense of the White Man's Art," 1923-1925
Box 6
Photographs
of paintings and of Charles A. Cumming
Box 7
Clippings, 1896-1931
