Her instinct for art seems to have been a gift direct. As a very little
girl her facility with the pencil delighted her teachers, and after the
regular exercises of the day she was allowed to occupy her time drawing
whatever fancy or surroundings might suggest. At seven years of age her
parents removed to Philadelphia, and there the young artist encountered
school regulations which rather debarred her from following her beloved
pastime. But her talent was so pronounced that one day in every week
was allowed her in which to attend the School of Design—an arrangement
that continued until she entered the grammar school.
A few years later she became a regular student at this School of
Design, where she took a course of wood engraving, but did not relax
her study of drawing. As an engraver she became so successful that
her work soon became remunerative, and gave her means to enter the
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. At the same time her progress as an
engraver was so marked that her efforts were brought to the attention
of the art editor of “Scribner’s Magazine,” for whom, to illustrate an
article on the academy, she engraved the “Woman’s Life Class,” from
her own drawing. Soon her drawings gave her a reputation, and she
abandoned engraving. Her first published drawings were for school-book
illustrations, from which her field widened and her work came into
great demand.
In 1887 she was married and spent ten months abroad, studying for a
part of the time in Paris in the school of Julien and of Carlo Rossi,
devoting the remainder of her stay in travel. Upon her return she was
prevailed upon to become an instructor in the Philadelphia School of
Design, where she introduced life-class study, which has met with
marked success.