Williams, Wheeler

An extensive and highly important archive relating to the life and career of Wheeler Williams, one of the most signficiant American figural sculptors of the 20th century. The materials in the archive range from correspondence to photographs to sketches to finished drawings and span nearly the entirety of Williams's life, from his schoolboy days to his studies at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris to his work on commissions in cities around the world. A full inventory is available on request.

Wheeler Williams was born in Chicago in 1897. He graduated from Yale and then received a master's degree in architecture from Harvard, and certainly his architectural training is evident in his sculpture. WIlliams was a member of the National Academy, president of both the Fine Arts Federation of New York and the National Sculpture Society, and the founding president of the American Artist Professional League.

Among his many public monuments, a number of which are documented in the present archive, are "Tablets to Pioneers" (Chicago, 1930); "Communications" (Washington, D.C., 1935); "Settlers of the Seaboard" (Philadelphia, 1942); "The Venus of Manhattan" (New York, 1949); and "Wave of Life" (Houston, 1952). Williams's conservative and traditional aesthetic were mirrored by his politics; he was one of a very few artists who supported the House Un-American Activities Committee, and one of his final major commissions was a memorial to "Mr. Republican," Robert A. Taft, in the nation's capital.