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Illustration


These illustrations were created for historical publications or educational textbooks.


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George Washington 1789

The Boston Tea Party
This is one of many pen and ink illustrations for "One April in Boston" by Ben Edwards and published by  Spyglass Books. This is Faneuil Hall in Boston, Massachusetts as it was first built in the 18th century before it was expanded and enlarged.
Faneuil Hall
This is my finished painting inspired by Benjamin Franklin's 1745 letter, "Advice to a Young Man on the Choice of a Mistress." Part of the wonderful new three-volume compendium edited by Russ Kick, "The Graphic Canon. " My painting appears in the first volume.

Instead of literally illustrating the text of Frankin's 1745 letter, I painted a picture showing the first flirtations between an itinerant silhouettist and a well-to-do-widow that may lead up a sybaritic assignation.

The scene shows a street in Philadelphia sometime about the last quarter of the 1700s. The shadow portraitist complements a fine lady on the quality of her classic profile and offers to cut her likeness for only the enjoyment and artistic pleasure of the experience.

Behind them, a British grenadier enjoys his pipe and the scene as it plays out in front of his recruiting office.
Choosing a Mistress
This illustration was created to evoke the look of 18th century woodcuts in portraying the landing of British troops at Long Wharf in Boston in 1768. I used hundreds of individual images taken from period woodcuts and adapted, retouched, assembled and combined them all to construct this view of the event, complete with inconsistent scale and perspective, but showing the Boston skyline and waterfront as it was in that momentous year. If you open the image in a new window, you'll get a larger view.
The British Land in Boston

This painting is an accurate portrayal of the only (officially) acknowledged battle between a US Navy airship and a German U-Boat. On July 18, 1943, the US Naval Blimp K-74 attacked and damaged the German U-Boat U-134 off the Florida straits and saved nearby merchant ships from probable sinking. The K-74 was shot down with the loss of its bombardier. The German U-Boat, its diving tanks badly damaged by the K-74's attack, was forced to limp across the Atlantic for its home base. It was discovered, bombed and sunk by allied aircraft 30 days later.
K-74 vs. U-134
This is the art for the the DVD "Airships Fight a Cold War", a chapter in the Airship History Series. The painting shows a USN type ZPG-2 airship in the 1950s equipped with radar and flying over the ice at the north pole while a Russian nuclear sub hides beneath the frozen stalactites under the ice.
Airships Fight a Cold War
Digital/Painter

Both of these illustrations were commissioned by Spyglass Books, and both took a considerable amount of research to complete. The Washington portrait was based on the Houdon statue in the state capitol in Richmond, Virginia. Washington's uniform from the late war was the model for the clothing. The Paul Revere portrait was posed by a living historian who does a first person interpretation of Revere at historic sites. His resemblance to Revere was startling, although I had to bring his features more in line with the Copley portrait of Revere by sharpening the angle of his nostrils, and enhancing the upturned angle of his upper lip.
Washington & Revere

NYC Subway

Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon

The Whitmans

Louis Morris

Mars Rover

Christopher Gadsden
Created for the Ben Edward's genealogy website, this illustration shows a typical wood, iron and steel printing press of the 18th century as was found in urban centers like Boston and Philadelphia.
Printing Press