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An early photograph of American painter Thomas Cole. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Museum’s decision to sell Thomas Cole painting draws fire

Tom Hoepf
Tom Hoepf
An early photograph of American painter Thomas Cole. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
An early photograph of American painter Thomas Cole. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

AUBURN, N.Y. (AP) – Descendants of 19th-century American statesman William H. Seward say they’re angered by plans to sell a valuable painting that had hung in his central New York home for years.

The Emerson Foundation, former operator of the Seward House Museum in Auburn, announced last week in a letter to supporters that Thomas Cole’s 1839 landscape titled Portage Falls on the Genesee had been removed and stored in a secured location.

The painting by the founder of the American art movement known as the Hudson River School was given to Seward when he was governor of New York in the early 1840s. Seward later served as Abraham Lincoln’s secretary of state during the Civil War.

Some of Seward’s descendants tell local media that they’re outraged by the decision to sell the painting.

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AP-WF-02-26-13 1511GMT

ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

An early photograph of American painter Thomas Cole. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
An early photograph of American painter Thomas Cole. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.