F. A. BRADER, 19th Century Itinerant Folk Artist, The Darwin D. Bearley Collection.

I first got interested in Ferdinand A. Brader after seeing one of his drawings at an exhibition of Ohio Folk Art at the Akron Art Institute in 1979. It was a large farm scene which had been loaned by the McKinley Museum and Library in Canton, Ohio. It took me over ten years but I finally purchased my first picture and then I decided to see how many I could find. Twenty-one years later, my collection has grown to a total of 29 pictures. These include 19 farm scenes, 2 non-farm scenes and 7 of his small non scenic drawings.
I have also spent many waking hours attempting to find information about the life of Ferdinand Brader. Almost no actual documentation was available until recently. I did find records from the Portage County Infirmary in Ravenna, Ohio in which it lists his Brader’s birth as 1833 and that he was from Switzerland. These records further state that the reason for his stay was, "mind impairment" and that he was "insane". It further states that he had asthma, "very bad but got better of it and left for himself to go to Kentucky".
He apparently never made it to Kentucky as no evidence of him being there has been found and he continued to produce drawings in Ohio after this date.

THE DRAWINGS

His first pencil drawings of farms and homes were done while he was in Pennsylvania as early as 1876. It is thought he did some 300 pictures in Pennsylvania, although the exact number is not known as he did not number many of his Pennsylvania pictures.

Brader's Pennsylvania renderings were done in Berks County, Lancaster Co., Montgomery Co., Lebanon Co. and from as far west as Somerset, Beaver and Allegheny Counties.

The majority of Brader's drawings were done in Ohio. His Ohio drawings first appeared in Tuscawaras county in 1884.

From drawings that survive it is known that Brader's Ohio pictures were done in 7 different adjoining counties; Portage, Medina, Wayne, Stark, Summit, Carroll, Columbiana and Mahoning Counties.

The vast majority of his Ohio pictures seem to have been done in the counties of Portage and Stark both of which had county infirmaries or "Poor Houses" where it is known, Brader stayed from time to time.

Based on Brader's sequential numbering system, used almost exclusively in Ohio, it is known so far that he did at least 980 scenic drawings. Of those, it is currently known that at least 205 have survived, 49 Pennsylvania pictures have survived and at least 156 Ohio drawings are know to have survived.

Drawing number 980 with the caption, "Homestead of Mr. and Mrs. John Kliver, Plain Twp., Stark County, Ohio,1895" is in the collection of The William McKinley Museum & Library in Canton, Ohio.

The numbers on his pictures can usually be found next to his signature in the lower right or lower left hand corner of his drawings.

Most of his drawings are quite large, some measuring as large as 52" by 36". The vast majority of these were done using only graphite pencil. However, about 1890 Brader began to incorporate the use of colored pencils into his drawings.

An expert letterer, Brader included bold captions across the bottom of most of his renderings, stating the resident's or property owner's name, township, county, state and the year the drawing was done.

Brader was an infrequent patient at the Portage Co. and Stark Co, Infirmaries or Poor Houses. These were located in Ravenna, Ohio and Canton, Ohio respectively.

The registry book of the Portage County Infirmary show that he was there from December 12, 1891 through April 19, 1892 and cites his birth in Switzerland as being in 1833. These records further state that the reason for his stay was, "mind impairment" and that he was "insane". It also states that he had asthma, "very bad but got better of it and left for himself to go to Kentucky".

He apparently never made it to Kentucky as no evidence of him being there has been found and he continued to produce drawings in Ohio after this date.

BRADER'S MEDIA

Most of his drawings are quite large, some measuring as large as 52 by 39 inches and were done using only graphite pencil. However, in 1890 Brader began to incorporate the use of colored pencils into his drawings as well.

WHERE DID BRADER LIVE?

Brader was a true itinerant artist. He traveled throughout several counties and would stay with the families whose farm he was drawing. However he was also known to have stayed at 2 infirmaries or "Poor Houses" in the area.

These were the Portage County Infirmary in Revenna, Ohio and the Stark County Infirmary in Canton, Ohio.

Coincidentally, Brader seemed to have produced the most drawings in these two counties.

Brader did at least 4 drawings of the Portage County Infirmary in Revenna, Ohio but no drawings have surfaced of the Stark County Infirmary.

Old records from the Portage County Infirmary in Revenna show that Brader was there from December 12, 1891 through April 19, 1892.

Recently the admissions ledger of the Stark County Infirmery was found and it shows that Brader was a patient there at least 4 different time from November 14, 1892 to December 31, 1895 and in a recently discovered article published in the February 13, 1896 edition of the Salem (Ohio) Daily News it suggest that he was living there at that time. (See above article)

THE BIG MYSTERY

A big mystery about Brader has always been about what finally happened to him. It had been rumored for years that he had returned to Europe but there was no actual evidence to show this.

Recently 5 old newspaper articles have been discovered that helps shed some light on this mystery but at the same time they add to the mystery as well.

These articles were found in the Canton Repository, the Louisville Herald and the Salem Daily News.

Two articles, both from November 6, 1865 were found in the Salem Daily News and the Canton Repository. The other three are from February 1896.

Together, these seven articles tell us that Brader was from St. Gallen Switzerland, that he had been an “inmate" of the Stark County Infirmary for years, that he was only 5 foot tall and "infirm" that he was a “landscape painter”, and “highly educated” and had been trained as a Fresco Painter. We also learn that he had a well-to-do brother that he was estranged from who had left Brader a sizable inheritance and that it had taken Swiss authorities 8 years to track Brader down.
Further, we learn that after he received his inheritance, it seemed that Brader had disappeared.
In the final 2 articles we learn that Brader had returned to Switzerland and was doing fine...
Furthermore, we learn that he had received a sizable inheritance from his diseased brother.
However, it has been discovered that on Aug. 29 1901, the district court Gaster (in Schänis) that Brader’s son, Carl Ferdinand Brader filed a claim that Brader was “lost” since they had not heard from him since June 17, 1900.
The court made it official and declared Brader officially “Lost”.

Brader's other Drawings

Along with the many scenic drawings, Brader did numerous "Certificate" type pictures.

These celebrated Births, Friendships, Marriages and Rememberances and still others were possibly have been Mourning pictures.

It is known he sometimes did as many as 4 of these along with his larger scenic picture.

As with his scenics, these were done in graphite pencil but later, after he started to use colored pencil for his scenics, he also did these small drawings in color.
It is not clear what some of these meant.

BRADER DRAWING EXHIBITIONS

There has been two exhibitions of Brader’s work.

In October of 1986, an exhibition was held in Reading, Pennsylvania at the Historical Society of Berks County, Inc.

This showing was entitled, "Brader in Berks, 1880-1883 and exhibited 16 of Brader's pictures both done in Pennsylvania and Ohio.

A catalog with the same title was produced.

In 1991 I was quest curator for the Massillon Museum in Massillon, Ohio where we organized an exhibition entitled "F.A. Brader, the Ohio Drawings".

This exhibition ran from January 20, 1991 thru March 3, 1991 but sadly, no publication was produced.

WHERE BRADER'S WORK CAN BE FOUND

Today, Ferdinand A. Brader’s drawings can be found in the collections of The Canton Museum of Art, Canton, Ohio(2); The William McKinley Museum & Library, Canton, Ohio(9); The Portage County Historical Society, Ravenna, Ohio(1); The Carroll Co. Historical Society (Algonquin Mill), Carrollton, Oh(1) and the Massillon Museum, Massillon, Ohio (1).

In Pennsylvania Brader's drawings can be seen at the Landis Valley Museum in Lancaster, PA. (2); The Historical Society of Berks County in Reading, PA.(5); The Library Company of Philadelphia in Philadelphia, Pa(1). Tha Philadelphia Musum of Art(1). The Chicago Art Institute, Chicago, IL (1); The Metropolitan Museum, New York City(1) and the American Museum of Folk Art, New York City(1) and Historic Schaefferstown, Inc. , Schaeffertown, PA (1) all have examples in their collections as well.
The drawing from the Metropolitan Museum and the Philadelphis Museum can be view on their websites.

There are numerous examples in private collections throughout the country as well.

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ONGOING RESEARCH

Since becoming interested in the pictures of Brader, I have been attempting to find out as much as possible about this artist. Recently I have begun to built a database of all the surviving pictures by Brader and I need your help. If you have a picture or know of pictures, I would request that you share this infomation with me. The information will not be made public but you can remain anonymous if you like. I only need to know the caption, the number if any, how and where signed, the size and condition, ie. good, bad, restored etc. ==================================================================

You can email this to me at fabrader@aol.com or Call me at 330-376-4965.