Rachel Bentley
Born June 10, 1894, in Stoughton, Wisconsin
Died May 4, 1991, in Menlo Park, California
Rachel Bentley gained widespread recognition as a watercolor artist in 1954 when 100 of her one-and two-room country schoolhouses were exhibited at the California State Fair. Earlier that year, Rachel came up with the idea of making a collection of these "little halls of learning.” At that time, little red schoolhouses were rapidly disappearing from the American landscape--and for the first time, the National Park Service was asked to declare a school (in Wakefield, New Hampshire) a registered national historic landmark.
An adventurer at heart, Rachel searched for schoolhouses in the foothills, mountains, and coastal areas of Northern California, ultimately covering 31 counties. She enjoyed her new life on the road and got leads on the whereabouts of old schools from farmers, ranchers, and other friendly people she happened to meet along the way.
The project took her far into the back country of California, where she would set up her easel and paint, sometimes in fields surrounded by tall weeds and thistles or pastures inhabited by curious cattle.
This “happy hunting” became her obsession, so much so that she was able to finish 100 schoolhouse paintings before the State Fair opened. Her unique collection has been displayed countless times since in galleries, libraries, universities, by historical societies and museums, and at art festivals. Many of the schools she captured by paintbrush are now gone.
The rural schoolhouses were not her only forte, however. Rachel had a warm affection for California and was deeply interested in its people and its history. Initially with her mother Nettie as her navigator (who was then in her eighties), and later on with her dear friend and traveling companion Mimi, she drove throughout the state looking for stagecoach stops, mining camps, lighthouses, seacoast cottages, rustic barns and farmhouses, and old churches. She followed the Mission Trail and wandered through many ghost towns in search of her subjects.
Around 1957, Rachel was commissioned to paint over 50 views of early Menlo Park and Atherton. For this project, she worked from photographs. Bay Area historian Susan Gale presented 25 of the watercolor paintings to the City of Menlo Park to form a permanent exhibit in the civic center. They also have appeared in numerous publications and been used for lectures on local history. Under the Oaks: Two Hundred Years In Atherton, a book written in 2009 by Pamela Guillard and Nancy Lund, features several of them, including Linden Towers, the "Wedding Cake" mansion of silver baron James C. Flood.
From 1956 to 1961, assignments from the Ford Times travel magazine sent Rachel to the mining towns of California and Nevada. Her paintings of ruins left behind from the Gold Rush and Comstock Lode were featured in a traveling art exhibit sponsored by Ford that went around the world and became a permanent piece of the Ford Times Collection of American Art.
In 1991, Rachel's family donated over 80 of her original schoolhouse watercolors to the San Mateo County Office of Education in Redwood City, where the paintings continue to be displayed throughout the building. Twenty-four schoolhouses are on public exhibit in the Rachel Bentley Gallery there. Her painting of the Carmel Mission (San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo Mission) and two schoolhouses were donated to the Oakland Museum for its California Collection.
Born June 10, 1894, in Stoughton, Wisconsin
Died May 4, 1991, in Menlo Park, California
Rachel Bentley gained widespread recognition as a watercolor artist in 1954 when 100 of her one-and two-room country schoolhouses were exhibited at the California State Fair. Earlier that year, Rachel came up with the idea of making a collection of these "little halls of learning.” At that time, little red schoolhouses were rapidly disappearing from the American landscape--and for the first time, the National Park Service was asked to declare a school (in Wakefield, New Hampshire) a registered national historic landmark.
An adventurer at heart, Rachel searched for schoolhouses in the foothills, mountains, and coastal areas of Northern California, ultimately covering 31 counties. She enjoyed her new life on the road and got leads on the whereabouts of old schools from farmers, ranchers, and other friendly people she happened to meet along the way.
The project took her far into the back country of California, where she would set up her easel and paint, sometimes in fields surrounded by tall weeds and thistles or pastures inhabited by curious cattle.
This “happy hunting” became her obsession, so much so that she was able to finish 100 schoolhouse paintings before the State Fair opened. Her unique collection has been displayed countless times since in galleries, libraries, universities, by historical societies and museums, and at art festivals. Many of the schools she captured by paintbrush are now gone.
The rural schoolhouses were not her only forte, however. Rachel had a warm affection for California and was deeply interested in its people and its history. Initially with her mother Nettie as her navigator (who was then in her eighties), and later on with her dear friend and traveling companion Mimi, she drove throughout the state looking for stagecoach stops, mining camps, lighthouses, seacoast cottages, rustic barns and farmhouses, and old churches. She followed the Mission Trail and wandered through many ghost towns in search of her subjects.
Around 1957, Rachel was commissioned to paint over 50 views of early Menlo Park and Atherton. For this project, she worked from photographs. Bay Area historian Susan Gale presented 25 of the watercolor paintings to the City of Menlo Park to form a permanent exhibit in the civic center. They also have appeared in numerous publications and been used for lectures on local history. Under the Oaks: Two Hundred Years In Atherton, a book written in 2009 by Pamela Guillard and Nancy Lund, features several of them, including Linden Towers, the "Wedding Cake" mansion of silver baron James C. Flood.
From 1956 to 1961, assignments from the Ford Times travel magazine sent Rachel to the mining towns of California and Nevada. Her paintings of ruins left behind from the Gold Rush and Comstock Lode were featured in a traveling art exhibit sponsored by Ford that went around the world and became a permanent piece of the Ford Times Collection of American Art.
In 1991, Rachel's family donated over 80 of her original schoolhouse watercolors to the San Mateo County Office of Education in Redwood City, where the paintings continue to be displayed throughout the building. Twenty-four schoolhouses are on public exhibit in the Rachel Bentley Gallery there. Her painting of the Carmel Mission (San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo Mission) and two schoolhouses were donated to the Oakland Museum for its California Collection.