James Earle Fraser (November 4, 1876 – October 11, 1953) was an American sculptor.
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Fraser was born in Winona, Minnesota. His father, Thomas Fraser, was an engineer who worked for railroad companies as they expanded across the American West. Fraser was part of a group sent out to recover the remains of the 7th Cavalry Regiment following George Armstrong Custer's disastrous engagement with the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho forces at the Battle of the Little Bighorn just a few months before James Fraser's birth.
Fraser was exposed to the frontier life and Native Americans, who were being pushed ever further west or confined to Indian reservations. These early memories were expressed in many of his works from his earlier trials, such as the bust Indian Princess[1] pictured below to his most famous projects, such as End of the Trail and the Indian Head (Buffalo) nickel.
Fraser began carving figures from pieces of limestone scavenged from a stone quarry close to his home near Mitchell, South Dakota in early life. After it became apparent to the family that he was serious about pursuing sculpture as a career Fraser began working as an assistant to sculptor Richard Bock and attending classes at the Art Institute of Chicago at age 14 (by that time Chicago). Fraser arrived at a time when he could participate in much artistic work associated with the World's Columbian Exposition. This World's Fair involved the production of massive amount of architectural sculptures.
In 1895 Bock helped his assistant gain admission to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where Fraser worked under well-known French sculptor Alexandre Falguière. It was while he was working and studying in Paris that Fraser came to the attention of Augustus Saint Gaudens when Fraser won a competition Saint Gaudens was judging. Saint Gaudens, who was always looking for capable assistants, engaged Fraser to assist him on his General Sherman Monument, which was eventually erected at the Fifth Avenue entrance to Central Park.
Having worked for Saint Gaudens for four years, Fraser left his master in 1902 and set up his own studio in New York, where he was to maintain a studio for over half a century. Shortly thereafter he began teaching at the Art Students League. Saint Gauden's effect on his work at this time was profound, and much of his early works were bas-relief portraits, frequently of people referred to him by the always over-booked Saint Gaudens. At that time Fraser also developed a reputation as a numismatist, creating his best-known and certainly his most circulated work – the Indian Head or "Buffalo" nickel – in 1913. This coin was discontinued after 1938, but has since been reprised in 2001 on a US commemorative coin, and more recently on a gold buffalo one ounce gold bullion coin. Almost as well known in its day, but largely overlooked now, was his Victory Medal produced in 1919 to commemorate the closing of the First World War. Over five million were struck at that time. In 1913 Fraser married a former student of his, Laura Gardin Fraser, who remained his partner for the rest of his life and was a highly respected sculptor in her own right.
Fraser was the designer of the Navy Cross.
It was for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition held in San Francisco in 1915 that Fraser produced his most recognized work, the doleful "End of the Trail." While intended to be cast in bronze, material shortages due to the war prevented this, and the original plaster statue slowly deteriorated until it was obtained by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in 1968 and restored. The restored statue is currently on display in the entryway of the Oklahoma City museum, and the original that sat in Visalia, CA, was replaced with a bronze replica.
The original bronze statue of the End of the Trail Statue is located in Shaler Park, in Waupun, Wisconsin. The statue was purchased by inventor and sculpture, Clarence Addison Shaler, and donated to the City of Waupun on June 23, 1929. The End of the Trail Statue is the official seal of the City of Waupun.[2]
The End of the Trail Statue is being worn on the back of Chicago Blackhawk's Corey Crawford's helmet. [3] Fraser was later to remark that he should have copyrighted the image and that many people, painters, print and calendar makers and even other sculptors, made more profit from this work than he did.
During the early years of the 20th century his style also changed from the impressionistic realism that he had inherited from Saint Gaudens to a more modern style, with smoother lines, less complicated silhouettes and less detailed surfaces. However, although Fraser had several pieces in the Armory Show of 1913 and despite the fact that he was considered among the ranks of sculpture’s "modernists" at the time, he quickly fell out of step with the artists who continued working towards an increasingly abstract style. Following the end of the First World War Fraser’s attention turned to larger works, public monuments and architectural sculpture.
He was one of a dozen sculptors invited to compete in the Pioneer Woman statue competition in 1927. [4], which he failed to win.
Although by the 1930s Fraser’s style of realism was no longer in vogue and architectural sculpture was no longer called for, he nonetheless stayed in demand. His last major installation, two large groups, "The Peaceful Arts" for the Arlington Memorial Bridge in Washington D.C. had in fact been sculpted years before but had seen their installation delayed because of the Second World War.
Muralist Barry Faulkner, a friend of Fraser’s from their days in Paris together described Fraser like this: "His character was like a good piece of Scotch tweed, handsome, durable and warm." [see Wilkonson, References] His papers are held at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.[5]
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