Page:McClure's Magazine v9 n3 to v10 no2.djvu/328

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1054
UNKNOWN LIFE MASKS OF GREAT AMERICANS.

THOMAS JEFFERSON. AGE 82. FROM THE ORIGINAL BUST FROM A LIFE MASK TAKEN AT MONTICELLO, OCTOBER 15, 1825, BY J. H. I. BROWERE. FIRST PHOTOGRAPHED AND ENGRAVED FOR MCCLURE'S MAGAZINE.

found comparatively easy through the calendars of Jefferson and Madison correspondence in the State Department at Washington, an examination of which, with the newspapers of the day, showing that Mr. Randall's method of writing history was to accept and repeat irresponsible country gossip rather than turn to documents at his hand that would explain and refute the gossip.

The one-time existence of the bust of Jefferson by Browere being thus established; the next and more difficult search was to discover its whereabouts, if still extant. But persistent and systematic inquiry discovered it, with a number of other busts by Browere, of persons of greater or less consideration, in the custody of the artist's family, through whose courtesy the works of their ancestor, John Henri Isaac Browere, are now for the first time published.

John Henri Isaac Browere was born in New York, November 18, 1792, and died in the city of his birth, September 10, 1834. He was of Dutch descent, and early turned his attention to art, becoming a pupil of Archibald Robertson, at the well known Columbian Academy. Determined to further improve himself, Browere went abroad, and traveled on foot for nearly two years on the continent, studying art and more