Herman A. MacNeil
Herman A. MacNeil was born in 1886, at Chelsea, Massachusetts. After graduating from the State Normal School of Massachusetts, he went to Paris, where he studied under Chapu of the Julian Academy, and two years under Falguiere of the Ecole des Beaux Arts. He came home and soon answered a call to Cornell, where he remained three years. Then three years were spent in teaching art at the Chicago Art Institute. While there, he taught Miss Carol Brooks of Chicago, whom he married in 1895. She is a very clever sculptor herself. Her “Listening to the Fairies,” “The First Wave,” “The First Lesson,” “Betty,” in the Fine Arts Palace of the Exposition, readily show how very charming her work is. Mr. and Mrs. MacNeil studied together in Rome for four years and on their return to America established themselves in New York, where the MacNeil studio is. He is the teacher of modeling of the National School of Design, New York. He has made a specialty of Indian subjects, “The Sun Vow,” “The Coming of the White Man,” and the “Moqui Runner” being some of his best pieces. To him the Indians are as fine as Greek warriors and most worthy of careful study. Whatever he does in sculpture is in its very essence national. He is extremely refined, a superb modeler and one whose every piece of work is strong and of the first rank.