Elbridge Ayer Burbank (August 10, 1858 – April 21, 1949) was an American artist who sketched and painted more than 1200 portraits of Native Americans from 125 tribes. He studied art in Chicago and in his 30s traveled to Munich, Germany, for additional studies with notable German artists. He is believed to be the only person to paint the war chief Geronimo from life.
Elbridge was born on August 10, 1858, in Harvard, Illinois, to Anna Maria (Ayer) and Abner Jewett Burbank. After attending public schools, he started art studies at the Chicago Academy of Design, where he was influenced by Leonard Volk and graduated in 1874.
His maternal uncle Edward E. Ayer was a successful business magnate, museum philanthropist and antiquarian collector. He collected books, original manuscripts and other materials relating to the history and ethnology of Native American peoples at the time of European encounter. His collection, one of the founding donations to the Newberry Library in Chicago, contains a number of Burbank's works.
Burbank was the only artist to paint Geronimo from life.[1] He painted or sketched more than 1,200 Native Americans from 125 tribes. Over a period of several years, he spent many months at the Hubbell Trading Post, where he studied and painted Native Americans. Burbank, Oklahoma, is named after him.
In 1910, the Editor of The Harvard Independent noted: "No other artist in the country has enjoyed the opportunities experienced by Mr. E. A. Burbank, now a resident of Los Angeles - the painter of Indian portraits, to meet face to face, and on their own ground, the once noted Indian chiefs America now so rapidly passing away. For the last twenty years Mr. Burbank has journeyed from camp to camp among the aborigines of the northwest and southwest, painting successively all the great warriors whose prowess has made their names famous in frontier history. It is, therefore, with considerable pride that The Graphic calls attention to a series of articles from Mr. Burbank's pen, describing his personal interviews with these once-powerful war chiefs, and illustrated by portraits from life, re-drawn in pencil especially for the Graphic, from his original studies. First in this notable galaxy was a picture and story of Red Cloud, the famous Ogallalla (sic) Sioux, recently deceased. Geronimo, the noted Apache chief who preceded Red Cloud the happy hunting grounds by a few months, followed".
As an adult, Burbank was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, referred to then as "manic depression". He was treated at several different facilities during his life, most notably for more than ten years at the State Mental Hospital in Napa, California.
He died April 21, 1949, in San Francisco, California, after being struck and severely injured by a cable car on January 27. The accident occurred in front of the Manx Hotel (now the Villa Florence). He was first buried at Mt. Olivet Memorial Park, San Francisco, California, but his remains were reinterred at Forest View Abby in Rockford, Illinois. In 1984 relatives had his remains moved and reinterred at Mount Auburn Cemetery, Harvard, Illinois.
In 1898, Burbank became friends with Chief Blue Horse when he was visiting the Oglala Lakota at Pine Ridge Agency. Burbank painted sitting portraits of the greatest Native American leaders, including Geronimo, Red Cloud and Chief Joseph. At the time, Chief Blue Horse was eighty years of age and rode each day on his horse to pose for Burbank, who he called "Son of the Shadow-Maker". Burbank was also an historian and his fond recollections illuminate Chief Blue Horse. "Hardly a day passed without Blue Horse coming to my studio to visit me. He would sit down and smoke a little, short, strong pipe and gossip with the other Indians present; all the time he was talking he would be fanning himself with the wing of a turkey. His face usually was painted red, and he wore all the Indian clothes he had, with a single feather on his head. He was a thorough Indian, and extremely kind-hearted. His principal object in life was to try to make others happy around him".[2]
