Exploring the Amazing, Prolific, and Sometimes Controversial Life of Sculptor Vinnie Ream: Creator of the Capitol Rotunda’s Lincoln Statue and Washington, D.C.’s Admiral Farragut Monument

On a recent visit to Washington, D.C., I had the opportunity to tour the headquarters for the National League of American Pen Women, an organization founded in 1897 that is dedicated to the recognition and advancement of women in the arts, music, and letters. While certainly not on many people’s itinerary when they visit the capital, I joined the NLAPW’s Santa Clara Branch in California several years ago, and I thought it would be interesting to see the headquarters and learn more about how the organization got started. Located between Dupont Circle and Scott Circle, just blocks away from the White House, the Pen Arts Building and Art Museum was once the home of Robert Todd Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s oldest son.

So, what does NLAPW have to do with the Civil War? One of the organization’s earliest members was Vinnie Ream – the woman whose sculpture of President Abraham Lincoln now stands in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. Among her many other subjects were General Ulysses S. Grant and Admiral David Farragut, and one of her greatest admirers and strongest advocates was General William Tecumseh Sherman. 

Each year, NLAPW gives out Vinnie Ream Awards in the categories of art, music, and letters. I had therefore heard her name before, but I knew nothing about her. How, at the age of 18, did Ream become the first female artist commissioned to create a work of art for the U.S. government? And why was her Lincoln statue chosen? I decided these were questions worth exploring.

Vinnie (Lavinia) Ream was born September 25, 1847 in Madison, then a small community in the Territory of Wisconsin, to Robert and Lavinia Ream. Her family lived in a log cabin surrounded by prowling wolves and snake-infested swamps. She first learned to paint and draw from some of her Ho Chunk (aka. Winnebago) neighbors. [1]

The youngest of three children, Ream moved frequently throughout her childhood because her father was a government land surveyor. In 1854, the family moved to Kansas, and Vinnie attended school in St. Joseph, Missouri. Three years later, the family moved to Columbia, Missouri, where she attended Christian College (now Columbia College). There she stood out for her musical and artistic abilities and “caught the attention of James S. Rollins, a local lawyer, politician, and supporter of the school,” which “proved fruitful in the years to follow.” [2]

Ream next found herself living in Fort Smith, Arkansas, but when the Civil War broke out in 1861, her family moved to Washington, D.C. The nation’s capital had been transformed by the upheaval of the Civil War: “Federal troops jammed the streets, army engineers feverishly worked on defense fortifications, and military hospitals were flooded with wounded and dying soldiers.” [3]

Due to failing health, Ream’s father Robert could only work part-time. So, to support her family, she began working at the post office for $50 a month. She served as a clerk in the Dead Letter Office from 1862-1866. There, “to help with the war effort, she wrote letters for the wounded soldiers in Washington, collected materials for the U.S. Sanitary Commission, and sang in hospital concerts and local churches.” [4] 

Soon, however, Ream’s life changed drastically. “As I was walking along Pennsylvania Avenue,” she explained to the Congress of Women at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893,  “I met Major James S. Rollins, of Columbia, Boone County, Mo., who represented that district in Congress, in which I had formerly attended school, saying that he had been looking for me and had promised the president of Christian College to send him a picture of his little pupil, Vinnie Ream. He walked with me to our home, and there arranged that my mother and myself should go with him to Clark Mills’ studio at the Capitol, where a bust should be made of me to send to Christian College. As soon as I saw the sculptor handle the clay, I felt at once that I, too, could model and, taking the clay, in a few hours I produced a medallion of an Indian chief’s head, which so pleased the major that he carried it away and placed it on his desk in the House of Representatives.” [5]

That medallion attracted the attention of many of Rollins’s colleagues. When they learned it was modeled in a few hours by a young girl who had never been in a studio before, they began lining up to have Ream sculpt their portraits. Mills, who was then finishing the bronze Liberty sculpture for the Capitol dome, took on Ream as an apprentice in 1864. She soon was making enough money to quit her job at the post office. 

Among her early subjects were Sen. James Nesmith; Sen. Richard Yates; Sen. John Sherman; Gen. Turner Morehead; Gen. George Custer; Rep. Thaddeus Stevens; and one of the founders of the Republican Party, Frank P. Blair. As she later stated, “These kind men became my friends, and warmly interested in my progress.” They also later became the advocates she needed to advance her work. [6] 

Renowned for her black ringletted hair, dark eyes, and beauty, young Ream often drew men’s attention and sometimes women’s scorn. She “quickly found herself in the midst of the masculine world of politics in the nation’s capitol,” but even at the young age of 17, she “seemed to understand … the importance of building not only her artistic, but also her social portfolio and was able to enhance both under the tutelage of Mills…. That she was ambitious there is little doubt; but Victorian society frowned on ambitious women, so Ream cultivated a sweet and demure manner.” [7) 

Ream soon set her sights on a more ambitious goal: sculpting a portrait bust of President Abraham Lincoln. Initially, Lincoln hesitated, saying he “was tired sitting for his likeness, and couldn’t imagine why any one wanted to make a likeness of such a homely man.” However, when he was informed the artist was “a little western girl, born in Wisconsin,” who was “poor” but had “talent,” he agreed. [8] 

Thus it was that, beginning in December of 1864 and continuing over the next five months, the young sculptress visited Lincoln in the White House for 30 minutes almost every day, observing him at his desk and sculpting his bust. As she later recalled, “He had been painted and modeled before, but when he learned that I was poor, he granted me the sittings for no other purpose than that I was a poor girl…. So it was, the great heart which vanity could not unlock opened with the sympathy that recalled to him his own youth; his battle with poverty; his ambition; his early struggles. So it was that I, a little unknown sculptor, born in Wisconsin, and a stranger to fame, was allowed the privilege of modeling from life the features of this great man.” [9]

Ream was the last artist to capture Lincoln’s likeness before his death. “Sometimes at these sittings his face wore that look of anxiety and pain which will come to one accustomed to grief. At other times he would have that far-away, dreamy look, which seemed to presage the tragic fate awaiting him; and again, those quiet eyes lighting up, a radiance almost Divine would suffuse the sunken cheeks, and the whole face would be illuminated with the impulse of some Divine purpose.” [10] 

Ream was nearly finished with her model when President Lincoln was assassinated. She was deeply affected by his death, saying, “So lately had I seen and known President Lincoln, that I was still under the spell of his kind eyes and genial presence when the terrible blow of his assassination came and shook the civilized world. The terror, the horror, that fell upon the whole community has never been equaled…. He was at his best when struck down, and had in his heart and mind great reservoirs of usefulness. His hand of steel and heart of kindness had guided us safely so far through the dark waters, and our ablest mediator, he might, from his gentle, forgiving and humane nature, have evolved plans of peace and reconciliation which would have more quickly, more firmly and more closely bound the estranged ones together.” [11]

After Lincoln’s death, Congress offered a $10,000 commission for the creation of a statue of the late president. The country’s best sculptors competed for the commission. Ream, confident in her artistic skill, was among those who vied for the award. Just 18 years old, she was well known among the politically powerful and had a well-established association with Lincoln. 

Ream’s age, gender, and lack of experience were all points of concern when the Senate debated the contract, as were the aesthetics of Ream’s realism vs. the classicism some preferred (read more about that here). However, Ream effectively campaigned for the commission. President Andrew Johnson, 31 senators, and more than 100 current and former representatives signed a petition of support for Ream. Though Sens. Charles Sumner and Jacob Howard vehemently objected, Ream was ultimately awarded the commission in July 1866 – the first woman to ever receive a federal commission for a work of art, and the youngest person to ever receive such a commission. She beat out 18 other more experienced sculptors, including her mentor Mills. 

Over the next two and a half years, Ream worked on a plaster model for the statue in her studio. To accurately render the statue’s garments, she borrowed the clothes Lincoln wore the night of his assassination. In 1869, accompanied by her parents, she took her model to Rome to have it carved in marble by skilled Italian stonecarvers, as was the practice of both male and female sculptors. Ream took the opportunity to study in Rome with Luigi Majoli and in Paris with Léon Bonnat. She also did some commission work – including busts of the Hungarian piano virtuoso and composer Franz Liszt and Cardinal Giacomo Antonelli. 

According to historian Gregory Tomso, “It would take four and a half years before the work would be complete, and during this time Ream became the center of one of the most public and divisive debates ever to take place in America concerning the relationship between art and American nationhood. Her work, her character, and her sex were relentlessly scrutinized by senators, editorial pundits and newspaper gossips. Some saw Ream as an untutored genius, a self-taught sculptor and daughter of the West who, like Lincoln himself, proved that privilege and social refinement were not requirements for success in the United States. Others saw her as an upstart opportunist who used her strikingly good looks to manipulate powerful middle-aged men, including senators, Civil War generals and at least two presidents, in order to secure government patronage for her art.” [12] 

Ream’s statue captured a solemn Lincoln with his right leg slightly bent and his right arm extended. He looks down toward his hand, which holds the Emancipation Proclamation. In his left hand, he clutches his flowing cloak. The lowered head creates a serious, contemplative impression. He is wearing the outfit he wore the night he was assassinated.

“The one great, lasting, all-dominating impression that I have always carried of Lincoln has been that of unfathomable sorrow,” Ream explained, “and it was this that I tried to put into my statue.” [13]

Ream returned to the United States in late 1870, and later that same year she sculpted a bust of President Ulysses S. Grant. Her statue of Abraham Lincoln was unveiled in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on January 25, 1871. 

“This night when the Lincoln statue was unveiled in the rotunda of the Capitol was the supreme moment of my life,” she later recounted. “I had known and loved the man! My country had loved him and cherished his memory. In tears the people had parted with him. With shouts of joy and acclamations of affection they had received his image in the marble. Upon the very spot where a few years before they had gathered in sorrow to gaze upon his lifeless body lying there in state while a nation mourned, they had gathered again to unveil his statue. ‘The marble is the resurrection,’ say the old sculptors, and now the dead had arisen to live forever in the hearts of the people whom he loved so well.” [14]

Among Ream’s greatest admirers was General William Tecumseh Sherman. It was largely due to his advocacy that Ream was awarded a $20,000 commission in 1875 to create a statue of Adm. David G. Farragut to be placed in Farragut Square (see this earlier ECW post). 

Many speculated about Ream’s relationship with the 53-year-old Sherman: “Sherman’s letters to Ream suggest intimacy, yet they could also be just another example of the effusive and flirtatious language that was common in the 19th century…. What is clear is that Sherman, like many other prominent men in Washington, was smitten by Vinnie Ream and that the two began to plot a strategy designed to win her the Admiral Farragut commission.” [15]

After marrying Brig. Gen. Richard Leveredge Hoxie in 1878, Ream stopped working as an artist to focus on being a wife and mother. However, she later returned to sculpting. In her later years, she created two other pieces that reside in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall: Sequoyah, who created the Cherokee alphabet; and Samuel Jordan Kirkwood, an American politician from Iowa. 

One of Ream’s most famous works, Sappho, based on the celebrated Greek poet, was gifted to the Smithsonian American Art Museum by her husband after her death. It is actually one of the only sculptures of a female figure that Ream ever created, as well as one of the only works that was not completed for a patron or commission. A replica of this statue now marks Ream’s grave. She died in 1914 and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. 

Ream’s work and legacy are still on display at the NLAPW headquarters, and I enjoyed learning more about this remarkable woman. She has inspired many other creative women to follow in her footsteps – and I felt inspired seeing the names of award winners who can now proudly display their Vinnie Ream Medals for their work in the arts, music, and letters.

 

Endnotes:

1. Anderson, Frank. “Vinnie Ream.” Wisconsinology – The Long Ago, 29 Jan 2021, https://www.wisconsinology.com/the-forgotten-long-ago/vinnie-ream.
2. Harper, Kimberly. “Vinnie Ream.” Historic Missourians, The State Historical Society of Missouri, https://historicmissourians.shsmo.org/vinnie-ream/.
3. Ibid.
4. “Vinnie Ream: One of the First Women Artists in the United States.” History of American Women, womenhistoryblog.com, 2007, https://www.womenhistoryblog.com/2007/01/vinnie-ream.html#google_vignette.
5. Ream Hoxie, Vinnie. “Lincoln and Farragut.” The Congress of Women: Help in the Woman’s Building, World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893, with Portraits, Biographies, and Addresses. Edited by Mary Kavanaugh Oldham Eagle. Chicago: Monarch Book Company, 1894. Pp. 603-608.
6. Ibid. 
7. “Vinnie Ream: One of the First Women Artists in the United States.” History of American Women, womenhistoryblog.com, 2007, https://www.womenhistoryblog.com/2007/01/vinnie-ream.html#google_vignette.
8. Ream Hoxie, Vinnie. “Lincoln and Farragut.” The Congress of Women: Help in the Woman’s Building, World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893, with Portraits, Biographies, and Addresses. Edited by Mary Kavanaugh Oldham Eagle. Chicago: Monarch Book Company, 1894. Pp. 603-608.
9. Ibid. 
10. Ibid.
11. Ream Hoxie, Vinnie. “Lincoln and Farragut.” The Congress of Women: Help in the Woman’s Building, World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893, with Portraits, Biographies, and Addresses. Edited by Mary Kavanaugh Oldham Eagle. Chicago: Monarch Book Company, 1894. Pp. 603-608.
12. Tomso, Gregory. “Lincoln’s “Unfathomable Sorrow”: Vinnie Ream, Sculptural Realism, and the Cultural Work of Sympathy in Nineteenth-Century America.” European Journal of American Studies, openedition.org, 2 June 2011, https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/9139.
13. Ibid.
14. Ream Hoxie, Vinnie. “Lincoln and Farragut.” The Congress of Women: Help in the Woman’s Building, World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893, with Portraits, Biographies, and Addresses. Edited by Mary Kavanaugh Oldham Eagle. Chicago: Monarch Book Company, 1894. Pp. 603-608.
15. Jacob, Katherine Allamong. “The Prairie Cinderella who sculpted Lincoln and Farragut – and Set Tongues Wagging.” Smithsonian, vol. 31, August, 2000.