Happy International Women’s Day!

Happy International Women’s Day! Here is to all of the awesome women of the world doin’ their thing. This young lady led an amazing life – she left home at age 14 to become a high-wire trapeze artist in a circus, then a “wild west equestrienne”.
“…Eric Sloane courted her in the early 1930s with trips to an airfield where they would watch planes. A contemporary newspaper account said she learned to fly so Sloane could sketch cloud formations up close.” Barbara was to marry Eric, and she became one of the “Ninety-Nines”. “I take him up in my airplane and watch him make color notes for paintings”, Mrs. Sloane told a reporter for the New York’s World Telegram, “and on every trip, day or night, I really have a wonderful time”.
To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, click here. While you’re there, please consider supporting our work by making a donation online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.

“The Tropical Cyclone” Weather Model Built by Eric Sloane for the American Museum of Natural History, NYC

“The Tropical Cyclone” Weather Model Built by Eric Sloane for the American Museum of Natural History, NYC

Another photograph of a model of the atmosphere that Eric Sloane built as a series in memorial to Lieutenant Joseph Prentice Willetts (30 September 1918 – 28 August 1943), U.S. Navy pilot who was killed in a training exercise piloting a Martin PBM C3 in heavy weather. The models were commissioned by the pilot’s parents, who collaborated with Eric Sloane in developing the models to teach principles of weather systems.
See photographs of all the models on display, learn how they are connected to the Museum of Natural History in New York, and how excited we are to have solved a bit of a mystery by visiting weatherhillfarm.com/research-2/.
To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, click here. While you’re there, please consider supporting our work by making a donation online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.

Eric Sloane’s “Radar Weather Detector” in Hayden Planetarium, NYC

“Radar Weather Detector”. Another photograph of a model of the atmosphere that Eric Sloane built as a series in memorial to Lieutenant Joseph Prentice Willetts (30 September 1918 – 28 August 1943), U.S. Navy pilot who was killed in a training exercise piloting a Martin PBM C3 in heavy weather. The models were commissioned by the pilot’s parents, who collaborated with Eric Sloane in developing the models to teach principles of weather systems.
See photographs of all the models on display, learn how they are connected to the Museum of Natural History in New York, and how excited we are to have solved a bit of a mystery by visiting weatherhillfarm.com/research-2/.
To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, click here. While you’re there, please consider supporting our work by making a donation online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.

Eric Sloane Mural at the Morton Salt Headquarters Building, Chicago

How would you like to come into work or your home office and have this behind your desk? Mural by Eric Sloane, N.A., c. 1960, for the President of the Morton Salt Company.
To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, please click here. While you’re there, please consider supporting our work by making a donation online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.

Eric Sloane Cirrus Sunset for The Santa Fe Opera Company

“Cirrus Sunset”, by Eric Sloane, N.A., featured on the 1992 season promotional poster for The Santa Fe Opera Company. Eric Sloane generously donated his time, money, and talents to multiple causes over the course of his life, The Santa Fe Opera being but one of many.

To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, please click here. While you’re there, please consider donating online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.

Eric Sloane Coffee Percolator from Delano Studios featuring “The Brook”

Had your coffee yet? For those experienced enough to remember, this is a coffee percolator. This one has a colorized black and white pen and ink drawing by Eric Sloane entitled “The Brook”. Between about 1950-1970, Delano Studios of Long Island, New York produced many household pieces using the illustrative work of Eric Sloane. These items have become quite popular over the last few years.
A Delano Studios catalog complete with pages that contain works by Eric Sloane, can be viewed at weatherhillfarm.com – just clink the “research on Eric Sloane” button.

Eric Sloane’s Early Placements

On 18 June 1968, Connecticut Governor John Dempsey announced that Eric Sloane would donate his early American tool collection to the state of Connecticut. True, Eric’s fascination with early American tools began c. 1952 after his purchase of an 18th century farmhouse in Brookfield, Connecticut. Yet it was Eric’s “placements” – consisting of early American hand tools and several early 19th century almanacs mounted to an antique barn board backing – where the artist synthesized his conception of tools as an art form. From Wil Mauch’s “Symbols of American Spirit: 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum”, used by permission.

To learn more about the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum and our mission to assist in the preservation and interpretation of the Eric Sloane Museum and its collection, please visit the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum homepage. While you’re there, please consider donating online to our new Hands-on! classroom project.