Circa 1940s drawing of Edgerton Highway and Copper River by Olive Malstrom Carl
I came across this while going through a box of drawings. I bought it at a rummage sale years ago for a few dollars.
The artist is Olive Malstrom Carl, who was a well-know painter in the Pacific Northwest. The following bio is from the book, Women Artists of the American West.
Born in Tacoma, Washington, Olive Carl was a painter in oil and watercolor of landscapes, seascapes, marines, still lifes, portraits, and old buildings of the Northwest such as “Cabin at the Edge of the Mountain’, and “Haunted House on the Whiskaw”.
She was raised in Tacoma, and while working in her father’s drug store, did sketches of customers. At age 18, in 1916, moved to Seattle where she studied at the Seattle School of Art and at the Seattle Art Musuem. She married Emil Henry Carl Jr. in 1924 and took time off from her career to start a family. But in the 1930s, she returned to painting seriously and in 1935 opened the Olive Carl School of Art, which remained in operation until 1974.
Seattle remained her home throughout her life until her death in 1988, but she traveled extensively including 17 trips to Alaska, to Canada, Europe and South America. She exhibited regularly and had 150 one-person exhibits, which included the Frye Art Museum and the Washington State Historical Society.
On the back of the drawing is the notation, “‘Biffy’ – outside toilet near Lower Road House enroute Chitina & near Liberty Falls.” The roadhouse mentioned may have been the Lower Tonsina Roadhouse.
