Auntie Mason and Her Husband

lithograph, 1923-24, signed and titled in pencil, also signed in pencil by the printer Bolton Brown, edition of 51. 10 x 9''

Mason 180

Condition: Very good condition

Provenance:

Private collection- Chagrin Falls OH

The subjects of the lithograph are Cynthia and Henry Mason, near neighbors of George BellowsSr’s family in Columbus and fellow congregants at the 3rd Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church.Oddly, both Henry and Cynthia died in the Bellows house at 265 E Rich St. Henry passed in1871 during a brief stay while his wife was out of town. Cynthia became increasingly feeble latein life and lived with the Bellows, dying in their home in 1898.Cynthia Mason was not a Bellows relation. Here, Auntie is being used as an honorific, “ageneral term of respect for (usually older) women” (OED). The Masons were childless, and itseems that some of Cynthia’s personal effects remained with the Bellows. This included anambrotype of the couple, now in the possession of Bellows descendants, and from which thelithograph was derived.Columbus Evening Dispatch Tuesday, Jul 26, 1898 , page 6