Frederick Meyer
Frederick Meyer | |
---|---|
1st President of Spencer Macky | |
Personal details | |
Born | Frederick Heinrich Wilhelm Meyer November 6, 1872 near Hamelin, German Empire (now Lower Saxony, Germany) |
Died | January 6, 1961 Oakland, California, United States |
Spouse | Laetitia Summerville (m. 1902–?) |
Alma mater | Prussian Academy of Arts Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art |
Occupation | Founder of California College of the Arts, academic administrator, educator, furniture craftsmen |
Frederick Heinrich Wilhelm Meyer (November 6, 1872 – January 6, 1961), was a German-born American designer, academic administrator, and art educator, who was prominent in the
Early years
Meyer was born on November 6, 1872, near Hamelin, German Empire (now Lower Saxony, Germany), into a family whose occupations were dominated by furniture craftsmen and weavers. He apprenticed as a cabinetmaker before he immigrated in 1888 to Fresno, California, where he worked in a large commercial nursery.[2]
In about 1890, he enrolled at the Cincinnati Technical School, and two years later transferred to the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art.
On November 7, 1893, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States of America. In the spring of 1895 he traveled to Germany, completed the program at the Royal Academy of Berlin for Fine Arts and Mechanical Sciences (also known as the Prussian Academy of Arts), and returned to the Pennsylvania Museum and School, where he was awarded a master's degree.[3]
Career
Between 1898 and 1902 Meyer held the post of Supervisor of Art for the public schools in
In October 1905 he was elected president of the California Guild of Arts and Crafts and his wife became its treasurer; they held both positions for two years.[5][6] After the devastating San Francisco earthquake and fine in April 1906, which destroyed the Mark Hopkins Institute, he briefly traveled to Europe.
Founding of California Guild of Arts and Crafts
Meyer expressed his dream of a school that would fuse the practical and ideal goals of craftsmen, designers, and artists, integrated into both theory and practice.
Meyer founded the School of the California Guild of Arts and Crafts in June 1907 with its first location in the Studio Building, one block from the U.C. Berkeley campus. He had just $45 USD in cash, access to three classrooms and 43 students.
The following year his school was renamed the California School of Arts and Crafts (CSAC) and briefly relocated to the space over a billiard parlor. In 1910, to accommodate the ever-expanding student body, the CSCA took over the campus of the former Berkeley High School building (or Commercial High School) at 2119 Allston Way (at Grove Street, now Martin Luther King Way),[7] where they remained until their move in 1923–1924 to a larger facility in Oakland on Broadway.
The school was renamed the California College of Arts and Crafts (CCAC) in 1936.
Personal life
In Stockton, California, Meyer met and married in June 1902, Laetitia Summerville from Boston. The couple relocated that fall to Berkeley, California.
Meyer died at the age of 88, on January 6, 1961, in Oakland.[11]
References
- ^ Newspapers.com.
- ^ Berkeley Daily Gazette, 5 November 1952, p. 27.
- ^ ISBN 9781467545679. An online facsimile of the entire text of Vol. 1 is posted on the Traditional Fine Arts Organization website ("Jennie V. Cannon: The Untold History of the Carmel and Berkeley Art Colonies, vol. One, East Bay Heritage Project, Oakland, 2012; by Robert W. Edwards". Archived from the originalon 2016-04-29. Retrieved 2016-06-07.).
- ISBN 978-0-7649-4803-9.
- ^ The Courier (Berkeley, CA), 22 December 1906, p. 13.
- ^ San Francisco Call, 28 April 1907, p. 42.
- ^ "Glance by California College of the Arts". issuu.com. October 10, 2007. pp. 8–9. Retrieved 2024-03-27 – via Issuu.
- ^ a b CCAC the Art College in the Community. the Press of the California College of Arts and Crafts. pp. 5–6, 14. Retrieved 6 January 2022.
- ^ http://www.cca.edu/about/history History of California College of the Arts
- ^ CCAC the Art College in the Community. the Press of the California College of Arts and Crafts. pp. 16–17.
- Newspapers.com.