Francis Seth Frost, often referred to (incorrectly) as Francis Shedd Frost, was born in West Cambridge, MA, in late April 1825 to Anstress Trow, a native of Mont Vernon, NH. Whether Frost had any artistic training is unknown, but he clearly was painting by the late 1840s. In 1853 Frost climbed to the Tip Top House on Mount Washington, establishing himself as one of the first visitors to the White Mountains. His first known painting, View of Tuckerman’s Ravine, was exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum’s spring 1854 exhibition. For the next half century, Frost traveled throughout New England, the Hudson River Valley, and the Western United States producing an extensive, now mostly lost, collection of paintings.
He was a founding member of the Boston Art Club and painted in the Rocky Mountains with Albert Bierstadt in 1859. Contrary to popular myth, Bierstadt did not abscond with Frost’s wife. By 1859, Frost had been married to his wife of 53 years, Almira, for ten years.
In the 1850s and early 1860s, Frost’s artistic reputation seemed fixed. He was known familiarly in the press as “Frost” and was referred to in casual company with Champney, Gerry, Shattuck, and others. He exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum from 1854 to 1864. But, in the late 1860’s his eminence receded and, in 1990, only seven paintings by Frost were documented in the Inventory of American Paintings at the Smithsonian Institution.
Frost died in Arlington, MA, in 1902. He is buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, MA.
Images of Francis Seth Frost
Francis Seth Frost (1825-1902)
Francis Seth Frost (1825-1902)
Reference
Francis Seth Frost (1825-1902), Beyond Bierstadt’s Shadow