Thomas Gibbs Moses timeline

BORN: July 21, 1856 Liverpool, England

DIED: March 17, 1934 Oak Park, IL

MARRIED: October 30, 1878 Susan E. Robbins of Sterling

TRAINING

Sterling, Illinois public schools (primary/secondary)

1881-1883 Chicago Academy of Fine Arts[1] renamed Art Institute of Chicago

New York, Roswell Morse Shurtleff

ART RELATED EMPLOYMENT

1871-1872 Scene painter, McVickers theater, Chicago[2]

1873[3]-1880 Almini Company, Chicago

1880-1934 Sosman & Landis, theatrical scenery (specialty in Masonic), partner 1904, vice president and later president 1914[4]

1893 Electricity Building exhibit, World’s Columbian Exposition[5]

1893 Painted scenic background for A Day in the Alps, Electric Scenic Theatre, World’s Columbian Exposition[6]

[1]Prospectus and Catalogue of the Schools of the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts, 1882-83, “Names of Pupils,” [p.13], AIC Scrapbooks, Vol. 3, n.p. This also confirmed his Chicago residence.

[2]“Thomas Moses Stage Artist For Booth, Dies,” Chicago Tribune, 3/18/1934, p.22.

[3]“Paint Mimic Scenes,” Sunday Inter Ocean, 2/28/1886.

[4]Some of this information found in Thomas Moses, “Stage Scenery How It is Painter,” The Palette & Chisel, Vol. IV, September 1927, pp.1, 3. Also information courtesy of Gene Meier who provided an adaptation from Harry Miner’s American Dramatic Directory for the Season 1884-1885. For further information see: Randy G. Frank, “The Sosman and Landis Studio, A Study of Scene Painting in Chicago 1900-1925,” MFA Thesis, University of Texas at Austin, May 1979. On p.75 he recounts Moses became president in 1917 after Joseph Sosman died.

[5]He created a mock stage in miniature to show the effects of stage lighting stating the ½ hour show would have people waiting in one hour lines to view. Thomas Moses, “Stage Scenery How It is Painted,” The Palette & Chisel, Vol. IV, December 1927, p.8.

[6]Moses worked on many backgrounds for exhibits at the World’s Fair, including A Street in Cairo, and others.