Interview with Eleanor Toews
Moving Image
Download as:
- Identifier
- 8072
- Description
- Raw footage of an interview with Seattle Public Schools Archivist Eleanor Toews about finding a lost Works Progress Administration (WPA) mural at West Seattle High School (WSHS).
The mural was painted in 1937 by Jacob Elshin and depicts the landing of the Denny Party at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. Elshin created several murals for the school's hallway entrance to the auditorium depicting scenes of early Seattle as part of a 1937 WPA-sponsored Federal Art Project. The lost mural was rediscovered in 2000 by an art teacher who informed Toews (who had been searching for the missing mural).
- Language:
- English
- Date created
- September 18 2001 No
- Coverage Date
- September 18 2001 No
- Series
- 3902-01: Seattle Channel Moving Images
- Produced
- Seattle
- Running Time
- 0:45:13
- Type
- Footage
- Note
- Seattle Public Schools Archives: After the discovery and restoration, the panels were on display at Seattle Center for a Seattle Sesquicentennial Heritage Expo November 12-13, 2001, with AKCHO.
- Seattle PI: The mural was painted in 1937 by Jacob Elshin, who was born in Russia in 1892 and fled his homeland after the Bolshevik revolution of 1917. He moved to Seattle in 1923.
- Seattle PI: As part of government relief efforts during the Depression, the national Works Progress Administration commissioned artists to undertake various public projects. Through a collaboration between the WPA, which paid Elshin, and West Seattle High, which supplied the paint and materials, Elshin covered three 5-by-9 panels in a style blending heroic realism and brightly colored impressionism.
- Citation
- Courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives, #8072, Series 3902-01.
- Related Items
- 8073: Interview with Chiara Carcano (is related to Moving Image)
13195: Lessons from the Past: The Lost Elshin Mural (is source of Moving Image) - Creator
- Seattle Channel (Television station)
- Speaker(s)
- Toews, Eleanor (archivist)
- Related People/Organizations
- Lycett, Peggy
Elshin, Jacob (painter)
Carcano, Chiara (conservator)
West Seattle High School
United States. Works Progress Administration
City of Seattle {USE}
Seattle Public Schools - Video Format(s)
- Carrier: DVCPRO (Box 54)
- Digital Format(s)
-
MPEG-4 (629 MiB)
Matroska (10 GiB) - Permissions
- Moving image content created by the City of Seattle is public record and does not require permission for use as it is a public record. To use content created by entities other than the City of Seattle, please contact the creator for permission. Please cite moving images materials “Courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives” with the item number if possible. The videos streaming here are a low resolution copy. If you require a higher resolution copy, please contact archives@seattle.gov.