High School (former) Murals – Stamford CT

Description

Seven New Deal murals covering 1,000 square feet, were commissioned in 1934 for the Stamford, Connecticut High School’s music room. They were painted under the auspices of the Treasury by James Daughtery (1887-1974), a well known modernist painter and illustrator. Daugherty conceived the Stamford panels to show a progression of history, using people from many ethnic groups taking part in education, sports, industry, science and the arts. He used local teachers and students as models.
The murals were cut into 30 pieces and thrown into the trash by workmen during a 1970 school renovation. A former student found the mural remnants in a dumpster on a heap of construction debris and rescued what he could. They were restored over a 16 year period by New York art conservator Hiram Hoelzer, who eventually became their owner. He subsequently sold two of them to private collectors in California. The city bought four murals back from Hoelzer in 2002 for $400,000. One is now mounted in the library of the University of Connecticut’s Stamford campus and another is in the Ferguson Public Library. A third, “Sports,” hangs in the High School’s Media Center and a fourth remains in storage until funding is secured to restore it.