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Artist
John Trumbull, 6 Jun 1756 - 10 Nov 1843
Sitter
Benjamin Silliman, 8 Aug 1779 - 24 Nov 1864
Date
1825
Type
Painting
Medium
Oil on wood
Dimensions
Panel: 48.9 x 40 x 1.3cm (19 1/4 x 15 3/4 x 1/2")
Frame: 67.3 x 58.4 x 8.3cm (26 1/2 x 23 x 3 1/4")
Topic
Benjamin Silliman: Male
Benjamin Silliman: Law and Crime\Lawyer
Benjamin Silliman: Science and Technology\Scientist
Benjamin Silliman: Literature\Writer\Scientific writer
Benjamin Silliman: Education and Scholarship\Educator\Lecturer
Benjamin Silliman: Education and Scholarship\Educator\Professor\University
Benjamin Silliman: Education and Scholarship\Founder\College
Benjamin Silliman: Science and Technology\Scientist\Naturalist
Benjamin Silliman: Science and Technology\Scientist\Chemist
Benjamin Silliman: Science and Technology\Scientist\Earth scientist\Geologist
Portrait
Credit Line
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Alice Silliman Hawkes
Restrictions & Rights
CC0
Object number
NPG.68.6
Exhibition Label
Born North Stratford (Trumbull), Connecticut
Benjamin Silliman was one of the earliest advocates for science in the United States. After his appointment as Yale College’s first professor of chemistry and natural history in 1802, he became a renowned educator, a popular public lecturer, and a founder of both the American Journal of Science (1818), where he was also an editor, and the National Academy of Sciences, which was established in 1863. Silliman was particularly active in the fields of minerology and geology and, as a devout evangelical Christian, argued that recent geological discoveries were reconcilable with biblical teachings about creation.
John Trumbull, Silliman’s uncle by marriage, painted this portrait in New York City, where Silliman was raising money to purchase the finest mineral collection in the United States for Yale. The scientist spent an hour and a half posing for Trumbull one morning before breakfast. He recorded that the artist “painted very rapidly.”
Provenance
Maria Trumbull Silliman [Mrs. John Church], daughter of sitter; her granddaughter Angelica Schuyler Church; between 1915 and 1920 purchased by her cousin Alice Silliman Hawkes, Port Washington, N.Y.; gift 1968 to NPG.
