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M. Knoedler & Co. 14 East 57th Street, 1900 |
Like many commuters, Norman
Wells traveled by train between the suburbs and the city for nearly 50 years.
It was just a half-hour ride from his hometown, Mount Vernon, N.Y., to
Manhattan.
On Valentine’s Day, 1939, he left work on East 57th Street and walked over to Grand Central Terminal, probably stopping to pick up a box of chocolates or a bouquet of flowers for his wife Mathilde.
On the train, he suffered a heart attack and died. He was just 65.
At the time of his death, Norman Freeman Wells had achieved success that far exceeded his family’s expectations.
He and his wife Mathilde lived in a large stucco house on the fancier side of town. Their home was filled with art, and the couple traveled extensively.
Walter Wells, Norman’s father, descended from early English settlers. He had been a carpenter since boyhood. In the 1890s, he started building pedestals and managing display equipment at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
In 1897, Norman began his career at M. Knoedler & Co., art dealers with an impeccable reputation, specializing in Old Master prints and post-Impressionist art.
It’s not clear how Norman found his way to the gallery. He had no formal education in the field and must have been a quick study because he rose swiftly in the organization.
During the late nineteenth century, however, such a trajectory occurred more often than one might expect. As the antiquarian art market became increasingly competitive, enterprising young men sought entry-level jobs at shops and bookstores that dealt in maps, prints, and engravings.
Some started off sweeping floors. Those who prospered might eventually take over the store or go out on their own.
Originally, M. Knoedler & Co. was part of Goupil, Vibert & Cie, a Paris auction house that established a New York branch in 1848.* The branch’s founder, Michael Knoedler, eventually bought out Goupil. He left the gallery to his son Roland, who hired Norman as a clerk and promoted him quickly.
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Knoedler advertisement, 1905 |
In 1908, when Norman married a Mount Vernon girl, Mathilde Kelly, one of the Knoedler sons attended the wedding and the firm gave the couple a piano and music cabinet for their new home, a small frame house on N. High Street set on a corner lot with a stone barn.
Most of their years would be spent there, on the city’s west side, a largely German and Irish enclave. The neighborhood was their comfort.
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Mount Vernon, N.Y., 1900s |
Every summer, the Mount Vernon papers published an announcement that Mr. and Mrs. Norman F. Wells had sailed to Europe, where they would spend two months touring and Mr. Wells would conduct business.
Norman learned well from an older colleague, Charles Carstairs, who worked closely with such high-end art collectors as the industrialist Henry C. Frick and the financier J. P. Morgan, Sr. When Carstairs was sent off to establish Knoedler’s Pittsburgh branch and subsequently moved to London to direct that branch, he left room for Norman to flourish.
The younger man developed a friendship with Herbert Greer French, a vice president at Proctor & Gamble, whom he advised on purchases of Old Masters prints. Eventually, this multitude formed the core of the Cincinnati Art Museum’s fine prints collection.
At the time of his death, Norman was Knoedler’s secretary-treasurer. Many an artist inscribed and presented prints to him, which must have brought him great happiness.
What was his true passion, however?
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Knoedler Annual Dinner, 1907; Wells is among those standing. |
*Dates vary. In 1863, the
business officially became M. Knoedler & Co.
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