Alexander W. Drake
Westfield, New Jersey, 1843 - 1916, New York
found: World biog. information system, July 12, 2007 (Drake, Alexander Wilson; b.1843; d. 1916; occupation: engraver) p. 99 (Alexander W. Drake ... death in 1916)
found: New York Times, via WWW, Aug. 12, 2009 (Alex. Wilson Drake; art critic, collector and editor; leader in development of magazine art; as a young man apprenticed with William Howland and became a master wood engraver; b. Westfield, N.J.; d. 4 Feb. 1916, N.Y.)
Artist, illustrator, critic for Century.
A.W. DRAKE—ARTIST AND PASSIONATE COLLECTOR
In 1913, Sarah and Eleanor purchased ninety birdcages at auction in New York City. They paid $1,300 for this collection acquired over many years by artist and collector Alexander Wilson Drake (1843–1916). Born in New Jersey, Drake was a wood engraver who studied and taught at Cooper Union. He was the esteemed art editor of The Century Magazine for forty-three years and a founding member of both the Grolier Club and the Aldine Club.
Drake was noted as a zealous collector of “everything but money.” His home on East 8th Street in New York City overflowed with pewter, brass, and copper, as well as rings, bottles, silver boxes, prints, samplers, ship models, birdcages, and decorated bandboxes. There were occasions when he was forced to sell collections in order to start anew with other collections.
“COLLECT — if you would be happy — collect anything, everything!” begins a 1916 article in The House Beautiful by Lida Rose McCabe, who interviewed Drake about his cages before he died. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, bird cages were in vogue, prized as decorative accessories for the home. Through his love of birds, Drake began, as a boy, to collect homes designed for them.
“With birdcages as with all collecting,” said Drake, “the joy of the quest is not to be estimated in dollars or cents. To make collecting worth while, one must collect in large numbers.” Drake also found joy in designing table decorations, furnishing his birdcages with tiny plants and lanterns for the Aldine Club. His arrangements for a dinner honoring Mark Twain in 1900 were described as “remarkable.”
In 1913, ill health forced Drake to retire from The Century Magazine and to sell many of his collections. The American Art Galleries created a special catalog of his work. A friend of the Hewitt sisters, Drake made his cages available to Sarah and Eleanor, who were thrilled to purchase the collection for their museum. It was exhibited privately at their home at 9 Lexington Avenue to much acclaim, and then installed at the Cooper Union Museum where it enchanted students and visitors.
SOURCES
“Alexander Wilson Drake,” by Clarence Clough Buel, and “An Appreciation,” by William Fayal Clarke,” The Century Magazine, May 1916.
“Alexander Wilson Drake,” obituary, American Art News, June 1916.
Beer, Alice Baldwin. “Cooper Union Museum to Cooper-Hewitt Museum: Draft of the Continuation of ‘The Making of a Modern Museum,’” 1977. Smithsonian Institution Archive, Record Unit 547.
Cooper Hewitt Design Library. Appreciation to Elizabeth Broman for her research and assistance.
Garisto, Leslie, Birdcage Book. NY: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
McCabe, Lida Rose, “A Famous Collection,” The House Beautiful, July 1916.
Webster, Walter F. “Bird Cages” [Drake Collection], American Homes and Gardens, August 1913.
https://www.cooperhewitt.org/2017/02/01/cooper-hewitt-short-stories-alexander-drake/ I.S. 12/12/2017
Person TypeIndividual
Last Updated8/7/24
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