Need some genealogy help......

I have been trying to research an obscure PA artist by the name of John Upshur Dennis Pleasants (1877-1957). I found his grave and also found that the last name, Pleasants, was added after his mother remarried. When I get into researching John Upshur Dennis, I find some famous people with that name. I am guessing, they are all descendants of John Upshur Dennis (1793-1851) who was married three times and had 22 children.

I found that my artist's mother was Hannah Sharp Pleasants. I found a link showing she was married to John Dennis (no middle name), possibly in 1881. Any help in filling in the dots? Any and all information you can find about John Upshur Dennis Pleasants would be helpful. Thanks!

 

Not sure if these genealogists are correct, but I found a couple of sources saying he was born in 1882 rather than 1877:

http://www.pennock.ws/surnames/fam/fam72944.html

https://books.google.com/books?id=c...nepage&q="john dennis" "hannah sharp"&f=false


Right now I don't have time to look elsewhere, but you'll probably also get help from others.

 

Interesting..... His tombstome has 1877 on it. The 1882 date would make more sense if his parents married in 1881.

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=113587981

 

Here is his mother's, Hannah Sharpe Pleasants, grave. It says her first husband was John Upshur Dennis making your John originally a Jr. For some reason, I doubt his father was one of the notable John U. Dennis. It would be unusual for a son of a notable to use a different surname.
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/f...all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=113587832&df=all&

The Wistar Family Genealogy has Hannah daughter of William Lindsey And Sarah Sharp born 1859, marrying 1st John Dennis in 1881, and marrying 2nd Charles Pleasants in 1891.
https://books.google.com/books?id=c...Aw&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=Dennis&f=false

--- Susan

 

It would be nice if date of birth could be verified in a reliable source. Gravestones are not always reliable, since the information is given by other parties. On the other hand, the two genealogies I linked do not have any source citations, so we do not know where they got the information nor how reliable the sources were.

If the parents were married in 1881, though, that is a good clue.

Recently a very kind friend of mine found the gravestone for one of my great-grandfathers, and sent me a photo. The year of birth on the grave is one year later than he was actually born, and I have more than one document that gives his date of birth correctly.

 

Thanks for the help so far ....... The birth date of 1882 seems to be the correct one based on many different documents. I was able to find him in the 1910-1940 census records, living first in Philadelphia and later in Aldan, PA. Always listed as single and living first with his mother and later alone. I found one commercial poster he did for a dept. store so maybe was an illustrator. This is consistent with some of his other work I have seen. The search continues......

 

Just realized one of my links was to the same book,Wistar, Fig had a link to, sorry.

--- Susan

 

It looks like the contributor of the Find A Grave records is a researcher of the Sharp family. I wonder whether it would be worth contacting him?

Fig

 

In the 1900 census, he's 18, and his parents Charles and Hannah, married 19 years, est. married year 1881. That doesn't fit in with his being the son of Hannah's first husband.

 

I wouldn't take that at face value quite so quickly, janet. I've seen several mistakes of this kind in my own tree work.

In the 1910 when Charles is not in the household to give information to the enumerator, Hannah gives the number of years of her present marriage (her second) as 19 years yet again. Which means she and Charles would have married about 1891, not 1881. In addition, she provides the Maryland birthplace of John's father (Charles was born in Pennsylvania.)

 

Think that has to be a mistake. Other records report her marriage to John Dennis in 1881 and her marriage to Charles Pleasants in 1891.

I am pretty satisfied with the information found about his lineage. I wish I could find out more about his life. I searched some city directories to see if he was listed without any luck. I may not have found the best place to search so any help in this regard would be appreciated.

In case anyone is interested, here is what some of the artwork is like. The first is the commercial poster I found. It had been sold on ebay but the photo is no longer with the listing. I was able to find the pic on a site that saved it.


These others are watercolors that I bought recently.

 

I like his art!

 

I like his art also. I give up. I can't find a thing about him artist-wise other then pics of some of his work that you no doubt have seen. None of the sellers seem to know anything about him. I've seen a couple of your pieces that you have bought presumably on eBay from lake_lenape... someone like The Garden of the Gods. lake.... whatever also had the watercolors "Rocky Stairs" and "The Mountain Railroad." Saw the "Great Fire Sale" poster on the Ephemera website. Pyramid Studios Art Gallery website Artistexpo.com has "Soviet Iron Foundry" watercolor by him priced at $300! No doubt you have seen this also; however, in case not:
Bottom of the page.
http://www.artistexpo.com/antarttable.html

--- Susan

 

http://s1298.photobucket.com/user/G...Paintings by John U D Pleasants?sort=3&page=1

I don't remember getting Photobucket results very often in a Google search.

 

Yep .... Bought on ebay and am considering buying more. The iron foundry one being sold for $300.00 was bought from the same ebay seller. I would have bought it as well, had I seen it first. I had not seen the ones on photobucket, so good find. I seem to be the only one trying to put a name and history to this artist.

These paintings are indicative of my primary art interest. In particular, the industrial and more arts and crafts period ones hit a soft spot. Seem to be very early 20th century or just a bit earlier based on the style of the art and clothing depicted. The back-stamps are interesting and the artist obviously took some time and pride in producing these.

I think these are good examples of undervalued art that can be found. I thought about putting this in the good paintings under $50.00 thread but started a new one since I was seeking assistance. I really meant to put this in the general forum but it, somehow, ended up here. Mea culpa ...... Thanks to all who took the time to try and help (need a grateful emoticon!)

 

It seems fine here... or in the Art forum would have been another good place. Although you weren't talking about the artistic qualities of his work, the question was about an artist so it seems to fit.

 

No big deal about where we put things here ....... so much better than that other place