Eric Sloane

Eric Sloane (born Everard Jean Hinrichs) (27 February 1905 – 5 March 1985) was an American landscape painter and author of illustrated works of cultural history and folklore.

Eric Sloane was born in New York. As a child, he was a neighbor of noted sign painter and type designer Frederick W. Goudy. Sloane studied art and lettering with Goudy. While he attended the Art Students League of New York, he changed his name because George Luks and John French Sloan suggested that young students should paint under an assumed name so that early inferior works would not be attached to them. He took the name Eric from the middle letters of America and Sloane from his mentor's name.

In the summer of 1925, Sloane "ran away from home" at 20, having squandered (he felt) his inheritance from his father. Working his way across the country as a sign painter, he created advertisements for everything from Red Man Tobacco to Bull Durham. Unique hand calligraphy and lettering became a characteristic of his illustrated books.

Sloane eventually returned to New York City and settled in the Merryall area of New Milford, Connecticut, where he began painting rustic landscapes in the tradition of the Hudson River School. In the 1950s, he began spending part of the year in Taos, New Mexico, where he painted western landscapes and particularly luminous depictions of the desert sky. In his career as a painter, he produced over 15,000 works. His fascination with the sky and weather led to commissions to paint works for the U.S. Air Force and the production of a number of illustrated works on meteorology and weather forecasting. Sloane is even credited with creating the first televised weather reporting network, by arranging for local farmers to call in reports to a New England broadcasting station.

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