Francis Quirk

Francis J. Quirk
Self-portrait By Francis J. Quirk

Francis James Quirk (June 3, 1907 – February 5, 1974) was an American artist, educator, museum curator and TV personality. He is best known for his paintings of Edgar Lee Masters and Carl Sandberg, as well as his affiliation with Lehigh University as a professor and curator.

Francis Quirk was born on June 3 1907 in Providence, Rhode Island. His parents Edward and Anne (née O’Neil) lived on 30 Waldo Street in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. He was the second of five children the others being an older brother Edward, a younger brother Henry, younger sister Anna M. and younger sister Helen M. Two of his father’s brothers Henry and Frank also lived with them according to the 1910 census.

Quirk completed his undergraduate work at the Rhode Island School of Design where he was the co-founder of a short-lived student humor publication, The Salamander. He completed his certificate in 1929 and his post graduate work in 1930. He would later continue post-graduate studies in 1941-1942 at the University of Pennsylvania. Biographies also list him as training in Provincetown, Massachusetts, Woodstock, New York, France and Italy although the exact circumstances of these studies are not yet known.

Quirk started out as an art teacher from 1930 until 1935 at the Montgomery School, for boys in grades 1-12 in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. In 1943 The School went co-ed and later moved to Chester Springs, Pennsylvania. While teaching at the School Quirk was quite active outside the classroom and establishing himself as a talented artist.

In 1932, Quirk successfully competed for a coveted spot at the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation that allowed him to spend three months at Tiffany’s estate at Laurelton Hall in Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island. Judges for the competition included impressionist painter Child Hassam and sculptor Daniel Chester French who sculpted the seated Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C,