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William
Standing (1904 - 1951)
Fire Bear, son of Standing Rattle,
was born on the Fort Peck Indian
Reservation in 1904. Named William
Standing, he went to the University of
Oklahoma under the guidance of Oscar
Jacobson and graduated from the Haskell
Institute in Kansas in 1924. He worked
as an interior decorator in Kansas, and
was both a serious and humorous artist.
George Catlin met one of Standing's
ancestors, The Light, and painted him
wearing buckskins on one half of his
painting -- the other half showing
him attired in a top hat, dark blue
military uniform, and tight fitting
boots. August Knapp of Oswego's "Pioneer
Store" obtained art supplies for William
and many paintings were actually created
there. Standing made an
auspicious debut at the Great Falls Art
Exhibition in 1931, where he sold all
his paintings, and secured a number of
commissions, despite being completely
unknown before then. Standing died on
June 27, 1951, killed in an auto
accident outside of Zortman, Montana
when the car he was driving rolled over
three times. A fire in January of 1956
at the home of his widow, Nancy, at
Poplar, Montana, destroyed a collection
of his pictures. |
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