Shades of Thomas Moran: From Bolton to the Wild Rocky Mountains

Thomas Moran was born and raised to parents of handloom weavers on Back Balshaw street, Bolton, Lancashire, but when the rapid industrialisation of nineteenth-century England mechanicalized the weaving process, his parents were forced out of their jobs. The whole Moran family, therefore, emigrated to Kensington, just outside Philadelphia, in the United States of America. At the age of sixteen, Moran became an apprentice to a Philadelphia wood engraving firm, Scattergood & Telfer. It was there where Moran discovered his talent for painting and drawing. Working diligently, Thomas began to take his skill seriously, both as a watercolourist and an illustrator, and with the support of his brother,  Edward Moran (who was also famous for his series of 13 historical paintings of United States marine history, which you can see, here), and an associate of the marine painter James Hamilton, Thomas’ passion as a budding artist grew.   

In early 1860, Thomas Moran travelled to Lake Superior, the northern edge of Wisconsin, USA, where he painted and sketched the landscape of the Great Lakes. Back in Philadelphia, Moran sold lithographs of the Great Lakes before setting off to London to see the works of the famed British landscape and marine painter, JMW Turner. Moran’s work so impressed the director of the National Gallery, that Moran was given a private room to work in. As William H. Truettner explains in his essay ‘“Scenes of Majesty and Enduring Interest”: Thomas Moran Goes West’, upon returning to the U.S., Moran wanted to ‘go west’ and continue his paintings but had to wait for the right opportunity. 

That same year Moran travelled to Denver and then north to see the Mountain of the Holy Cross-a massive mountain with a cross of snow on its side. The resulting painting became Moran’s chief contribution to the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876. Iconic in its union of wilderness and religion, The Mountain of the Holy Cross, became one of Moran’s best-known works. His reputation was established.  

Moran continued to travel widely during the following decades. He returned to Europe several times again following trails blazed by Turner. In 1883 he journeyed to Mexico. In later years he returned to the Grand Canyon and travelled more extensively in Arizona and New Mexico, producing several striking works of the pueblos at Acoma and Laguna. Extraordinarily productive, both as a painter and an etcher, Moran continued to work well into his eighth decade. At his death in Santa Barbara, California, in August 1926, he was memorialized as the “Dean of American Landscape Painters.”  

As a tribute to Thomas Moran, Bolton Museum and Library Service’s curator Matthew Watson, discusses one of Moran’s best-known works: Nearing Camp.

To discover the complete works of Thomas Moran, visit: www.thomas-moran.org