Frederick Blakeslee

Frederick Blakeslee (December 4, 1898 - March 5, 1973) was an American illustrator.

Biography

He was born in Buffalo, New York, to Bertha and Harland Manley Blakeslee, and had a sister, Helen, born in 1908.

When Blakeslee was 12 years old, Glenn Curtiss started a flying school in Buffalo, and in 1915 opened an aeroplane factory near Blakeslee's home. Blakeslee worked for Curtiss as an assistant draughtsman in the design department, and was able to join test flights and lean more about the planes. He took night classes at Albright Art School in draughting and design skills, and also learned color theory and composition from teaches such as Lucius W. Hitchcock and Edward Dufner. Blakeslee's goal was to become an aviation, but he had to take introductory classes in drawing human figures.

He registered for the national draft on September 12, 1918, but the war ended soon afterwards and he was never inducted. Curtiss reorganized his business once the war was over, and Blakeslee became a designer for the Curtiss-Sperry Company. He studied at the Pratt Institute and qualified in 1926 as a professionally certified draftsman. While there he studied under Harold Winfield Scott, and made friends with several others who became well-known illustrators, including Walter M. Baumhofer and Rudolph Belarski. By 1927 he began taking on freelance art work, and then was commissioned to create the book jacket for Ernest Miltion's first novel, To Kiss the Crocodile.

By 1929 Blakeslee was painting pulp covers. His first was a cover for War Stories. At around this time he got engaged to Lorna Jones, but she contracted tuberculosis and the wedding had to be delayed until after two years of treatment. They were married on Jun 21, 1930.

During the 1930s Blakeslee was creating covers for most of the pulp magazines that focused on aviation. His closest business relationship was with Henry Steeger of Popular Publications, and from the mid 1930s most of Blakeslee's work was sold to Popular. From 1943, when Popular acquired Railroad Magazine, Blakeslee also began painting steam trains.

As the pulp market died Blakeslee decided to take a desk job as he needed more income. He was hired by Sperry Gyroscope, in Lake Success on Long Island, to create technical drawings from engineering specifications.

Blakeslee died of a heart attack on March 5, 1973. Lorna survived him dying on March 29, 1978. They had no children.

Sources

• Saunders, Frederick (Spring 2008). "Frederick Blakeslee (1898-1973)". Illustration. pp. 16–50.