THE AMERICAN THANKSGIVING DAY SERVICE IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 1944
Artist:
Frank Beresford
Categories:
SUBJECTS >> COLLECTIONS >> Beresford Collection
Catalog Number:
1959.010
Location:
BLDG 2354/ 6TH FLOOR LIBRARY
Description:
When England's famed Westminster Abbey was turned over to the Americans in 1942 for their Thanksgiving Day Service, a nearly 900-year precedent was broken, for no other nation had ever been so honored. Nor had anyone, the artist stated, ever painted the Abbey. The following year, 1943, he started this painting, finishing it in 1945, the year in which the hostilities of World War II ended. Here, the viewer may see American Ambassador John J. Winant reading the Thanksgiving Day Proclamation from President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the 1944 ceremony.