Rural Charms and Rural Scene

These two decorated pages were part of a sketchbook executed by Betsy Lewis in 1801. Other pages from this book are illustrated and discussed in American Anthem as part of the Ralph Esmerian gift to the American Folk Art Museum (Lee Kogan in Stacy C. Hollander and Brooke Davis Anderson, American Anthem (New York, 2001), figs. 22a-d, pp. 304-305). Betsy Lewis was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1786 to James and Hannah Pierce Lewis. She attended the Ladies Academy in Dorchester where she completed the sketchbook. The first forty-seven pages of this book were intended to memoralize the death of George Washington (Hollander, p. 304). At the lower right of Rural Charms, Lewis expressed this sentiment in a drawn memorial initialed GW as well as in the patriotic exclamation MAY AMERICA BE FREE FOREVER bordering the text.