Rachael Robinson Elmer

Rachael Robinson Elmer (July 28, 1878 – February 13, 1919), also seen as Rachel Robinson Elmer, was an American artist from Vermont, who gained notability as a painter of postcards of New York City, which "changed the world of American postcards". Early life and education Rachael Robinson was born in 1878 at her parents' Rokeby farm in Ferrisburg, Vermont. (The family home is a National Historic Landmark.). She was from an artistic family: her father Rowland Evans Robinson was an author and illustrator, her mother Anna Stevens Robinson a painter. Her grandparents, Rachel Gilpin Robinson (1799-1862) and Rowland Thomas Robinson (1796-1879), were active abolitionists and founders of the Vermont Anti-Slavery Society, who made Rokeby a stop on the Underground Railroad. Beginning in 1891, at twelve years old, Rachael began taking a correspondence drawing course through the Chautauqua Society of Fine Arts. The Chautauqua Society of Fine Arts was founded in 1874. Their correspondence format became widespread in the United States between the 1870s to the 1930s. Still active today, the society made art education accessible to thousands of Americans around the country through distance learning. She studied under artist and art critic Ernest Knaufft until 1895. When Rachael took the course, it cost $5 a year.