Jacob Eichholtz (1776-1842) - Find a Grave Memorial

Artist. A prolific self-taught early American painter, he was best known for his Romantic Victorian traditional portraits. The son of a tavern owner who served in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, he received his basic education at Franklin College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He then apprenticed as a coppersmith and worked as a tinsmith, and in 1805 he opened a business manufacturing kitchen household items. He was attracted to drawing from an early age and in 1808 he started to devote his time to painting to the point where he was able to support his family selling portraits. In late 1811 he travelled to Boston, Massachusetts where he worked under the tutelage of famed American artist Gilbert's Stuart. In 1815 he sold his tinsmith business and became a full-time artist and was soon engaged in commission work, painting portraits in Baltimore, Maryland, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and other places. In 1823 he moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where he continued his work and exhibited with the Society of Artists at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. In 1830 he returned to Lancaster and continued painting there until his death at the age of 65. During the course of his career, he painted over 800 portraits, many of prominent people in Pennsylvania society circles, including a young future US Congressman Thaddeus Stevens and future US President James Buchanan. A number of his works reside in art museums and historical societies throughout the US, including the Smithsonian Art Museum and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Originally interred at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in Lancaster, in the early 1850s his remains were removed and reinterred in the new Woodward Hill Cemetery.

Bio by: William Bjornstad