Wheeler Williams
1897-1972

Born in Chicago in 1897, he began his artistic studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago with the sculptor Albin Polasek.  Subsequently he attended Yale, and in 1922 he received a Master of Architecture degree from Harvard.  The academically accomplished Williams furthered his study of sculpture at the  École des Beaux-Arts in Paris under the tutelage of Jules Coutan.

Upon Williams’ return to the United States, he was commissioned to create sculptural groups for building pediments, fountains, and other public monuments throughout the country and beyond. His work echoed that of his teacher Coutan, who sculpted the group of figures above the entrance to Grand Central Terminal in New York City. Though Williams enjoyed creating animal subjects, his work was often narrative or allegorical, as in these two sculptures. Another use of the American Indian subject can be seen in his 1938 relief Indian Bowman at the United States Post Office, Canal Street Station, in New York City.