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Martha Susan Baker

American painter, muralist and teacher (1871–1911)

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionApr 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ21995239 ↗
Source-derived summary

Martha Susan Baker (December 25, 1871 – December 21, 1911) was an American painter, muralist and teacher born in Evansville, Indiana, United States.

Early life

Baker studied art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she later taught.

Career

She wrote and illustrated numerous articles for The Sketch Book: A magazine Devoted to the Fine Arts, published in Chicago.

Baker exhibited her work at the Illinois building at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois.

Baker painted one in a series of eight murals, begun in 1900, that were located on the tenth floor of the Fine Arts Building, located at 410 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago.

In 1903, she appeared on the “Jury of Selection” for the Annual exhibition of the Art Students League of Chicago.

Baker died in Chicago in 1911.

Works

referenced at unless otherwise noted.

Carl Van Vechten, portrait, Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven, Connecticut

Dr. Martin Henry Fischer, portrait, Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio

Mrs.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Martha Susan Baker” as american painter, muralist and teacher (1871–1911). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Martha, Susan and Baker.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1871, 1911, 1893, 1900—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1871-12-25. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Martha, Susan and Baker providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Martha Susan Baker”, the useful work is to connect “american painter, muralist and teacher (1871–1911)” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q21995239. VIAF identifies the subject as 16904239. The Library of Congress control number is no2003007496. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1871, 1911, 1893 and 1900.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Martha Susan Baker”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Martha Susan Baker primary sources, Martha Susan Baker archive and Martha research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Martha Susan Baker”?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Martha Susan Baker” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.