The fine sporting dog paintings of Edwin Megargee had frankly eluded my art education until 1970 when someone gave me an attractive three page pull-out from an old Life Magazine showing dozens of dogs and their breed lines, each dog depicted by an icon-sized watercolor. You guessed it, the dog portraits in this tree chart had been done by Edwin Megargee. Later, as I would read and see more of his art it became clear this man had enjoyed a highly successful career with a wide range of animal subjects - namely pure bred dogs, horses and domestic animals, realistically painted for both illustrations and private commissions .

Actually he was born S. Edwin Megargee Jr. in Philadelphia in 1883, later known in art circles as Edwin Megargee. He was the eldest son of twelve children, several of whom also became artists. Edwin’s father, a successful attorney, was an active sportsman - there were always gun dogs and hunting gear in the Megargee home. As youngsters often gain inspiration from family activities, Edwin loved drawing and would spend hours sketching animals; dogs, cats and birds of all sorts while stretched out on the living room floor.

“As a child I had a craze for drawing,” he would later tell Field and Stream writer Freeman Lloyd, “And in school I was punished for drawing while in class.” After a year at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and having convinced his father of his interest in painting, Edwin finally enrolled at the Drexel Institute in Philadelphia for four years of art, then furthered his studies at the Art Students League in New York City.

Megargee’s first job was as a newspaper artist - he was sent out to capture events in picture form just as news photographers do today. In 1912 he worked for a text book company where his first assignment was illustrating a textbook on domestic fowl. It is typical for budding artists not to immediately attain the highest ivory tower, but my guess is young Edwin applied his talents at full capacity. Also rather typical, the chicken illustrations led to further commissions including an atypical portrait of an imported champion Chester White pig.

Having moved to New York in 1919, Edwin soon set up a studio in Union Square, and just as A. B. Frost had earlier worked along side Thomas Eakins at Harpers Weekly, Lynn Bogue Hunt’s studio was just down the hall. Wouldn't you have liked to have been a fly on the wall back then and thrilled at their spirited, artful conversations, comparing bird dogs, shot guns and paintings?

Megargee’s son, Edwin I. “Ned” Megargee, told me recently how his father’s career weathered the depression, helped, fortunately, by two magazines, “Country Life ran a long series on domestic animals, large full page illustrations. And Field and Stream’s series “Shooting Prints”, showing the various hunting sports, upland bird hunting, water fowling, etc., each in subsequent issues, was later published in a portfolio My dad even painted a number of portraits of nearby parish priests in this period.”

Fishing and hunting at every chance, his trips along the shore and up into New England and Canada sharpened his picture sense. His father-in-law, Charles T. Inglee, also a sportsman, bred champion Gordon Setters whose line originated at the Duke of Gordon’s castle in Scotland. Inglee also provided a separate home for the newly wed Megargee’s at his country property in Greenbrook Township in New Jersey. Megargee himself bred Scottish Terriers and was active in show dog judging, for which he was licensed, and held offices in the American Kennel Club and several of its affiliates. To this well credentialed artist/dog person, breeding was becoming everything.

As for his approach to painting, Megargee was very comfortable in oils, water color and drawing - he even did etchings, aquatints and several bronzes. While Megargee painted many different domestic animals, he is best remembered for his depictions of pedigree dogs. This work, however, was almost totally based on his thorough familiarity with the anatomy of each animal and breed that he dealt with. He was not dependant on photography for source material, as were so many painters. William Secord, whose gallery had a one man show of Megargee’s art work last February, told me, “Megargee did not use a camera for he had his own way of working with dogs directly, and had a remarkable connection with animals. He could somehow calm them to where they would actually hold a pose for a suitable length of time.”

Megargee’s output in the coming years was extraordinary. In step with the growing post World War I advertising and publishing markets, he would come to paint countless advertisements and illustrate over twenty books, authoring several himself, some published by the prestigious Derrydale Press,. His painting of a Husky promoted Fleischman’s dry gin and In 1935 his portrait of the 1934 Kentucky Derby winner, “Cavalcade”, graced the cover of the official Derby Program. He began issuing shooting dog prints, and his paintings appeared repeatedly in such periodicals as Country Life, Hunting and Fishing and Field and Stream. Three paintings of large hounds were featured in a 1954 National Geographic magazine, but a much more familiar Megargee dog was the original Greyhound Bus emblem which he designed.

Edwin illustrated the book, Retriever Gun Dogs, History, Breed, Standards and Training and his still popular folio of six hunting dog prints, Gun Dogs at Work, with text by Freeman Lloyd was published in 1945 by Field and Stream. In it is a photograph of a dapper but sober looking Edwin at his easel in his Union Square studio, brush in hand, wearing a smock and tie. (His son Ned says the expression masks his dad’s marvelous sense of humor.) Published in 1954 by World Publishers, The Dog Dictionary, which he wrote and illustrated, was probably the most comprehensive, difficult and time consuming of all of his book projects.

Looking at the works of Edwin Megargee, especially his dog art, one can see an interesting common denominator. These paintings fulfill his very strong feeling that pure bred animals should be depicted in a way which would explain their basic purpose - the activities for which they were bred. To him, each dog painting should feature the standards for which breeders strived, owners utilized and judges hoped to see.

Paraphrasing a paragraph Megargee wrote for the Scottish Terrier Club of America, which plainly states his philosophy, “The standard is not a set of arbitrary requirements formulated to satisfy the whims of fashion. Rather it was written to preserve and perfect a particular type of dog, bred for a very definite purpose. There are definite reasons for every line of the standard.” I would think Megargee would be sadly shocked at the changes in breeding today, especially those apparently done just for looks.

As he painted his dogs, each breed would in turn dictate its own setting - for instance, most of the hunting breeds were done in a warm autumn color scheme, while his Alaskan Malamute is seen in appropriately cool blue colors. The stance was equally important as was the lighting - usually with the light coming from one side just enough to clearly define the anatomy. When in this “mode” he would not be detoured and had little interest in complicated hunting scenarios or romantic landscapes.

For much of his work, I believe Edwin Megargee the painter was always part Edwin Megargee the breeder and part pure bred dog show judge, and this amount of his immense output was a form of extremely well done cataloging. He was to dogdom what Roger Tory Peterson was to bird art - the lure of emotional expression was deferred in order to illustrate and confirm.

Edwin Megargee and his art are unique in that respect - his mission was a celebration of breeding without compromise. His paintings, both illustrations and private commissions, were warm and attractive, solidly painted, simply designed but accurate in detail. He had followed his own road towards works which will remain instructive, collectible and a pleasure to view by means of his own enormous energy and singleness of purpose. As he himself once said, “Early in my career I determined to portray animals as they actually are.”

Special thanks to the artist’s son, Edwin I. “Ned” Megargee; William Secord, The William Secord Gallery, NYC; and Stephen and Cinnie O’brien, The Stephen B. O’brien Gallery, Boston.
More illustrations of Megargee’s work may be seen in the elegant and informative book, “A Breed Apart”, by William Secord. .. could be cut(Megargee illustrated two books published by Denlinger, Washington D. C, A Blueprint of the Collie, 1945. and followed in 1946 by The Complete Collie).