Charles Percy Parkhurst Papers, 1938-1990 (span), n.d.
| Oberlin College Archives
Administrative/Biographical History
Charles Percy Parkhurst (1913-2008) was born in Columbus, Ohio on January 23, 1913, and was raised in Oberlin, Ohio. He attended Williams College in Massachusetts (BA, 1935), Oberlin College (MA, 1938), and Princeton University (MFA, 1941). In addition to holding several professional posts, Parkhurst continued to study and conduct research in the field of art history for the entirety of his career, focusing primarily on color theory. He held several prestigious honors, including: the Graves Prize (1935); a Jacobus Fellowship (1940-1941); the Chevalier de le Legion d’Honneur de France (1947); a Ford Faculty Fellowship (1952-1953); and a Fulbright Grant (1956-1957).
After graduating from Princeton University, Parkhurst held the position of assistant curator at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. He served in the United States Navy during World War II and, owing to his curatorial experience, was assigned to the Roberts Commission. Otherwise known as the “Monuments Men,” the Roberts Commission, created by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1943, was charged with the preservation of cultural properties in war areas, the reclamation of stolen artwork, and returning cultural heritage to its prewar owners. In 1945, Parkhurst and other military officers from the Commission created controversy by signing the Wiesbaden Manifesto, which objected to the congressional proposal to bring reclaimed artwork to the United States.
After the war, Parkhurst accepted the position of assistant to the director at the Albright Art Gallery in Buffalo, a post he held from 1946 to 1949. In 1949, he returned to Oberlin as Professor of the History and Appreciation of Art and the Director of the Allen Memorial Art Museum (AMAM), the latter title also encompassing the position of the head of the Department of Fine Arts. Under Parkhurst’s tenure as director, the AMAM made some of its most important acquisitions and cemented its place as an important and well-respected art museum in the United States. Throughout his career, Parkhurst was an outspoken proponent of making museum collections accessible to students, and worked to broaden the scope of the AMAM’s holdings. Under his tenure, the AMAM promoted interdisciplinary study by curating exhibitions of interest to various programs of study, such as English, theology, sociology, geology, physics, chemistry, and psychology. The holdings of the AMAM increased substantially under Parkhurst’s directorship, from 3,971 items to 9,061.
In 1958, Parkhurst was elected president of the College Art Association of America (CAA), further raising the profile of the art programs and collections at Oberlin College. He also helped to found the Intermuseum Conservation Association (ICA) in 1952, which was housed at Oberlin College and was the first consortial art conservation organization of its kind in the United States. In 1955, Parkhurst was named chairman of the College and University Museums Committee of the CAA. His task was to curate an exhibition of artwork owned by colleges and universities in the United States, which then toured Europe in 1956. After traveling with the exhibition, Parkhurst proceeded to the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands, where he studied color theory and composition in paintings under a Fulbright Grant.
Parkhurst held his posts at Oberlin College until 1962, when he was appointed director of the Baltimore Museum of Art. Between 1966 and 1968, he worked on a project to develop a system by which to accredit museums. The American Alliance of Museums, formerly the American Association of Museums, began offering opportunities for accreditation in 1971. Parkhurst moved from Baltimore to Washington, D.C. in 1970 in order to become the assistant director and chief curator at the National Gallery of Art. He retired in 1983, whereupon he taught at Williams College and Smith College.
Parkhurst married Elizabeth Huntington Rusling in1938, and the couple had three children: Andrew, Christopher, and Brucie. Parkhurst remarried in 1962 to Rima Zevin Julyan, and together they had one child, Brooke Woodbridge, as well as three children from Julyan’s previous marriage. Parkhurst married again in 1986 to Carol Clark. He died on June 25, 2008.
Sources Consulted
“About,” ICA Art Conservation, accessed March 6, 2018.
http://www.ica-artconservation.org/about/.
“Accreditation,” American Alliance of Museums, accessed March 7, 2018.
http://www.aam-us.org/resources/assessment-programs/accreditation.
“Charles P. Parkhurst Art Conservation Fund,” Allen Memorial Art Museum,
accessed March 6, 2018.
http://www2.oberlin.edu/amam/CharlesP.Parkhurst_ArtConservationFund.htm
“Charles Parkhurst Chosen to Head Art Department.” Oberlin Times (Oberlin,
OH), May 5, 1949.
Grimes, William. “Charles Parkhurst, Who Tracked Down Looted Art, Dies at 95,”
New York Times, June 28, 2008. See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/28/arts/design/28parkhurst.html.
Author: Rebecca Sparagowski Forms of Material (links to similar genres) Administrative InformationFor additional files relating to Charles Parkhurst’s work at Oberlin College, see RG 9/3, the Allen Memorial Art Museum Records, particularly those records pertaining to the years 1949 to 1962. See also RG 28/3 for Parkhurst’s faculty file.
Documents relating to Parkhurst’s work with the Roberts Commission are held at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (finding guide: https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/gallery-archives/pdf/nga-ga-rg28mfaa-f-charlesparkhurstpapers.pdf) and the National Archives of the United States (finding guide: https://www.archives.gov/iwg/declassified-records/rg-239-monuments-salvage-commission).
The Baltimore Museum of Art holds records pertaining to Parkhurst’s directorship there (finding guide: https://artbma.org/documents/findingAids/BMA_DirectorsOfficeFindingAid.pdf?pdf=DirOfficeRecs), and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. hold records from his directorship there (Record Group 3, Office of the Deputy or Assistant Director).
The Charles P. Parkhurst Papers date from the late 1930s to 1990 and document Parkhurst’s teaching career, with particular emphasis on his time at Oberlin College (1949-1962). The material gives insight into his teaching methods and strategies, such as his focus on the historical context of artwork, visual recognition of artistic principles, and understanding artistic techniques. The papers are arranged into two series: 1. Teaching Materials and 2. Television Show Materials. The majority of the material is either handwritten or typewritten, although Parkhurst did use some printed material, such as newspaper articles. There are no photographs included in the collection, but there are other visual materials, such as photostats and study prints.
Series 1. Teaching Materials (4.13 lf)
Series 1 includes Parkhurst’s teaching materials from his various teaching positions. These materials relate primarily to architecture and the appreciation of visual art, and document Parkhurst’s teaching through syllabi, schedules, course procedures, lecture notes, quiz and exam papers, and student papers. The bulk of the material is included in Subseries 1, which comprises materials prepared for Oberlin College courses. The materials are organized by course. Subseries 2 comprises teaching materials from other institutions at which Parkhurst taught and is categorized by institution. Those categories are: Unidentified Institution (probably Williams College and/or Smith College); New York University; and Princeton University. Larger teaching materials include photostats of architectural elements, an article about Brunelleschi’s dome in Florence copied from Revista d’Arte, and study prints, all of which are housed in an oversize box (Box 7). Subseries 3 comprises student papers, and access to some of these materials is restricted.
Series 2. Television Show Materials (1.05 lf)
Series 2 reflects Parkhurst’s broadening interests in the form of materials used in developing a television program on art history called “Images and Realities”. The program aired in the late 1960s on WJZ TV, the then-ABC affiliate channel in Baltimore. In this public education project, Parkhurst covered such topics as the cave paintings at Lascaux, ancient Egyptian artwork, and paintings by Giotto. The material in this series, which focuses on the history of art, shows a different aspect of Parkhurst’s interest in art than the materials in Series 1, which emphasize the appreciation of art. In Subseries 1, Parkhurst’s notes for the episodes shed light on his process for developing the episodes and their content. Subseries 2 includes study prints which were used in the episodes and which exemplify the artwork and styles Parkhurst discussed in the episodes.
Series 3. Parkhurst Student Papers (0.21 l.f.)
Series 3 contains papers written by Parkhurst while studying for his master of art degree. These papers were written for classes taught by Clarence Ward, and include Parkhurst’s master’s examination. All of the papers are typed, and some include manuscript notations. These papers are restricted from copying.
Series 4. Writings (1 folder)
Comprises one booklet written by Parkhurst, “Light and Color,” in the Art Treasures of the World series published by Harry N. Abrams, Inc. in 1955.