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The West Coast Magazine November 1907. Arizona Number.
[Los Angeles?, 1907.]. Oil on canvas, 20” x 15.25”, signed lower left. CONDITION: Very good. The original illustration for the cover of the November 1907 Arizona Number of The West Coast Magazine. Smith’s captivating composition juxtaposes the romantic figure of a cowboy astride his horse on a ridge with a gritty smelting plant in the background belching a large plume of smoke into the sky, capturing two phases of Arizona life and history. Born in Massachusetts, Langdon Smith (1870–1959) moved to Denver, Colorado with his family as a youth and later to Pasadena, California. After studying at the Los Angeles School of Art and Design, Smith ventured back east in 1895 and worked as an illustrator for the New York Herald. After two years, Smith moved back to California and between 1905–06 worked as a partner in the stage coach line between Mojave and Olancha. Between 1907 and 1912, Smith produced some twenty-two covers for The West Coast Magazine and illustrated many books. Beginning in 1915, he spent winters in his Los Angeles studio and the rest of the year in the Sierra Nevada town of Forest City, where he engaged in gold mining as well as painting. Working in oil, watercolor, and pen-and-ink, Smith is best known for his scenes of the Old West, mining life, and early California. He died in 1959 from an intestinal disorder at Miner’s Hospital in Grass Valley, California. Billing itself “an independent journal of thought and entertainment,” The West Coast Magazine ran from September 1906 to 1914, publishing articles on subjects of western interest as well as other topics. The magazine was edited by John S. McGroarty (1862–1944), a poet and Los Angeles Times columnist who also served two terms as a Democratic Congressman from California (1935–39). REFERENCES: “Langdon Smith” at askART online; The West Coast Magazine, Arizona Number, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Los Angeles: Grafton Company, Nov. 1907).
Item #4441
Price: $2,750.00