Elisabeth Augusta Chant (1865-1947)

Elisabeth Augusta Chant was born in England in 1865.  Chant's family emigrated to the United States where they first settled in Hawley, Minnesota in 1873.  They eventually moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota where her father opened a meat market.  After serving as a nurse in the Spanish American War, Chant returned to Minneapolis to pursue her training as an artist.  She rented a studio and was active in the Minneapolis Art and Crafts Society.  In 1911, Chant moved to Springfield, Massachusetts, where she worked as a muralist and designer.  Elisabeth Chant's mode of dress and eccentric lifestyle became a concern to her family, and they had her committed against her will to a mental hospital in Rochester, Minnesota.  Upon her release, she continued to paint, traveling to the Far East and the Phillipines.  Chant returned to the United States in 1922 and settled in Wilmington, North Carolina.  She continued to live there until her death on September 21, 1947.

Information from Minnesota Impressionists, Rena Neumann Coen, 1996, Afton Historical Society Press